The Practice

I feel it is important to know that it is the perfection of wisdom, rather than the perfection of meditation, that is stressed as the key to attaining enlightenment.
Dalai Lama (calendar)

I am practicing lol!  I still listen and read what I can to enhance my learning.  I meditate even though it is a little more challenging to do so well these days. Most importantly, I am working on choosing peace.

I find myself  getting lost in worry, filling my mind with all the conversations, confrontations and choices I will have to make in the future. And I pull myself back into the moment , into "reality". 

Off the mind goes again with me chasing behind it...and I call myself back. Sometimes I come back willingly  with my tail between my legs, other times I come back resisting the leash.  But I come back!

I will get a twinge of pain out of nowhere...and off the mind goes again dragging me into some deep dark cave.  I take a deep breath and I dig my way out until I can see the sun again.

Then  I will catch myself dreaming of or spending precious parts of my day trying on the different possible outcomes for this as if preparing myself to star in either role. I sigh...put down the script...and attempt to perfect the role I am living right here and right now.

Just when I think I am handling this all so bravely and thinking I have all the worry behind me, I will find myself snapping at someone for some thing silly or the tears will come into my eyes.  I breathe and I attempt to allow the feelings to just be as I gently  remind myself that we "know nothing yet". ..."it is likely nothing."  Then I find myself imagining how I will confront this pissed off person if ( not if "when")  it all proves to be  nothing. I experience the anticipatory shame. I swallow hard and bring myself back to my breath, my surroundings here and now...the present moment.

I keep slipping into the "problematic" mind and I keep pulling myself back to the moment.  This, I am realizing  my dear friends, is what a real spiritual practice is all about!!! It involves catching ourselves getting lost in thinking and pulling ourselves back...again and again and again...to the only thing that is real...our present moment.

We get closer to truth a whole lot quicker this way than we ever would if we left all the physical problems of the world behind to meditate on some mountaintop.  (Ooops!  Did not mean for that to sound judgmental towards those who choose that life...there is definitely a place for them.  But for most of us ...it is all about finding the space beyond the thinking as we deal with secular life.)

Every time we become aware of our being lost in mind, we become un-lost.  Every time we pull ourselves away from mind, we are finding the space.  Every new time we find the space...the longer we stay there. The longer we stay in spacious presence, the wiser we become.

 Awareness, disentangling and increasing the moments we spend in still, silent space free of mental trappings ( regardless of what we are doing in terms of physical world obligations)  marks our practice in terms of success. So simple, so real and so very effective.  Keep bringing yourself back!

All is well in my world.