One of the comments I frequently hear in relation to meditation practice goes something like this: “My mind is so busy. I cannot stop it from thinking. I/It gets distracted”.
It’s not just people new to the practice who voice these frustrations. I most recently heard it from a priest who has been practicing for years and done several meditation courses, read books etc.
It seems that the belief of primacy (i.e. the first belief we have acquired about something) that meditation practice is about ‘stopping the mind from thinking’ is so strongly reinforced in us that we don’t seem to hear anything else subsequent to that first belief!
One of the things that I set out to impress upon my clients whom I teach meditation to, is that the purpose of meditation is to develop self-awareness. It is NOT to stop the mind from thinking! That will happen naturally once you give the mind an object of focus eg the breath or an image and you practise bringing your mind, which will wander away from this object of focus, back to the object AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN…
It does not matter how many times you have to bring the mind back. It may be 4.5 minutes out of a 5 minute practice. It does not matter. Really! Because every time you become aware that your mind has wandered, you are practising awareness, you are waking up! And that is the purpose of the practice!
You are becoming aware of the nature of your mind – its habits and behaviours, its preoccupations, its fears, anxieties, worries, pains, cravings etc. You are becoming aware of this powerful instrument that has been controlling your life. The frustrations, the tendency to give up, the self-judgments and self-chastisement that you experience during your meditation practice are exactly what happen in other areas of your life. The practice helps you become aware of them as they are happening!
When you are fully aware of something as it is happening, you are in that gap/place of true choice. You can now choose to respond consciously and intentionally rather than react out of habit/conditioning. This is what is called ‘authenticity’ and living authentically is about choosing freely, consciously and intentionally – quite different to acting from ‘force of habit’. Practicing authenticity/true choice during your meditation practice enables you to practise it in other areas of your life as each situation or encounter arises.
The practice also teaches you acceptance and compassion. As you bring your mind back, again and again, WITHOUT JUDGMENT AND SELF-CHASTISEMENT, BUT LOVINGLY, you are practicing self-acceptance and self-love; the peaceful, joyful and loving fruits of which are ripe for picking in all areas of your life and with all the people and things in it!
The practice of meditation is both deep and wide in its offerings. On the one hand, your experiences during your practice is a microcosm of your larger world – all the mental activities and reactions that you experience here are what you experience in the so-called world ‘out there’.
But the practice can also draw you into the deeper, hidden, ultimate world or reality that mostly remains masked/obscured by your conditioned existence i.e. your daily activities commitments and habits of thought, speech and behavior. And until you encounter and experience this deeper reality, you lack self-awareness, for this is your true nature, this is who you truly are!
As with the acquisition of any other skill, you need to practice! But, in the case of meditation, practice doesn’t make perfect; rather it reveals the perfection of all things, including yourself! Enjoy practising!
©Lucy Lopez 2007
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