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Before I learned to meditate, I always was looking for something, anything, to take away the pain I was in. And it was painful to be me at that time. In retrospect I see that there are a few components to that experience of suffering that I was in
First was the fact that I was filled with stresses, a lifetime of experiences that had imprinted themselves on me and made it uncomfortable simply to be me. The experience of being in my body at that time was not terribly fun, so though I did practice present moment awareness, achieving it was a mixed blessing, at the best of times.
Second, I was not in conscious contact with the field of all possibility on a regular basis, as we are when we meditate--of course we cannot help but be in contact with that field, since we are that field. Still, identified as we are in large part with the ego, before meditation it was a rare thing to feel that connection. Today the connection is there always, and all I need do is turn in its direction to receive healing and inspiration from it. When I feel myself 'at one with' this field, the discomfort of this one small speck of the field--me--simply disappears. When we know this truth, we are healed. We rise above and beyond the pain and the suffering. Without it, our pain and suffering can swell to take up all the space there is and be all that there is for us to experience.
Third, I did not know then how to choose my mood. I was at the mercy of my feelings, at the mercy of the uncomfortable body sensations and the stories my mind told me to explain to me why I had them. Bad feeling=bad person. Me. Of course you feel bad. You are bad. You deserve to feel as badly as you feel.
So the way I felt was my identity. I had no choice. I had no way to think of myself as other than my thoughts and feelings, and if I was feeling 'bad,' then the only way I could change my mood was to change the way I felt. I did not realize then that mood, or point of view, was completely separate from feelings and thoughts.
To make it a bit more poignant, think about what it's like when you have the flu. The 'please God, just shoot me,' sort of flu. If, when I am sick, I am at the mercy of my feelings, these sensations in my body, then I will be in an awful mood until I am well. I will feel miserable, I will behave miserably, I will make the lives of the people around me miserable. I will try to stay as far away from 'living in the moment' as I can, and will just groan and roll about, praying for it to be over.
But as a meditator, no matter how badly I feel, I still can have a choice in my mood. I do not have to assume the former point of view of 'bad.' Bad feelings, bad sensations, bad person, bad mood, bad life. I can instead choose joy. I can choose graciousness and gratitude. I can choose not to have to torture the people in my life with my suffering. I'm not saying that I will enjoy the flu, but I am saying that not even the discomfort of the flu is enough to drive me away from my precious connection to this something bigger than myself. I can choose life, even as my body aches and snivels here with me.
Today I will assume a joyful mood, even if a situation 'tells me' I should suffer, or be in fear, or hate some one, or hate some thing, or hate life, or hate myself.
Fountain, City Hall Park, New York, NY
All material copyright JeffKoberMeditation
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