Journaling Archives - Madhu Bazaz Wangu
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Journaling

Tuesday, March 31, 2026

Posted on March 30, 2026
in Attention and Awareness, Flourishing, Imagination, Journaling, Meditation, Originality, Spirituality
1 Comment

Daffodil Field, Ashby Ponds A gift! These words rarely come to mind when we wake up to a brand-new day. Instead, our mind is already occupied with memories and anticipations. The blank page of the day stands waiting to be filled with feelings of comfort, joy, and moments that are uniquely ours. But we are not present for it. What if you open your eyes in the morning and feel grateful for another new day. Wash your face, brush your teeth, drink a glass of water, and sit at your Sacred Power Spot. You meditate. Your journal. Then comes several minutes of deep reading – a poem or a short chapter from an anthology meaningful to you. By this time, your mind is bound to feel enriched with benevolence and peace. With positive energy, the...

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Tuesday, March 3, 2026

Posted on March 2, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Originality, Spirituality
4 Comments

Protective Home Kami, 1977, Oil on Canvass The following post was partly inspired by Bhante Gunaratana’s book Meditation in Plain English, Wisdom Publications, 2011. The meditation we practice here is called Vipassana or Insight meditation. Vipassana is exercise in attention and awareness. When we practice it, we must toss out everything in our mind except awareness of sitting still and breathing. This is not easy to do. We keep practicing diligently and one day our conscious thought, the ego, moves like a cloud and lets the sun of awareness shine. The pure awareness hides behind our ego which is nothing but our judgement, evaluation and criticism of people and events. Such mental images hide awareness.  Continuous focus on the breath at the tip of your nose, (or chest or belly) takes you deeper and deeper and makes you aware...

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Thursday, February 18, 2026

Posted on February 18, 2026
in #Awareness, Attention and Awareness, Imagination, Journaling, Meditation, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds
2 Comments

Still Life with Samovar from Kashmir We are not naturally mindful. But mindfulness can be cultivated and developed through the deliberate use of attention and awareness. Eventually with practice, the two faculties merge to become one. This results in an expansion and strengthening of our conscious power. We become more mindful. With the daily ritual of deliberate breathing exercises and journaling, you are training your mind to pay attention to the thing in hand as well as to “stand back” and become aware of it. When this happens, it changes everything about the way you think, speak and act. You get glimpses of your Authentic Self. What you trust, what you truly value and believe in. You begin to pay attention to the intuitive ideas that cross your mind. Your creative flow is...

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Thursday, February 12, 2026

Posted on February 11, 2026
in #Awareness, Attention and Awareness, Awareness, Journaling
2 Comments

Notes on Faculties of Attention and Awareness Attention We are born with limited conscious power. But there is a way we can expand and strengthen it. Fortunately we are already practicing the two of these breathing exercises (which will eventually train us for meditation) and journaling.  The job of attention is to focus on one object at a time outside of the general field of consciousness. It is energized by our conscious power. For instance, as you breathe, you pay attention to the sensations of air going in and out of the nostrils; as you journal, you pay attention to the words you are writing; and finally when you read you step into a literary dream the book creates.     Awareness Like attention, awareness also gets its energy from conscious power. As you pay attention to...

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Thursday, February 5, 2026

Posted on February 5, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Originality, Spirituality
4 Comments

Personal Power/Spiritual Spot My earliest attempts at writing freely on the pages of a notebook were during the time of extreme trauma. That led me deeper into journaling. Within the span of eighteen months, my youngest brother was killed in an automobile accident, soon after that my grieving mother passed away and my father followed her, his soulmate, within a few months.  This all happened during the months which were supposed to be celebratory for the family, especially for my husband and me. But we were in mourning when I gave birth to our second child. Her presence and my daily pouring out of emotions in words kept me sane and brought me back to my senses from the doldrums.  Journaling was the source of emotional relief and healing. Tending to our beautiful...

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Tuesday, February 3, 2026

Posted on February 2, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Well Being
2 Comments

How does it feel to sit at your Spiritual Power Spot in your home? Peace? Calm? Some other feeling or sensation? Do you journal and practice silent meditation for 5 to 15 minutes at this spot?  At times when I’m faced with a “shitty” emotional problem I let go of the brick wall of expectations that my inner critic builds. If that doesn’t work, (and here’s when my journal comes to my rescue) at the top of the page of my notebook I write, “What should I do? How can I solve this problem?” Instead of carrying  my grievances and complaints around I vent them in my journal as no one else seems to be as intimate as this notebook. Journaling requires trust in yourself and believing that the practice you are following...

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Monthly Guiding Points

Posted on January 31, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Sharper Brain after Retirement, Well Being
2 Comments

JanuaryYour decision to walk on the path of spirituality and creativity is noble. If followed diligently it leads to wisdom, peace and joy. But the journey is filled with blocks, pitfalls and false dead ends. In order to overcome any strenuous situation you need persistence and perseverance. To help you successfully journey on the spiritual way I have collected ten practical points about mental clarity that I promise would guide you along the way.  I have learned and recapitulated these lessons from the works of great thinkers, spiritual masters, philosophers and teachers; their written and spoken words. Each guiding point is a practice; simple but not easy. But when practiced seriously, mere words turn into physical sensations and feelings. Eventually they impels us to act accordingly. Once activated they amaze us...

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Thursday, January 29, 2026

Posted on January 28, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Spirituality, Well Being
4 Comments

Self-doubt is one of the major emotions we all go through. There are days when you feel overwhelmed and sluggish without any tangible reason. What can you do? You allow the heavy dark clouds of emotions and thinking to shower on the pages of your notebook, a rainstorm of words. You trust that by the end of two to three pages it will shed light on things you were only partly aware of. And it will present possible solutions to your malaise and listlessness. I started doing serious journaling in my early fifties that encouraged me to change my profession from teaching art history and world religions to become a freelance writer. It felt the right thing to do, I wished I had started journaling sooner. Not only was I able...

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Tuesday, January 27, 2026

Posted on January 26, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Well Being
4 Comments

The Final Post on Daily Journaling:What you pour on the blank pages of your journal can be compared with autumn leaves. The mountain of dried leaves of your mental trash is all biodegradable. It decomposes into mulch. Into this mulch you’re ready to sow new seeds and watch them sprout as fresh green saplings. It often happens, that upon rereading your journal after some time, you gain greater insight into the things that have happened. Personal events gather universal significance. You realize such exchanges and events, good or bad, are human. The edges of harsh events have softened. You’re pleasantly surprised at where one month’s or one year’s journaling has led you.  When you don’t journal for a while a restlessness gnaws at you. Your mind feels muddled and overwhelmed with mosaic...

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Thursday, January 22, 2026

Posted on January 22, 2026
in Journaling, Meditation & Journaling at Ashby Ponds, Spirituality
6 Comments

The eminent social psychologist, James Pennebaker in his book, Opening Up by Writing Down, writes that not fully expressing negative emotions, suffering in silence and keeping secrets—swallowing them or pushing them down—affects your heart, mind and body for the rest of your life. By hiding your fears, anger, and hurt from the world, you hide it from yourself. In order to replace the mask of social “goodness” and “niceness” with authenticity you must first recognize the anger, the hurt or the fear buried deep inside you. The recognition must be followed by acceptance of your negative emotions. Some of us may require therapy or hypnosis to cleanse the system but most of us can do this by, as the title of the book suggests, “opening up and writing down.” If you like, write...

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