Meditation
Waking up and realising that many of our actions are based on old emotional injuries is very painful. When we suddenly see, that we created our reality based on learned emotional habits that have nothing to do with what is actually going on. We see and interpret something that is not happening and act based on this perception. At the same time the other person is reacting to our behaviour, also based on his or her own stories and we create a completely new reality. Thats a mind-fuck? :)
What is so frightening about the present? When we are fully aware, then there is no mind-made sense of self. We have nothing to hold on to, no pretended explanation for our existence. Things are just as they are. Meditation trains us, to be more and more in the now, to observe ourselves while acting and reacting in the world.
This morning I woke up and felt a little sad emptiness inside. Nothing had happened that could explain the feeling. My life was exactly like the days before, when I felt content and happy. Why did I suddenly feel, like something was missing? My initial response to this feeling was: I don’t want to feel this. But: The feeling apparently came from my inside. Why was I looking for the cure in the outside?
Most likely you will suffer during meditation because you judge yourself, have expectations and are not willing to accept what is happening in the present moment. You are in the mind. But you want to be beyond your mind. And to get there you should first of all not take the whole meditation practice so serious ;)
Life is full of changes. Most of us don't like this. The problem is, that not the change is the problem but your resistance towards the change. In meditation, you learn to dance between everything that is appearing and dissolving. The nature of our life and mind. And in between, you may find some freedom...
The tone of your inner voice in meditation is crucial. When you catch yourself thinking, what is your comment and how do you say it? I know that my voice is pretty judgemental. But what I actually need and deserve is caring, loving. I tried and my meditation was full of honest, deep love. It made all the difference...
When I first heard teachers saying “the world is not real, you are living in an illusion” I did not really understand. I mean things are as they are and I am doing my best to survive and navigate through the struggle of life. “You have a choice. You can choose how you want to feel about something”. Really?
I used to see body relaxation as really disturbing in my meditation. A necessary evil. Surprisingly, the more I practiced, the more I realised, that body relaxation is actually the most necessary preparation. Only with a relaxed body, the mind can relax and this is the essential prerequisite for the state of meditation to happen.
Every time you sit down for meditation, you should do it as though for the first time. Meditation is not an action, because the state of meditation is “being”, not doing. You are not achieving something. As soon as you want to be “successful” with your meditation, want it to be “better” than yesterday or more advanced than your friend’s, you are in your mind.
Most of the day you spend thinking and creating stories in your mind. You think about what happened, how you feel about it and contemplate about what could happen in the future. All of this is not real, because it is either a memory or hasn’t happened yet. It is not what is actually happening now. And now is the only thing and moment that is real.