online: 9 september 2003

4 september 20038 last days of summer


17:54 Sunny evening and still warm enough for light clothing. A man walks by without a shirt. Nettles have lost most of their leaves and the stalks look purposeless, as if about to collapse. I had little energy myself for the 1st kilometre but regained it in the 2nd. The sky is a dull blue (perhaps smoggy) with no clouds. A middle aged woman in pinkish red seems to struggle a little as she walks up a steep hill... I'm glad I came, I nearly didn't.

I'm continually surprised at how being amongst trees and semi-wildness restores my energy and spirit - if I persist beyond 20 minutes. I notice that 20 minutes is also the time it takes for Yogic or Alexic* relaxation to take effect.

A rare event - a wren, about 5 cm head to tail, perches within 2 metres and stays from 10 to 20 seconds. The wrens I've seen usually perch 5 to 10 metres away and stay only for a second or two.

Someone is playing a recorder or some such woodwind in the distance.

Just describing these events seems to improve my state of mind - and perhaps it can does the same for those who read it themselves, or listen to me reading it. I don't need to know why this is - I just like walking and writing in this city forest. I'm adapted to it.



*My version of Yogic relaxation is to lie on my back while consciously letting go of muscle tensions in the periphery of the body: feet and shins, hands and forearms, tongue, eyelids, brow, and perhaps sphincter (if bladder is empty) - while keeping thoughts to periphery and to breathing...

I learnt this from Harold Abrams's 1940's book about athletics training and how to avoid tight stomach muscles before a race. Doing this I accidentally learned to go into deeper relaxation - a slightly frightening state of semi-deliberate deliberate loss of consciousness that I discovered later resembles Yoga.

'Alexic relaxation' is my name for F M Alexander's way of relaxing the spinal muscles by lying on back with knees bent and feet on the floor close to body - and about 5cm of paperbacks to raise head a little. Almost sure to relieve backache if you continue for 20 minutes - but that's a long time if you are not used to it.




what's new

homepage

digital diary archive

© 2002, 2003 john chris jones

You may transmit this text to anyone for any non-commercial purpose if you include the copyright line and this notice and if you respect the copyright of quotations.

If you wish to reproduce any of this text commercially please send a copyright permission request to jcj at publicwriting.net