Zoya about Life

A new year of Water dragon, the Chinese year 4710(!) will begin on Jan. 23, 2012. Congratulations to all!

illustration by Jason V Lu

A year of Dragon is the luckiest year out of the 12 years cycle as Dragon is believed to be the most powerful of all Chinese zodiac animals . Did you know that Chinese people compare themselves to the descendants of Dragon? Yes, Chinese emperors were believed to be the incarnations of dragons from the heaven and enjoyed the title “the Son of Heaven”. In Dragon year, as it is so lucky, many people try to start something important – new projects or careers, marriage or even a new life – giving birth to “a baby dragon” is the luckiest event for any family! In Taiwan, there is already 10% increase in pregnancy rate (to compare with last year)!

baby dragons bought by Zoya Lu:)

The celebration of the New Year is very important in Chinese culture. Every family has been preparing for weeks now. People have started shopping, decorating their houses and preparing gifts of red envelopes well in advance. You can see bright coloured new-year stuff on sale everywhere.

lucky symbols to stick on the doors

flowers and plants to decorate the house

sweets for kids

On Saturday, Jan. 21st, we’ll gather for a big Chinese family lunch and a ceremony of praying to ancestors. Then on the 22nd, on Sunday night, is the New Year’s Eve (called 除夕”Chuxi” by Chinese), so there will be a huge family dinner in every house. On that day, no matter how far, people will go back home, and the whole family will get together to celebrate the coming New Year. Chinese New Year of 2012, which is usually called Spring Festival, begins from the first day of the first Chinese lunar month (Monday, January 23), and lasts for 15 days till Monday, February 6, the Lantern festival (I’ll post some Lantern photos then). Starting from Monday most people will have a whole week off work. Most shops and restaurants will be closed.  People will stay home and eat, drink, play, rest and eat more! There is a great post on Chinese traditions for this time of the year here.

May this special Chinese Dragon year become a special year for you too!

Zoya

19th of Jan, 2012

Tomorrow (Dec 22nd) is the winter solstice! Here comes the longest night of the year! That's the time when we must be most introspective and allow plenty of rest to the body and mind. And what do we find in reality? Paradoxically, these days can be the most hectic and least peaceful time of the year...

I don’t read many books. Somehow I feel that real knowledge can only come through my own experience. Meditation has proved to be the best tool to open the door to the wisdom source for me. In my life, the meditation came first, and then there were some books that helped me to put into the words my inner experiences and realisations. One of those books is The Power of the NOW by Eckhart Tolle – a great book I highly recommend to everyone who wants to be happy (unconditionally:).

Today I’d like to share a few quotes from this author who never fails to inspire me.

“If you cannot be at ease with yourself when alone, you will seek a relationship to cover up your unease.  You can be sure that the unease will then reappear in some other form within the relationship, and you will probably hold your partner responsible for it.”

«When you are enlightened, there is one relationship that you no longer have: the relationship with yourself.  Once you have given that up, all your other relationships will be love relationships. »
«As long as the ego runs your life, most of your thoughts, emotions, and actions arise from desire and fear. In relationships you then either want or fear something from the other person.

What you want from them may be pleasure or material gain, recognition, praise or attention, or a strengthening of your sense of self through comparison and through establishing that you are, have, or know more than they. What you fear is that the opposite may be the case, and they may diminish your sense of self in some way.

When you make the present moment the focal point of your attention — instead of using it as a means to an end — you go beyond the ego and beyond the unconscious compulsion to use people as a means to an end, the end being self-enhancement at the cost of others. When you give your fullest attention to whoever you are interacting with, you take past and future out of the relationship, except for practical matters. When you are fully present with everyone you meet, you relinquish the conceptual identity you made for them — your interpretation of who they are and what they did in the past — and are able to interact without the egoic movements of desire and fear. Attention, which is alert stillness, is the key.

How wonderful to go beyond wanting and fearing in your relationships. Love does not want or fear anything. »

Eckhart Tolle

Namaste to all who is reading my first blog:)

I’ve been considering blogging for a long while (almost two years?:), and I’m finally doing it. Yeay!:) Today is happened to be 12/12/2011, quite an interesting date. Recently we’ve had many special dates – 01/10/11, 10/10/11, 20/11/2011, 01/11/11, 11/11/11, and all of them have a specific meaning and therefore a task to perform. Honestly, I wasn’t able to “celebrate” all of them, though I believe in numerology and the fact that each number has a particular vibration and some special energy. But today is different to me –I’m doing it!

A few days ago, I saw a friend’s post on FB about the 12/12 alignment with an attached article on Divine Forgiveness and Divine Union. The part on forgiveness has clicked with me. It is something I’ve been working on for a few years. I’ve been receiving the message of forgiveness many times recently, so it feels like it’s time to finish the work! No, it is not that I have some enemies, or I hold a grudge against someone. In my case it’s more about forgiving my-Self! I haven’t killed anyone but I’m sure in some cases I could have done better… And don’t we all criticize ourselves for not being good enough, not doing enough of good things, or doing too much of bad stuff? Some people might take it easier but my «inner critic» is a strong guy, and I’ve spent much time and energy confronting him (yes, it’s him, not her:) i see him as a middle-aged man in a black suit:).  I was lucky to get help from my mentors and friends; I used Emotional Freedom Technique, Shamanic Healing, and hours and hours of meditation to getto where I am now at. However, I feel it’s not over yet. Tonight I’ll do an important step to say final «good-bye» to that unloving part of myself that holds me back from letting go of all past «mistakes» and embracing the now with openness and joy that will lead to an abundant future.

“Forgiveness” doesn’t require much effort at it is not an action. It is simply stopping of blaming someone or yourself for something. Since blaming requires energy, and forgiveness is the stopping of this action of blaming, it actually is easier to forgive than to continuously be blaming another or yourself. So all I need to do is to relax, take a deep breath in, breathe out and forgive! Then the energy that was held to feed my inner critic and the space taken by this guy who lacks compassion will get free! Yep, that’s it! Tonight is the night! Thanks to blogging I made this final decision. I’ll do it the moment I finish my writing.

Farewell my inner critic! Your space will be taken by a loving rose-cheeked woman with an open heart:)

P.S. for more on forgiveness have a look at the Anahata Chakra's healing strategy