2009.09.13 13:00 - A quiet-seeming session

The Guardian for this meeting was Maxine Walden. The comments are by Maxine Walden.

Reading over the chatlog I felt that there may have been a meditative aspect to the log, folks at ease in just being together in mindfulness, but also that I as guardian may have been a bit intrusive or insensitive, as if taking my role too seriously, perhaps seeming a bit bossy or infantilizing about gathering the impressions from the 90 second pauses.  The task of the guardian is a delicate one, and individual style and judgment are important, but this is the second time in a few weeks that I feel the role of the guardian, and perhaps questions about sensitivity/intrusiveness can be highlighted from the log.  Maybe readers can form their own impressions.

   As I came to the Pavilion doug and Yakuzza were already in conversation. 

Yakuzza Lethecus: hey doug
doug Sosa: dramatic entrance, hi.
Yakuzza Lethecus: i hope you had a great weekend
Yakuzza Lethecus: mine is over already :(
doug Sosa: well, struggling with a project. keeps remining me to STAY COOL.
Yakuzza Lethecus: ur free to talk about it ?
doug Sosa: sure.
Yakuzza Lethecus: hey maxine
Yakuzza Lethecus: hey shy
Maxine Walden: hi, Yaku, doug
doug Sosa: launched a website on sustainability. then spent hours watching videos and reading articles on state of the art. what a chllenge.
doug Sosa: hey maxine.
Maxine Walden: hi, Shyama
doug Sosa: hi:)
doug Sosa: shymaya, born new, join.
Maxine Walden: Shyama, is this your first time at these meetings?
Shyama Sheryffe: no..iv been here couple of times
Maxine Walden: ah, great. You know about our chatlog then and it is OK to include you in it?
Shyama Sheryffe: nods
Maxine Walden: wonderful, just checking, one of the guardians' duties
Maxine Walden: doug you were mentioning your website on sustainability. How is that going?
doug Sosa: wonderful responses from people who say they want to get active. now, getting them active is the next task. :)
Maxine Walden: I can imagine
Yakuzza Lethecus: hey arch
Archmage Atlantis: Hello all
Yakuzza Lethecus: is it a different page then ur blog ?
Maxine Walden: hi,arch
doug Sosa: One person almost - almost - ruined my mood, when he wrote "Why don't you a-holes solve your roblems by adopting my commercially available system to help people let go!!"
Maxine Walden: Arch, have you been to these meetings before?
doug Sosa: http://mahb.stanford.edu click on wiki
Maxine Walden: that would deflate one's mood, doug!
Yakuzza Lethecus: hey pila
Maxine Walden: hi, pila
Pila Mulligan: greetings
doug Sosa: :)
Shyama Sheryffe: hi pila :)
Archmage Atlantis: Yes a number of times actually
Maxine Walden: great, Arch, sorry I did not recognize you. Just checking as the guardian
Archmage Atlantis: np
Yakuzza Lethecus: i like the reading room, you don´t have just references to springerlink or what ever pay for article source just a fully readable pdf :)
doug Sosa: :)
doug Sosa: the tradeoff is between the reading room and the wiki. Always a hard decision, but given that people want to interact..
doug Sosa: so my focus has shifted to the wiki.
doug Sosa: Now to get the members, about 100, to use it.
doug Sosa: Anyone can read it.
Maxine Walden: facilitating the interaction and the 'getting active' is so important and may have its challenges
doug Sosa: so, 9 sec. i am impressed by what i bring to that task fromthe 9 sec. a degree of letting it be, appreciating the rough parts.
Maxine Walden: yes, can imagine the lessons from the 9 sec can be so important
doug Sosa: everytime i shift real world tasks, the 9 sec is very helpful.
Maxine Walden: yes, as it may be for each of us (thinking we have a 90 sec reflection coming up in about 1 min)
Maxine Walden: maybe we could each reflect upon its experience
doug Sosa: ok, hold on tight to the world so that... oh, i forgot, get ready to let go :)
Maxine Walden: hahaha
--BELL--
Maxine Walden: care to share your experiences of this 90 sec just past?
Qt Core: hi all
Maxine Walden: hi, Qt
doug Sosa: immediate muscle relaxation..
Maxine Walden: Qt, we are sharing our experiences of the 90 sec meditation just past
Qt Core: regular ot there was an experiment ?
Maxine Walden: that letting go, re muscle relaxation can be so informing...reminding us of how would up we get in our daily goings on; at least that is part of my experience
Maxine Walden: regular, Qt, every 15 min 'bell'
Maxine Walden: would = wound
doug Sosa: also going into the 9 sec this week i've ben amazed by hof my focus shifts from three or maybe ten things objects) to many more, a hundred or so.
Maxine Walden: interesting, doug
doug Sosa: letting them all be peers to each othe, each with rights, like this old black canvass bag here with me, and me wiht it. it has its rights to be an appearance.
doug Sosa: I hadn't noticed it for a few weeks.
Maxine Walden: all thoughts, things striving for attention deserving equal 'rights', doug?
doug Sosa: no striving, just a kind of isness, what i think we are calling the apperance of being. But
doug Sosa: let's not get too metaphysical. i was describing earlier how i had to vacuum the house and found myself 9 secondsing it.
doug Sosa: everythig seem less an obstacle, i was able to me a bit slower, and more deliberate, and casual at the same time.
Maxine Walden: ah, sorry, was not aware of the context...
Maxine Walden: yes, that letting go, letting be does seem to allow for a more quiet cadence...
doug Sosa: by earlier i mean yesterday.
Maxine Walden: ok, getting clearer about it
Maxine Walden: any other experiences from the last 90 sec pause to share?
Maxine Walden: perhaps we are all meditative today...
Yakuzza Lethecus: hey prometheus
Prometheus Tsiolkovsky: hello :)
doug Sosa: :)
Maxine Walden: Prometheus, are you familiar with these meetings?
--BELL--
Prometheus Tsiolkovsky: No, please explain the rules :)
Pila Mulligan: are you there Maxine?
Maxine Walden: sure, Prometheus, we meet every 6 hours, if desired, and practice letting go of the issues of the moment
Pila Mulligan: ah :)
Prometheus Tsiolkovsky: mindfulness practice
Maxine Walden: as we did just now with a 90 second pause. Yes, exactly, mindfulness practice
Maxine Walden: and we also keep a chatlog which we post on a wiki. Would it be OK to include you, SL name of course, on that chatlog?
Prometheus Tsiolkovsky: Sure :) I am here to observe and learn however :)
Maxine Walden: the wiki is playasbeing.wik.is
Maxine Walden: great!!
Maxine Walden: any sharings from the last 90 sec pause?
doug Sosa: I ws still pretty relaxed from the first so it wasn't as big a tranition..
doug Sosa: transition..
Maxine Walden: hmm, yes, doug
Maxine Walden: I find that the fountain dissolving into mist during the 90 sec is a lovely metaphor for the letting go
Maxine Walden: letting everything dissolve into the moment
Maxine Walden: so that the birdsong and fountain song shine through
Maxine Walden: crickets too
Maxine Walden: sometimes just being quiet in the presence of other like-minded folk is very meditative
Archmage Atlantis: I'll try to convince the frogs that a mating all around us in the rainy season of that position :)
Archmage Atlantis: *are
Archmage Atlantis: Makes silence a rare commodity
Maxine Walden: hmm
Maxine Walden: Prometheus, every 15 min here we have a 90 sec pause, so at 1:45SL, just a couple of minutes, we will have another pause
Maxine Walden: 1345 SL
Prometheus Tsiolkovsky: I realized that ;)
--BELL--

During and just after the pause several members leave.  It feels like a quiet session.

doug Sosa: silently bye
Archmage Atlantis: Blessings all, bye
Maxine Walden: bye, Arch
Yakuzza Lethecus: bye arch :)
Pila Mulligan also needs to slip away now -- bye QT, Maxine, Yak and Prometheus
Maxine Walden: bye, Pila
Qt Core: bye
Prometheus Tsiolkovsky: bye
Maxine Walden: I'll need to go as well in a couple of minutes
Yakuzza Lethecus: bye pila
Yakuzza Lethecus: and maxine
Maxine Walden: Very nice to see everyone today. Hope to see you again soon