Not About Peace. Not An Escape.

 

Lately, I am hearing more people express a sense of dismay with their "progress" meditating. Honestly, when I hear this I wince inside. I can't help it. If we are thinking in terms of "progress" then we are missing it altogether and, even more, it's mean to ourselves! So, if you have this sense of not progressing or not being good at meditation, then I hope this message speaks to you and feels reaffirming.

Meditation is not something to progress at. It is simply something to do. We refer to it as a practice, but I wonder if that's in the way, too. Why? Because it is not something to master or even get good at. It is not something to win at. You'll never arrive somewhere. Why? Because you have already arrived. You are here. It's simply remembering that you are here that mindfulness meditation helps us to do. Here and not in the future, the past, or in fantasy. 

Is it a practice? Maybe we are causing ourselves some suffering by calling it that. I wonder if it would be more beneficial to say simply, "I meditate." Just like we would say, "I brush my teeth." We don't practice brushing our teeth. We just brush our teeth. We don't practice meditation, we just meditate, which means we follow our breath to stay in the present moment, we get distracted, we return to our breath again. Sometimes we can stay in the present longer, sometimes we are gone in a split second. We just do it.

You are here in this form with a brain that produces many thoughts. Endless thoughts. It is what it is made to do. We could say, "thank you, my brain." It's a good thing to have one. But I know sometimes we wish it would quiet down. Fortunately, our brain also has the capacity to let go of a thought, the next thought, and the thought after that, one at at time. This is what we are doing in mindfulness meditation.

We start by following the breath because it is happening only in the present moment. Sensing our breathing, we are right here. Sensing anything, we are right here. If I listen to these sounds right now, I am present. If I feel my feet on the ground, or my pelvis on the chair, I am present. If I smell this flower in front of me, I am present as I draw the air in through my nose. If I feel this inhale and this exhale, I am present. I can't sense these things and be somewhere else in my thoughts. So we use the body to stay here. 

It could be that we feel like we are failing or not getting any better at it if we are holding on to some notion that we should be getting to a peaceful place, or a place where thoughts stop coming in, or a place of otherworldliness (bliss), or a place of perfection where we don't get distracted. If we have those motivations or goals we have fallen off the path. It's going to feel like we aren't very good at it.

Of course, there are different forms of meditation. Some are intended to bring us to another place, out of this body. Mindfulness is not that. Mindfulness is awareness of what's happening in the present moment. We are not trying to get to another place, a special way of being, or ongoing peacefulness. It is not an escape. It's the opposite. It helps us to be right here with what is, whether what is is pleasant, unpleasant, neutral, or anything along that spectrum. We learn that we can stay. We can observe and we don't have to react by trying to get away from it. This is where its power lies because then we can make choices. We can't do that when we are not present. And so this is why we meditate. It helps us to live aligned with what matters to us. We learn that we can be aware. We can stay. We can observe. We can make a beneficial choice from there.

Just meditate. That's it. Just meditate and let the doing of it speak for itself.  Lately, I am hearing people say that they notice as they meditate more regularly (just about daily) they find that it is easier to do -- to be still and to stay. Of course it is. Like riding a bike. It's not scary like that very first time we did it without any training wheels.

My encouragement this week is to meditate regularly without evaluation, without trying to get somewhere, or attain something. You have already arrived. Now, just meditate. 

Need any help, just reach out.

🙏🌷
Jean