Writing and Being Zen

 I’m trying something new these days. It’s actually something I’ve been doing for a while now; I just didn’t know that it coincided with the Zen part of life. I’m trying to find a balance between being a productive writer, a better psychic, and the stillness within. Right now, it might just be knowing that others are doing this as part of their modern-day lives that is helpful.

You know what they say, “Misery loves company”. For some reason, that phrase has been coming back to me often these days. I’m not sure why, other than through my writing, I seek your company. Either you are also interested in writing, and/or you are interested in being or becoming psychic.

Or you are just old like I am.

Each circumstance comes with its own version of pain and of joy. Maybe that’s what they mean. There is a duality in life that happens all the time. Focus on one or the other, but the stillness between, where good becomes bad, and all is right with the world. I guess that’s what I’m trying to see.

I can tell you that if you’ve ever told a story, you are a writer. And, if you’ve ever had a particularly odd thing happen in your life, a thought you don’t know how you thought it, well, you’ve experienced something psychic.

Everybody is psychic. We just sort of forgot how to be that way.

I will sometimes put a short inspirational thing up at the top heading of the documents I use to write my articles. Or, sometimes I just open a blank page. It takes a minute to think of something and then head to the upper part of your page, but something like the following might interest you.

·       *  I seek stillness and calm before I write.
* I am calm before I write.
* I am empty and then full.

You know what doing this feels like to me? It feels like when I try to meditate and everything in the world wants to stand up and be acknowledged in my head before I can get to the open air of a meditation. I find that interesting.

Thanks for reading. Come back for more or check out the other places I write online.

🌺 Pauline Evanosky

🌺My Links:

Talking To Spirit — my website since 2001
Pauline Evanosky on Medium
Talking To Spirit on Substack

Pauline on Vocal.Media

Pauline Evanosky — my author’s website

My Table of Contents for Medium — Updated Monthly
My Table of Contents for Substack — Also Updated Monthly

Facebook for shorter pieces

Resources for psychic development from my website, TalkingtoSpirit.com

My 20-Minute Experiment

I’ve been up for four hours. I’ve gotten a lot done this morning. Wrote an article, working on another one that I started yesterday. I’ve got another one half-finished from yesterday, and I just had a thought.

It has to do with a kitchen timer I’ve got around my neck. It’s there because I tend to forget things I’ve got going on in the kitchen. See, I really don’t like standing there waiting for things to finish. Like I was boiling up some potatoes. They were sprouting, and I figured I’d best do something with them. I also don’t like throwing food out. So, the plan is for me to make some potato salad for dinner tonight. I had the timer on for 20 minutes. When the dinger dinged, three potatoes were finished, but a larger one was still on the hard side, so I left it in the water with the burner off to sit for a while.

While I was waiting, I decided to sit down and watch a little bit more of the television show I’d been watching (The Closer on Netflix). I love that show to bits, and I knew if I didn’t get up in time, I’d find myself still there at 3:30 this afternoon. So, I set the timer for 20 minutes.

That’s where I got the idea to conduct an experiment today.

I’m going to keep the kitchen timer around my neck, and I’m going to keep setting it for 20 minutes at a time. Now, in the grand scheme of things, I will typically spend an hour or so on an article. However, as the day moves forward, I will spend longer and longer with each successive article. Why that is, I’m not sure. Another experiment, for another day, I suppose.

At the end of the day, like yesterday, I will have a couple of unfinished pieces on my computer desktop. Seems a little unorganized. I mean, yes, I can understand having a book not finished. A book could be 120,000 words, and nobody is going to finish one in a single day. However, you could work on getting a chapter done in a day’s time. Depending on how long you want your chapters to be, on average. None of them will end up being exactly the same, but I tend to like mine to be between 4,000 and 5,000 words. Give or take. If they get to be more than that? I break them in two and have another chapter.

Maybe that’s what people who make podcasts do. They get hold of something they just can’t shake enough. Picture a dog with a bone.

Productivity is my name. Most days.

Plus, I don’t have all the time in the world anymore. When you turn 70, too, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

I’d say this piece is about halfway done. I’m going to switch off to one of my other partially finished pieces to complete it (I hope) and will come back to this one about an hour or so from now to let you know how the next twenty minutes goes….

Okay, I’m not sure what time it was when I cut away from this piece, but I’m back again. Maybe this 20-minute thing isn’t something that I want to go on all day. Remember, back when we were in school? I can’t remember how long classes went, but I’m thinking they were probably 45 minutes each. Then, you’d have ten minutes to get to your next class. Maybe four classes in the morning, lunch, and then three or four classes in the afternoon. Since I went to school in the 1970s, I’m sure things have changed with short days and more days off, which, I think, would have been nice. Still, the day was packed for me in those days.