Unexpected Meditation

I have just started a regular meditation practice, literally, as in today was the second day. Ok, so maybe that can’t be categorized as regular just yet, but its a start, and my intention is to do a minimum of 10 minutes a day, so that’s regular. I had been debating what is the best time of day for a meditation practice and came to the conclusion that (for me) unless it is a weekend day, the evening is the best. I find that from the moment I awake up during the week my mind begins racing with all of the things I have to do that day, particularly as it relates to work and this point in the game that is way too much distraction for a beginner like myself.

So today, my intention was to meditate just before settling down for the night. As often happens in life, my intention was thrown off course by unforseen circumstances. The day did not start out great, it was the first day back to work after the daylight savings time change and I didn’t wake up until much later than I had planned. Grogginess had taken over my body and I practically had to drag myself out of bed. Upon arriving at work I immediately had to deal with a disgruntled client and an employee that was MIA. As the day unfolded and I dealt with both of these situations I could feel that I was ready to lose it, I was on the verge of a breakdown. It was all I could do to compose myself enough to announce that I was going for a walk and that I would be back. As I walked down the stairwell and out the building all I could think about was how sad I felt that my uplifting weekend of inspirational yoga was being followed by such a crummy day. That being the case all I wanted to do was get back to that feeling from the weekend, I wanted to remember and feel those heart qualities from class. So, I decided to walk across the street to the park, sit in the grass, close my eyes and meditate. The park may not seem like an unlikely place to meditate, but rather appropriate. In the case of this particular park, the only thing that separates its from the freeway is a frontage road that runs between the two. Even the noise of the freeway was not enough to drown out the noise of my mind. As I sat there the frustration just continued to boil up within me, but after a couple of moments my breathe became more and more steady. I began to focus on the sound of the cars passing by and the sensation of the sun on my face and the breeze passing through my hair. I slowly began to shift my attention to the more subtle sounds around me, a leaf passing through the grass, the clank of a nearby dog’s leash and collar meeting. In the end it was really the sun that helped to calm my senses. The longer I sat there, the more there was this sense of pressure at my third eye, it was as if it had opened up and was allowing the sun to enter my body, filling it with light and then radiating out through my heart. As I walked back to the office I already started to feel the frustration from 15 minutes earlier slowly re-entering my mind, at that moment, I told myself to remember the feeling of the sun warming and filling my body and the way that that made me feel.

I’m not going to go as far to say that the frustration left my mind, afterall, the issues had not been dealt with entirely, but there is no doubt that my taking the time out to meditate kept me from entering a place of darkness. It kept me from my most extreme reaction to frustration, which (as much as I hate to admit it) is to cry. And, in the end I like to think it helped me to make a more rational decision; to respond to the situation in a way that is more authentic to my true self, rather than simply reacting. I’m really just thrilled to have been able to apply my meditation practice rather than simply meditating for the sake of meditating. If nothing else, I know it made me feel better and day would have been a lot worse had I not taken a couple of moments to pause.

Tags: Meditation

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