I’ve been tagged by Bill over at My Everyday Life to participate in ‘the 7 P’s’ meme.

Bucky, from WVb (West Virginia Blogger) started this meme in an attempt to get to know his fellow bloggers a little better. It’s a creative way to describe yourself.

So here are my 7 P’s:

1. Passion – spirituality, family, friends
2. Purpose – to be, to create, to love
3. Pursuit – self-realization and a better understanding of life
4. Position – husband, father, friend
5. Pummeling – attachments
6. Progress – meandering but in a positive direction
7. Personality – open minded, even-tempered, giving, approachable

Now I’m supposed to tag 5 other blogs that I read on a regular basis, but instead I’m going to leave it up to you to decide if you would like to be tagged.

There are a few of these memes circulating, some involving seven random facts and some involving eight. Again, I waited so long after being tagged the first time (by Savvyology) that a couple other bloggers (NancyE at WaterFall’s Paranormal Life and One Mystical Monkey)
tagged me in the meanwhile.

So now to business.

The Rules

Reveal seven (or eight) random facts about yourself in a blog post.
Include these rules in the post.
Tag seven (or eight) other bloggers, listing their names in the post.

The Reveal

1. Ran the quarter mile and mile relay in high school track.
2. Was voted “Shyest” my senior year in high school.
3. Kept a pet caiman (south american alligator) in the bath tub at college.
4. My wife and I were taking a nap with our week-old son (our first) when we were rudely awakened by the Loma Prieta earthquake. That was frightening on several levels.
5. Hated – hated – oral reports in grade school, but eventually learned to give talks in front of groups of a hundred after a few years of ministry training with the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
6. Am in the process of working on an oil painting of Sri Ananda Moyima.
7. My two favorite TV series in recent years are Heroes and The 4400.
8. Married for 20 years (this November).

Solicitations for additional details are welcome.

(It seems this meme has saturated the pool of bloggers that I’d consider for tagging, so I’ll forego that step. )

Do a Google search for ‘raising vibration’ and there is no lack of information available. But in the spirit of the ‘high vibes game’ meme started at OptimistLab (I’ve just been tagged … twice), I’ll give my take on it as well as five things I do to ‘raise my vibration’.

But first, the following individuals with great websites tagged me within a day of each other, before I had the opportunity to work on this post:

Jonathan Bankert from JonathanBankert.com
Pamm from My Secret Spiritual Dance

Five Ways I Raise My Vibes

Raising your vibration means different things to different people. To some it means increasing your level of good feelings, to others it means increasing your level of spirituality. From my perspective:

The closer you are to who you want to be, the better you feel and the more things in life just seem to fall into place effortlessly. That said, these are the things that work to help me be in that place:

• Meditation/Breathing Exercises

  As a daily practice, I like to start the day with meditation and some Kriya Yoga pranayams, or breathing exercises. This puts me in a positive frame of mind for the day.

• Modified Five Tibetan Rites

  These exercises do not take much time to perform and are great for generating rejuvenating energy. There are plenty of instructions on the web, but I perform a modified version taken from the book Your Hands Can Heal You, by Master Steven Cho.

• Kirtan/Chanting

Whether with well-known Kirtan chanters such as Krishna Das, or with a local group which gets together once a month, an evening of Kirtan leaves me so hyped up with energy that I can be a bit overwhelming with my family after I get home.

• Listening to inspiring music

Krishna Das, Wah!, Jai Uttal, and Snatam Kaur are among the artists that I listen to. Their music always puts me in a peaceful, positive, mood.

• Unselfish acts

In an episode of Friends, Joey tells Phoebe that there is no such thing as an unselfish act. In a sense, I have to agree. While family and friends provide plenty of opportunities to do things for others that do not bring immediate benefit to myself, the mere fact that they benefit is meaningful. Why? Because we are all connected, and if something happens that makes another happy, why is it any different than if it were happening to me?

Spreading Good Vibes

As part of this meme, I’ve tagged and submitted the following posts to the website High Vibe It, which functions like the community-based Digg website for articles/posts/news, except that the intention of High Vibe It is to focus exclusively on positive-oriented content. Some of these writers might already have been tagged, but I felt it good to draw attention to these posts anyway.

• Are you Using the Language of Love?

  By Mark at The Naked Soul, this post is a good reminder about being aware of how we speak to those whom we love.

• Installing the Love Software

  By surjit at gurushabad, computer geeks (and others, too) will find humor and meaning in this post about the ingredients for love.

• A compass tells you what you want most

  JackDirt at excommunicate.net tells how to tap into your subconscious for answers.

• A Better Way to Unleash Your Potential

  Lee over at absolutelee.com shows why our failures are no reason for giving up on a dream.

• Gardening for Your Soul and Your Success

  Joseph Bernard at Explore Creating a Meaningful Life relates gardens to our current life and beyond.