Thankful, Grateful....Mindful

7 Suggestions On How To Integrate Being Mindful With

Living Vegan

It's always the perfect time to be thankful, grateful and mindful about the lives we live.

This is the time of year however when we Americans supposedly take time out to reflect on what it is specifically we have to be thankful about.

Rather than write about the usual hypocritical aspects of what Americans now unashamedly call Turkey day I think it's rather important to notice the relationship between being thankful, grateful and mindful with living vegan.

Living vegan is easy. It's very simple. It's not born from some magnificent sacrifice and there is really nothing that remarkable about it. The only thing remarkable or special in regard to being vegan is when we realize that 99% of our neighbors are not vegan.

Living vegan is not a diet. It's not a fashion or lifestyle choice either.

Being vegan is about opening our hearts and minds and about expanding our moral concerns to everyone.

Yes, everyone.

So with the above idea in mind (no pun intended, yet definitely noticed) during this time of year we can look at what it means to integrate and incorporate being mindful into our daily lives as vegans.

Since being thankful and grateful fall under the umbrella of being mindful we'll focus (no pun intended again but noticed once more) on bringing mindfulness to living vegan.

Being mindful or mindfulness comes directly from the teaching of Buddha himself and has become a main part of the Buddhist tradition.

Being mindful simply is about being purposefully aware.

Being mindful is about noticing what we are experiencing and what our responses might be to that experience. Being mindful is about contemplation and focusing ones attention.

While there are certain activities involved with being mindful it is not a technique but rather a way of being.

It's not about doing something but rather about connecting and being aware.

Mindfulness is a subtle activity and you are in some ways...doing it right now while reading this.

There is something real and extremely beneficial to be said about deliberately transforming our moment to moment experience of the world and becoming absorbed in the present moment.

Mindfulness can feel like the ah ha moment we can sometimes experience.

In that brief flash of insight we notice our own attention being focused and we're automatically absorbed in the ...what's happening now moment.

When we have insight like this it really feels as if time is slowing down. This is because when we're truly focused on something time disappears.

We all know the saying that a watched pot never boils. This is because when we're focused on the water in the pot our perception of time changes because we're being mindful to the situation. That is the beauty in being focused and in deliberately paying close attention to what is important.

This is where the practice of mindfulness can benefit our living vegan.

Being mindful is about paying attention and attempting to understand our own minds. This can help lead to self knowledge of who we are, why we are drawn to living vegan and why the rights of non human animals matters to us.

Being mindful helps us see the big picture of our being vegan. To discover what's important and what's not.

Mindfulness is one-third attention training, one-third being focused on a very important aspect of who we are and one-third of everything else.

OK, I made that very last bit up about mindfulness but it sounded very Zen and actually made sense. This is really because being mindful is a very open and simple concept.

Anyway...

Here are 7 suggestions on how to bring mindfulness into being and living vegan.

These are not rules or techniques and certainly not a to do list but rather some simple ways to incorporate mindfulness into your own veganism.

1. Self Inquiry. Self reflection with some type of inner growth work.

Learning about who we are through introspection.

Asking ourselves important questions and attempting to find the answers.

Personally connecting to what it is that drives or draws us to living vegan.

Being vegan is something which takes place and happens within us.

Becoming vegan is not something that is an external something or that takes place outside of us. It happens inside and that is where we begin to investigate as well.

2. Study.

Read, listen, research. There are so many important books, websites, podcasts and other resources from which we can learn everything we need to know about animal rights and living vegan.

Studying is about understanding the theories behind what we feel so that we might know which action to take.

Studying is important so we can have a more reflective attitude toward being vegan.

We all should know the difference between an abolitionist vegan and an animal liberationist vegan.

And those are just the A's.

Not everything is found in books however, so this can also include studying nature or our own relationships with others in regard to our veganism.

This is about connecting the dots, growing in wisdom and understanding the principles about being vegan.

3. Personal, mindful practice.

Finding something that takes you beyond yourself yet where you can also become mindful about being vegan and contemplate it. This can be anything from practicing meditation, practicing yoga, hiking, running or even gardening.

Something where you can connect your thoughts about being vegan to an activity and then connect with it on a regular basis.

This is where you can notice the connection to moving, breathing and being alive. This is where you make the connection that we animals are all the same. We move, we breath, we feel.

4. Finding a teacher.

Looking for guidance and direction from someone. Someone who can give us advice, who we can learn from and who we have a connection with.

The truth is we can learn from everyone and in a very real sense we can make everyone we meet into our teacher.

The world and our own perception of the world becomes a very different place when we treat everyone as if they were our teacher.

We can learn a lot about being vegan from people who are not vegan.

We can learn incredible truths about compassion and kindness from people who seem cruel and who mention that they're not concerned about the lives or well being of other animals.

We can discover new aspects about ourselves when we see how others shut down at the mention of our veganism. We can also learn from others how and where we close up or shut down too.

This is easily noticed for example when we walk directly past a homeless human and we fail to stop and offer help.

5. Community.

Humans are social animals and we need to be with others.

It's very important to feel we're part of a community.

That we belong somewhere. That we fit in and connect with others in important ways.

That we share ideals and values with certain other people.

Every major social and political movement throughout history thrived and succeeded by building a community of support and collaboration. A supportive group of other people helps us stay focused on the journey ahead.

Being with other vegans who get us, who think like us can help round off the rough edges that we've built up from living in an animal eating/wearing/exploiting society.

The consequences of not having a community or belonging to a group is alienation.

Feeling cut off from the world can make us believe that we can't fulfill our role or purpose in society.

6. Volunteering/Giving back.

This is compassion in action and the essence of living vegan.

Being a mindful vegan is all about volunteering to help relieve the suffering in the world and to making the world a more peaceful and loving place.

On the outer level it's all about making a difference for others, being generous to others and being connected to our altruistic nature.

It's not about writing a check (although money is always needed when animals are being rescued and need to be cared for).

However, on a more mindful and contemplative level it's about giving without expecting or wanting anything in return.

It's about focusing our attention on dropping the need to be recognized for giving back to others and or for receiving attention from our giving back to help.

So being mindful about giving back might be doing something compassionate or kind without anyone else ever even knowing about it.

7. Being thankful/grateful.

In the context of being mindful it's important to focus on being thankful and grateful.

The world is not a worse place than it was in the past. We have so much to be thankful and grateful for

about being alive today and that we are living vegan.

We have so much cruelty free food to choose from and so much positive vegan culture to become involved with. We need to learn to appreciate our circumstances so that we can become better activists and better advocates for the non human animals.

Living vegan makes a real difference.

Being thankful helps us stay focused on the actual positive aspects that we're doing something that is saving lives.

Every vegan saves approximately 95 farmed animals lives each year.

Being grateful when we are motivated by compassion, kindness and empathy.

Being thankful however does not mean we don't realize and recognize that it's far worse today for the 55 billion farmed animals being killed for food every year on this planet than it ever has been.

It's not a better time for the animlas raised and slaughtered for food than it was in the past. The same modern technology that makes our lives easier, more efficient is also the cause of so much greater harm and makes life a million times more horrific for the animals, whom we eat, wear or exploit.

Yet as vegans living today the burden is on us to help other humans discover a much more compassionate way of living on this planet we share with our fellow earthlings.

Becoming vegan is the only solution to ending the death and suffering being inflicted on the other animals of the world.

Being mindful on a personal level of what it means to live vegan is such an incredibly important aspect to developing veganism for the rest of humanity.

The implications of not being mindful about our own veganism is that we run the risk of losing focus and losing the power each of us has in helping develop the next phase of human evolution.

That evolution is human veganism.

And it will come about by our all being more mindful together.

Be a mindful living sanctuary to someone else's existence.

Go vegan.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/deborah-schoeberlein/teachers-take-a-breath-in_b_768044.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/16/technology/16brain.html?_r=1&hp

Inner Acres

The Personal Lessons Learned About Living Vegan

From A Farmed Animal Sanctuary.

I long to accomplish a great and noble task.

But it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble.

Helen Keller

(1880-1968)

Cowboy and friend

Now whenever I spend a day at Animal Acres something within me opens up.

It used to be much more common for me that I would experience myself shutting down after being there.

Especially on that 50 minute drive back to Los Angeles where I would seem to focus on the fact that this beautiful safe haven for animals was a bit of a delusion and not the reality for which the vast majority of farmed animals live their lives.

The reality is that there are nearly 12 billion farmed animals killed every year for food in the United States. The reality is that the modern farmed chicken industry today will confine up to a quarter million birds in one building alone. The reality is that an industrial hog producer in America will kill nearly 80,000 animals in one single day. The reality is there are about 400 rescued farmed animals living peacefully at the sanctuary here at Animal Acres.

This massive imbalance of killing and cruelty versus kindness and protection is heart wrenching to say the least. One can't help but feel the weight of this reality bearing down and literally crushing any positive feeling, either about the sanctuary itself or what we as individuals might be able to contribute in helping bring an end to this violent and oppressive injustice our society calls, food production.

Yet now, after the end of each day and after having spent more time with the chosen few non humans at Animal Acres, I leave the sanctuary with more awareness about these thoughts.

I now leave with a much deeper acceptance of this reality and of the positive aspects of living vegan.

It's not just about the obvious connection to the animals and seeing them living happily and in peace. It's not just about recognizing their wisdom, humor, insights and how brilliantly they appear to live in the endless present that makes being around them so perfect and so rewarding. No, that's only a part of it all.

For me now, it's also the understanding that providing sanctuary for even one life matters immensely. Especially to that one life who has been given refuge.

I know this sounds quite obvious but sometimes it's the easily recognized and obvious things that are the big lessons and the ones which hit us the hardest when we seriously acknowledge them for the first time.

When we pause and think about the actions we take everyday for instance to protect our own lives or to increase our own well being we may also recognize that our life too is only just one life and yet worthy of sanctuary.

We do what needs to be done everyday for our own lives and it never seems meaningless or unimportant. So why would it be any less important to save or vastly improve another life?

When someone adopts one dog or one cat from a kill shelter it makes a huge difference to that one animal. It's never an unimportant or insignificant event for the life saved , especially on a personal level for that being.

And in this exact context the lessons I've learned and have found to be so moving about my time at Animal Acres is the awakening to what living vegan means when wrapped up in this specific sentiment.

Living vegan makes a huge difference in this context and understanding it as having meaning and importance has served as new inspiration for making it the foundation of a different reality than the one I used to stand on.

Although I've been living vegan for many years I never fully grasped that my being vegan was something that happened from my inner life and not something that came about from outside myself.

When we are able to discover it and sense it directly from within, it deepens.

When we find those places, those inner acres of meaningful terrain they can be the strongest ground we have to stand on.

This new foundation for me is one constructed on appreciation, contemplation and compassion.

And from this also comes the insight that living vegan is simple and not in any way at all very remarkable.

Being vegan is also not at all even the slightest bit challenging .

This to me, gives veganism a truth that cannot be denied.

In a world that's so brutal and seems so dismal it's not always what we do or who we are that means anything but rather how we connect those experiences to our inner life that can make a difference.

When we stop worrying about how nothing we ever do will actually make a difference and live with the knowledge that everything we do matters, we not only gain strength from our choices but we are able to notice that what we do... we can do quite well.

If in that moment whatever we are doing is actually our main focus and inspiration then everything else disappears and this becomes who we are and gains much more meaning.

Cleaning out one barn stall, carrying one bag of pig feed, feeding an apple to a goat resident all makes a difference.

The importance and meaning of whatever we do comes about when that activity is cared for and respected.

Nearly everything we do are just tiny activities but they can all add up. The same is true for every life that is given sanctuary.

The same is true about living vegan and in remembering the lessons we've learned when we're inspired by what is important to us. It's in those lessons that something important arises and something meaningful can be given back.

Living vegan is the most important step we can take when we open up to the idea of living compassionately.

When something is important and has meaning it's because we found that something in ourselves and then opened up to it.

Be a Sanctuary for someone,

Go vegan.

Click MP3 below to Listen

Someone

We must begin seeing other animals as equal. Existence makes us all equal.

Alice Walker

Erin and Bruno at Animal Acres

You, are now in front of a computer reading this sentence. You, who clicked on an internet link which brought you to this blog is the same you who feels that you are one thing and the computer is another thing.

You, acknowledge the computer is only a physical object in front of you however, you also know that you are more than just merely a physical object.

You, have moods, feelings, thoughts, memories and expectations.

You, have wants, desires, awareness and personal characteristics that make you, who you are.

You, have a mental life, yet you are also more than just that specific dimension as well.

You, are that one, that place, where the world ignites around you or seems as if it illuminates from inside you and perhaps it feels as if you are noticing all of this from somewhere behind your own eyes.

These impressions, these feelings are merely the firsthand results of your own perceptions of what it is to feel like a self.

Even though none of these feelings, perceptions or experiences are you, (anymore than are your eyes, hands or mouth), the feeling of being a self exists.

And the boundless contents of who you are, are not just sensations, thoughts or experiences but are also made up of your assumptions of who you might be for example in a social context or of your ability to be kind, or of your level of confidence or lack there of.

All of these phenomenon add up to the complex notion that you are more than just a body or brain or even a mind.

You, are someone.

Although there are many mysteries in the universe that are unanswered and you may not actually know why you are a someone... you, do in fact know what it feels like to be someone.

It feels exactly what you are feeling right now.

Alive, aware and conscious in this exact present moment.

In simple terms, this is it.

In a more generous explanation it is the feeling that you are the emissary or the agent of that distinct and unique, internal dimension you might interpret as yourself.

But being someone is even more than just this.

The simple fact that your ideas, emotions and sensations all have a subjective quality is exactly what it means to be someone.

And without a doubt you can experience all of the above without ever even being aware of lets say, your liver, your lungs, your aging process or even your own thoughts.

Very often humans will make the claim that non human animals are unaware of their own lives or not conscious of who they are. But the very fact that we humans are not always self aware or conscious of what our body or brain are doing at any particular moment does not mean we're not a someone with feelings, needs or a life to be cherished and honored.

And all of this, makes you, being a someone, the most important substance in the world.

All of this ability to experience happiness or suffering, in this specific context, makes you the only legitimate sphere of concern as well.

Even when you care or have concern about others it all originates from you being a someone who has those interests with or for others.

Now with all this said we can pause here, reflect and realize we're

(you and I) not the only ones who must be someones.

There are others out there who also have similar qualities of subjectivity and similar components that make being a someone a very relative concept.

We notice that others are someones too on the basis that they declare they are alive and conscious beings through the outward signs they display.

For instance how do we even know that our human friends and family are someones like we are?

We can only infer that they are by relying on their reporting to us that they are.

Sometimes with our family and friends it can even be a bit too much reporting.

However, it's not just in words or language that matter in regard to this but rather a reportability based on external signals that are relayed to us which will make the case, that there is someone there.

This is true for not only humans but non human animals as well.

If you are possibly doubting this premise than you can sincerely take notice that there exists no sanctuaries or shelters for chairs or stones. None of us (in our right minds) have compassion for cars , ipods or sticks. And with this said it should be noticed here and focused on....that when it comes to ethical or moral concerns, being a someone is all that's important.

Being a someone is the only context in which happiness and suffering actually matters. Nothing else in the world has any value other than how it affects the actual or the potential experience of some-body who is a someone.

You are a someone and so is every other being that possesses the qualities of having a subjective component to themselves, even if they are not aware of that actual component.

This element might be what many call sentience or if we are generous to one another, consciousness.

Whatever differences we might have from another someone it is our fundamental similarities of being someone that make us all equal.

When we humans live vegan we become a sanctuary for other someones and our actions reflect exactly what it is that makes the world a better place.

When we choose to be kind and love all others and not just some, we make the world a happier, healthier and more preferable place for every-one.

When we become vegan we save the life of someone else and become a personal sanctuary for the many others who want to live and be loved just like, you.

Be a sanctuary for someone....

Go vegan.

Many of you might remember this song and video which was performed live a the 2010 Animal Acres Gala.

This song was written and recorded by Josh Auer.

The video was created by the fabulous Casey Suchan and Denis Hennelly of

Open Road Films. My sincere gratitude to everyone who made this work come to life.

Click here to watch the video

Josh Auer's music...

http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/dear-you-ep/id301749161?i=301749261

Being Kind To Others For Ourselves

If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion. ~Dalai Lama

Besides the undeniable way in which Facebook helps organize our personal communities, it's also a great place to read comments from people who have volunteered their time and energy helping others.

Whether they've been volunteering at a sanctuary like Animal Acres or have been rescuing homeless animals, their enthusiastic posts sound like they're coming from people flying high on ecstasy at a rave or a love festival. This analogy isn't so far-fetched when you consider that the similarities in responses are not just a coincidence.

Over the past few years a number of researchers in the fields of cognitive science and psychology have shown that the love, compassion and kindness we express to others are much more conducive to our own mental well-being than we ever actually imagined. (Note: At the end of this post, I will provide links to these studies.)

The connection between being kind to others and the flourishing of happiness, whether that happiness is personal or on a global level, appears to be quite obvious.

(Since happiness is a rather vague word I will use it here in this post to mean the state of well-being)

There is a chain reaction when we are kind to others; the recipients of our kindness in turn feel better and thus act kinder to others, and so forth and so on. Kindness does appear to make life worth living.

One known fact in this chain that links us all is that each of us who is alive and conscious wants to be happy. Non humans as well as humans.

Every sentient being moves toward happiness and away from the absence of it. The basic principle that everyone longs for happiness and freedom from suffering is what causes us -- humans and non humans alike -- to feel compassion for one another.

Whether we're conscious of this principle or not, it's what helps make empathy possible.

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. ~Plato

Put another way, the individual and collective goodwill generated by humans and other animals who are treated with kindness and compassion, and who pass this feeling along, becomes the greatest source of happiness that exists.

Simplified still more: To treat others kindly is to act out of concern for their happiness yet it also proves to be a path to our own personal happiness as well.

Although this is a bare-bones explanation of altruism and its consequences, it tells us that there is a clear connection between being kind to others and feeling better about ourselves.

We simply need to honor the fact that including other beings in our wish for happiness is actually what makes us feel better and is what brings about concrete benefits to everyone.

There is a beautiful, truthful, unified irony here in our being compassionate activists. For what we soon discover is that we can all benefit not only from our own kindness to others but also from observing another's kind deeds done for others. You could say that we can all band together to "selfishly" help those who cannot defend themselves or speak out. By "selfishly," we can say that as activists we all benefit from giving, nearly as much as our intended beneficiaries do.

photo:Cameron O'steen

This is not about so called positive thinking. This is about putting the Golden Rule into action and about actually doing something. Positive thinking never found a home for a shelter animal or rescued a dog from a busy highway.

The benefits of committing acts of kindness are backed up by scientific evidence. Computer studies have analyzed data showing the reactions of good deed doers. There has even been exciting new research done that involves studying the brains of Buddhist contemplatives with fMRI machines. The monks have spent decades meditating on compassion or sympathetic joy. Over the years, these people have actually enlarged the areas of their brains that are responsible for feeling love.

Results of diverse studies have also proven that people who volunteer, people who perform acts of kindness, and people who focus on love and compassion (that is, meditate) have all shown marked improvement in their physical well-being.

In addition, the studies have shown that engaging in acts of kindness brings about feelings of euphoria and joy, followed by periods of calmness.

According to Allan Luks, the former executive director of the Institute For The Advancement of Health who conducted research in this area, "These feelings involve physical sensations that strongly indicate a sharp reduction in stress and the release of the bodies natural pain killers, the endorphins." This initial rush, he said, is then followed by a longer-lasting period of emotional well-being.

photo:Cameron O'steen

So from this information we can hypothesize that whatever a person's current level of happiness is, it will generally improve when they are kind or help others in need.

Volunteering to help care for animals at a sanctuary or shelter, for instance, not only contributes to the happiness of the animals but also causes feelings of fulfillment and accomplishment and a stronger sense of love and compassion toward one's self.

These states of mind not only feel good and affect us, but they also spread to those around us. Love and compassion are seriously contagious

Although it is true that cruelty, hate, jealousy, spite and shame are also contagious, they merely promote and spread the same negativity which created them. And, importantly,

they are never sources of happiness.

Like the Buddhists who focus their attention with laser-like intensity on love for all beings, we, too, can also practice becoming specifically aware of our compassion for animals.

photo:Cameron O'steen

There is something about being purposefully aware of what it feels like to be compassionate that brings us closer to recognizing our own kindness.

Any skill requires that we practice and refine our technique if we are to become accomplished. The same can be said about practicing kindness; we need to payclose attention to our mind when it fills up with the desire to be kind. The more we perceive and recognize this desire in ourselves, the more effortless it might be to live compassionately more frequently.

Now, as readers of this blog know, the definition of being kind to nonhumans includes not eating them and not being complicit with their exploitation and their deaths, even indirectly.

Living vegan expands our thinking to embrace others' wants and others' happiness. When we begin to move toward this attitude and away from always thinking about what seems best for ourselves (the "me first" mentality), we actually walk right into our own happiness, sometimes not even consciously aware.

As an ethical decision that is based on compassion and kindness for others, veganism, when done mindfully, becomes a rational way to strengthen and reinforce our own happiness.

The entire notion of living vegan and becoming a sanctuary for others is simply about understanding that what would benefit ourselves, we simply do for others as well.

Live vegan, be a sanctuary for others.

It's easy and it's a beautiful feeling.

“What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?”-Jean Jacques Rousseau

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=meditate-on-this-you-can-learn-to-be-more-compassionate

http://www.mindandlife.org/collaboration.html

http://www.upaya.org/newsletter/view/2009/11/30#story6

http://www.crystalinks.com/medbrain.html

HELP US PLACE 114 GOATS WHO ARE NOW RESIDING AT OUR EVACUATION CENTER.

The animals rescued from a cruelty case in April are now healthy enough for adoption.

PLEASE POST ON YOUR FACEBOOK, BLOGS, AND OTHER SOCIAL NETWORKING VENUES THAT HOMES ARE URGENTLY NEEDED FOR OVER 100 RESCUED GOATS. WE NEED TO PLACE THESE ANIMALS TO ENSURE THERE IS SUFFICIENT ROOM AT OUR EVACUATION CENTER FOR THE SANCTUARY ANIMALS (IF WE NEED TO EVACUATE.

Please click here or visit our website for an URGENT ADOPTION ALERT to post and distribute.

http://www.animalacres.org/volunteer.html

http://www.animalacres.org/donate.html