Status Updates From The Dharma of Fashion: A Bu...

test a radically new look one day, and you may encounter a dormant part of yourself, which may feel like a new self. set a challenge - on Friday, I will be reborn. then, every Friday, I will dress up for my new birthday.
We often return to the safety of habit too quickly, d/t fear of what partner/friends/neighbors will think.

it is easy to confuse seduction with a sense of completeness. Not every arising desire must be satisfied.

addiction is an attempt to distract from inner feelings.
but we can develop more useful practices to alleviate our loneliness sadness. we can show the emotional mind that the rejections that felt so intolerable in childhood - thus vital to avoid - can now be tolerated.

Recovery from substance use should actually suggest growth and cultivation, not return to the life we were running from to begin with.

Courage is not about denying or overcoming fear, but understanding and acting wisely with fear.

Change is made attractive.
… we should perhaps be asking WHERE our desires to continually remodel the self come from.
what it is we strive to leave behind: to understand our minds Wanderlust.

addictive cycles are not ab the objects (shoes, food, cigs), but a desire to conceal negative feelings from our awareness.

must learn how to tolerate negative affect, not conceal it. mindfulness creates a safe place for these feelings

Balanced ascetism if often misunderstood, seen as a type of self-punishment or denial. It’s actually a search for true joy and happiness by putting aside, where possible, what we don’t need especially when we’ve become addicted or dependent.

our culture celebrates youth, beauty, success, and a type of homogenized happiness based on accumulation of greed. we hide the elderly in assisted-living facilities and nursing homes, the sick in hospitals. The dead are whisked away and dressed up to look like they’re sleeping and the poor are ghettoized.

two types of suffering
1. those we can not control (dying, aging, sickness)
2. self centered thought, why me?? escapist ideation. addiction to distractions.