Week 6, Day 1

Well, I missed several days of exercising, it was just too hot and muggy. And then I somehow threw my back out. Excuses, excuses, I know. I did do my mindfulness meditation, however.

For the body;
I walked just over 1 mile on the treadmill at 2.1 miles per hour and I will do the flexibility exercises after posting this.

For the mind:
I listened to several podcasts from The Classic Tales with B.J. Harrison, "The Lost Phoebe" by Theodore Drieser and Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Redheaded League".

For the spirit:
I spent some time with friends at a chicken barbeque.

Week 5, Day 3

For the body:
Thirty minutes on the treadmill, walking at 2.1 mph.

For the mind:
I stretched my brain muscles by beginning to learn my way around Facebook. I was invited to be friends there by my niece, Robyn, and my student intern, Rachel. I also found another niece who is living in Florida. I planted two flowers in my online "garden" there and will send flowers to Robyn when she accepts the garden invitation.

For the spirit:
Twenty minutes of mindfulness meditation (following the breath) sitting on my library futon between Zeke and Zak.

Week 5, Day 2

For the body:
Yesterday called for 1 set of 12 repetitions using a 2.5 pound weight of the following strength exercises: chest press with dumbells, low back extension, abdominal curls, bicep curls, tricep press, arm lateral raises and side leg lifts.

For the mind:
(OK, mind candy.) I'm deep into Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - disk 11 of 17 of the CD version. For more serious moments I've started reading Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson.

For the spirit:
Twenty minutes of mindfulness meditation (without the cat) on my cushion upstairs.

Week 5, Day 1

Harborfest brought about some dislocation in my exercise plan. Because I chose to attend the Blood, Sweat & Tears concert on Thursday and the fireworks on Friday, I missed doing a strength and a flexibility program. I believe I walked enough (to get to an excellent site for watching the fireworks) to count as 30 minutes of aerobic activity. (Photo credit: Kim Westcott, Cornerstone Media Solutions)

Last night I began week five of the program and did my 30 minutes of walking on the treadmill (while watching another House episode on my iPod). I also did the required flexibility exercises. Then it was time to go upstairs and sit on my meditation cushion with my cat, Zak, for 20 minutes of mindfulness meditation.

Week 2, Day 4

For the mind:
I found some time to read Garrison Keillor's The Writer's Almanac today and found the following entry:

It's the birthday of the literary critic and teacher Harold Bloom..., born in New York City (1930) to Jewish immigrants. His first language was Yiddish, and he started reading poetry in English before he'd ever heard English spoken. He didn't do well in high school but took the statewide Regents exams, got the highest score in the state, and that won him a scholarship to Cornell.

He went on to study literature at Yale in the 1950s at a time when there was a dress code. The students wore jackets and ties. Harold Bloom wore an old Russian leather coat and a pair of fisherman's trousers. He became famous at Yale for his great love of poetry. He memorized everything that he read. He could recite enormous, long poems.

As a professor at Yale and as a critic, Bloom has moved further and further away from the mainstream of literary criticism in this country. Most other critics look at literature as a product of history, politics, and society. Whereas Harold Bloom is one of the last who believes that great literature is a product of pure genius, and who believes that we should read not to learn about history or politics but to learn about the human soul.

In the last few years, he's begun writing books for general readers, believing that scholars have forgotten how to read for pleasure, and many of his recent books have become best-sellers, including Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human and How to Read and Why and Genius: A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary Creative Minds.

Now, I took a mandatory course in college entitled "Literary Criticism" that was the most deadly dull, excruciating exercise in futility that I can remember from my entire four years. To read that Professor Bloom had a completely different view of literary criticism, "...to learn about the human soul..." sparked enough interest in me to go online to the Pioneer Libary System and request his book, How to Read and Why. More to follow...

For the body:
Today is a rest day as the Solutions for Wellness exercise program slowly builds up over the next twelve weeks. Moderation in all things, I tell myself. And, indeed, my muscles were a bit sore from the strength training.

For the spirit:
After I post this, I'm going to set my meditation timer widget for twenty minutes and sit on my futon between Zeke, the basset, and Zak, the cat, and attempt to follow my breath. Wish me luck!

Week 2, Day 3

For the body:
Even with the humidity sky high, I managed to walk from my office in the jail to our main complex and back this afternoon, hurrying a bit because of thunder. Later that night I walked 15 minutes on the treadmll in the much cooler exercise area in my basement.

For the mind:
I listened to the episoide #69 podcast of This American Life entitled Dreamhouse and will delve back into further chapters of Beyond AI.

For the spirit:
I got about a third of the way through Gil Fronsdal's second introductory lecture on mindfulness meditation as well as sitting for 20 minutes. I should get extra points for that because my husband's newest toy, an HD LCD TV was installed on our television stand and the older, heavier TV was placed on my meditation cushion so as to not mar the hardwood floor. I went out to our gazebo with our basset, Zeke, instead. It was difficult staying focused when he just had to keep our property safe from marauding chipmunks by barking. I had my iPod with me to keep track of the time. I used the stopwatch function, which somehow seemed just wrong. Meditation shouldn't be measured down to hundreths of a second.

Week 2, Day 1

Today's exercise plan called for 30 minutes of aerobics and 10 minutes of flexibility exercises. I spent about two hours cleaning the house (vacuuming, scrubbing the floor, dusting, carting things down cellar, etc.) in an effort to get the house ready for company if my mother-in-law's family decided to spend some time at our house after celebrating her birthday at the Pleasant Beach Hotel in Fair Haven, New York. I'm going to say that doing that was at least the equivalent of walking on the treadmill for 30 minutes. I did the 10 minutes of stretching and managed to find the time to get in 20 minutes of mindfulness meditation today.