I meditate to avoid being an asshole

This was one of the first posts I shared on Meditation, it was written for my my dear friend Lyn's website www.lovenomadic.com.  In preparing for my series that begins next week, I was once again reminded of the "why" I meditate...  Enjoy the throwback!

When Lyn asked me to write a piece on Mediation I was surprised, I practice meditation, I’ve taught meditation but I never really considered myself an expert on meditation.  I sat down to write this and many thoughts flooded my mind (this happens when I sit down to meditate too…)  and I wanted to write a prolific piece on the many benefits of meditation, the beauty and peace of the practice, but a voice kept coming to me WHY do you meditate, why?

So, time to get honest I meditate mostly to avoid being an asshole.  When I don’t meditate I find I am often annoyed, slightly irritated by traffic, I am impatient with my son and can be quite a smarmy bitch to my husband.  This isn’t my regular behavior, by nature, I believe I am a kind hearted and compassionate person, I’ve created or learned some pretty gnarly coping mechanisms early on in my life to deal with deep insecurities and retraining myself not to react but to act has been a lifelong process.

Simply put meditation is a necessity for me, it is not by some virtue that I found the practice; it was out of desperation and desire that I found it.  There is a saying I heard early on in my journey “religion is for people who don’t want to go to hell, spirituality is for people who have been there”.  I had been there and meditation is a way out. 

I picked up my first book on meditation almost 20 years ago, its concepts and ideas were leap years beyond anything my mind could comprehend, I clearly was not ready, but the seed was planted.  I have found myself over the years drawn to meditation in strange ways, but they always seemed to be attached to a deeper commitment than I was ready to make.  About 15 years ago I was introduced to Raj Yoga and attended weekly meditation for a brief time, but they were recruiting for their center in NY and the rebel in me still wouldn’t let me join anything, but I did find I liked the way I felt after our weekly meetings and desired that feeling for many years to come. 

I found Reiki & Yoga 10 years ago and that began my real practice of a consistent meditation.  Coming to a regular practice is hard; I have had some resistance towards it for most of these years.  My spiritual experiences have always come as more of the educational variety anyway, and so has it been with meditation.  This has been a benefit because it has allowed me to slowly evolve and steep myself more into an authenticity I never knew existed.  It has allowed a process of becoming rather than just changing.  I am who I am meant to be at this exact moment and I even believe that some of the time!   

How do you do it, you ask?  I’ve learned all you have to do is just sit and be quiet and you can do this anywhere.  But… when you are beginning you should create a ritual (a set time, so you have something to commit to) create a space, I have an altar, but this can be a chair in your favorite room, you can have candles, a deity or any other object that softens your heart, right now I mediate on my beautiful porch overlooking an English garden.  I found it easier to start in a quiet space with very little distraction, on my porch I hear cars go by, birds chirping and general neighborhood noise which I embrace, it teaches me I can find stillness anywhere. Next, set a timer, as little as 5 minutes a day can make a difference. I’ve found that rarely is my mind ever void of thought, so don’t get discouraged when you start creating lists or when random thoughts invade your space.    The practice of meditation isn’t to become void, but to become as “full”y present as you can be in each moment.  It teaches you to act rather than react, to begin to know yourself, without judgment, but with clear eyes and an open heart. 

Some techniques that helped me out early on were to simply count my breath, it was the first real deliberate meditation practice I was consistent with. It gave me something to do while I was trying to be (you can’t go from “doer” to “be-er” overnight).  I tried a Zen meditation where you count to ten and then begin again, this never worked for me as I would always go past ten then berate myself for not doing it right. Counting my breaths 108 times (a single breath being a complete cycle of inhale and exhale) was a regular practice at the beginning.  I’ve used mantra which is also very powerful.  This can be a Sanskrit mantra or just a positive statement such as I am peaceful, I am happy, I am loved, I am abundant or I am here.  Just the repetition of a beautiful phrase in and of itself is healing, but repetition is where the true practice of meditation begins. 

Many people close their eyes during meditation, which was very helpful for me early on.  I now practice with a steady downward gaze my eyes looking over the bridge of my nose a foot or two in front of me.  This is a common practice for meditation in Reiki which is my regular practice. There are other meditation techniques in Reiki I use and they can be found in the Japanese Art of Reiki http://us.ihreiki.com/shop/product/the_japanese_art_of_reiki. My Reiki teacher has a meditation CD with guided meditations and is very helpful when you are first beginning (or something fresh for the seasoned practitioner), it takes all the guessing out of it http://www.thereikijourney.com/The_Reiki_Journey/Welcome.html. If you prefer print, I am currently reading Be the Change by Deb and Ed Shapiro which shares personal experiences from many modern day practitioners http://www.amazon.com/Be-Change-Meditation-Transform-World/dp/1402760019.  There are many great resources and ways to meditate, but the only way to begin is to begin. Ask people around you, read excerpts on Amazon, find guided meditations, anything you desire, there are many resources, just seek.   

 I’ve found meditation is strong and grounding, which surprised me when I started. It should help immerse you into the world, or perhaps it will be a bridge to find your place with in it.  Either way the practice of meditation is never about moving away from the world, but finding your true “seat” within it.  Don’t expect anything, don’t expect a quiet mind or a more peaceful life, don’t ask it for anything.  Meditation will give you more than you ever knew existed, I promise. 

Smoking Yoga Teacher

More yoga teachers smoke than you know.  My addictive personality couldn't survive soft tissue cancer.  My sister, the matriarch and my pseudo mother through my 20’s and 30’s ended up in a coma after her first chemo treatment.  She found out while I was on a beach in Rhode Island getting engaged.  I came back with my news first, so being who she was, she waited another month before she told me.  “I have Leiomyosarcoma, I have a chance for a clinical trial” and she assured us the doctor told her she wasn't in the “last 2 outs of the final inning” (she loved baseball and he used these baseball analogies the only 2 times I met with him, which made me want to scratch his fucking eyes out).

She didn't make it into the trial; she downplayed this as no big deal and decided to try a very progressive chemo treatment.  It was a beautiful Indian summer day in October, I was in my second weekend of advanced yoga teacher training, exhausted happy and soaking in an ancient wisdom I thought was sure to save my soul.  She was in a coma was all I heard, the rest of the message was white noise, except that she was rushed to the hospital. 

This is when I learned the difference between doctors and surgeons, doctors are like Mother Goose telling fairy tales and assuring us there is still hope and surgeons are autistic idiot savant detectives, just laying out the facts.  It was decided in the infinite wisdom of the doctor while my sister was in what he called a semi-coma to biopsy her cancer once again to see if there was a different treatment approach.  My brother-in-law didn't want to go down for the surgery so I volunteered.  I waited in the pre-op area and held her hand while they prepared her for surgery. 

I went to the waiting room and about an hour later the surgeon came to talk to me, he said they were able to obtain a viable sample easily and he must have seen the look of relief on my face, as he looked perplexed, so I pressed him further.  He said that he could have taken the sample from almost anywhere inside of her body, that the cancer had made its way to all of her organs and the soft tissue of the stomach.  He told me in just a few sentences of facts that my sister was riddled with this cancer and would most likely not survive.  I tried to press him further but he could tell I hadn't been told the true nature of her illness, he excused himself rather abruptly. 

I held it together and made my way back up to her room on the 5^th floor.  I was reeling, what I sub-consciously knew was now confirmed. 

I waited until she was brought back up and my brother-in-law arrived back to her room before I made my way calmly down the elevator and outside to the smoking area where another sister was and said “give me a cigarette”, she refused and pleaded not to start, she knew how many times I had started and stopped.  I had begun to live a much healthier lifestyle in these past years and finally had gone a few years without them.  I didn't care; I needed something, anything to take me away from the reality of where I had been the last 3 hours.  I smoked on and off since I was ten years old and they were like a faithful old companion to me.  The ritual, the smell (however terrible after they were put out) became a place of comfort.  I didn't want to deal with how I was feeling and this was my familiar route.  I needed something and I was not ashamed.  I used to be ashamed of my smoking habit when I first started practicing yoga and had come back to it on and off, but this time it was just my old friend to accompany me through the pain, take the edge off and give me something, anything to do. 

I was still teaching yoga and seeing clients privately and hiding the fact that I was smoking, trying to cover it up with showers, hairspray and essential oil, but I know it lingered more than on my clothes, it lingered in my heart and soul. 

My sister died 6 weeks later, she decided to let go shortly after her first bedsore appeared, it was the one thing I knew would be the marker for death to come, I've seen this firsthand before. I kept smoking, I kept teaching and I kept grieving.  I lost hold of my meditation practice and asana was just something I had to do to keep things moving.  All the things that had saved me had not mattered for a time. 

One morning 4 months after my sister died I awoke coughing and crying and I knew I could handle the rush of grief that was about to take hold.  I threw out my cigarettes that day and cried for what seemed like an eternity.

We don’t know what goes on inside other people or what their experiences have been.  Even I tend to offer judgment before understanding.  I offer this story as invitation to offer compassion before judgment because I think most of us are doing the very best we can.