DAY 2 – Goodbye Cousin of Mine

7:02am: Focus on the nasal cavity. Today’s task has branched out a bit.  The bulk of the course is via video by Goenka and teacher is really an assistant teacher… Goenka has a really slow voice and it makes it hard to stay awake since we watch his hour and a half of discourse in the evenings.  Oh! And teacher plays tapes of Goenka singing as we are meditating—what is with that? 
Helen’s leaving today I briefly broke Noble Silence this morning when she hunted me down in the dorm rooms to tell me.
11:45am: Morning meditation was actually a bit better on the comfort level. Or maybe I was just too tired to shift a lot… could really be either one. My brain has really been drifting today and I have actually been having some really creative brainstorming sessions. But brainstorming isn’t the point of the meditation so I had to reel my thoughts back in and focus on my breathing again—left nostril is still doing all of the work!
The song today has branched out from Nepali songs and I welcomed Madonna into my mind—more like it snuck in there until I felt swaying and singing along to “Like a Prayer.” That would have been wholly inappropriate, so I refrained.  Today was totally better than yesterday on so many levels!