Eat. Pray. Eat

I’m reading the book Eat Pray Love and hoping to finish it by the time the movie screens in cinemas. I’m averaging about 10 pages per week at the moment. I think I’m on track.

It’s no surprise that it’s a bestseller. Elizabeth Gilbert presents such an honest vulnerability and a gamut of emotion. I actually do LOL*, tinkering on a ROFL* at times. The book chronicles her journey of self discovery after a tumultuous divorce where she finds herself eating herself crazy in Italy, finding zen in India and falling in love in Indonesia.

I guess a lot of women can relate to her journey. I can too. The eating part is self explanatory but I’ll explain how I can relate to her as she looks for inner peace. She writes about how she finds it so difficult to be still and achieve zero thoughts while meditating in an Indian ashram.

I’ve been attending Ashtanga Yoga classes for awhile now. It’s a dynamic mix of different asanas and breathing techniques. Artee, our instructor consistently reminds us to focus on our breathing and ‘zone out’ by focussing on a point in front of us. I struggle to turn off my brain chatter. I’m sure I’m not the only one but that doesn’t make me feel any better. Telling myself not to think of anything is just counterintuitive and makes my thoughts race even further from zen island. In front of me is a glass wall with abstract frosted designs on it. I focus on a point and it starts looking like…….char siu pau (BBQ pork bun)! Another part of the class which always makes me chuckle is when we move from a pose where we stand on our toes and drop down into a squat. As the class approaches the squat, you can hear a series of knees going POP…pop..pop…POP POP POP as it resonates through the class. The acoustic memory part of my brain somehow relates that to the sound of juicy charchoal-grilled chicken wings being snapped at the joints. Oh, how I miss home.

Well, it's soup for dinner....again. Sigh.



*for you baby boomers, LOL is abbreviation for laugh out loud and ROFL is abbreviation for rolling on the floor laughing

Much love,
Michelle, 14 degrees