and nourishing life with mindfulness
A difficult sitting this morning. Not that anything particularly difficult was going on in my head, or occuring on/in my body.
Just difficult to really “get into” being present.
I was just not quite “on” the ball (of Mindfulness)
A half a millimetre off from being here.
A nano-second away from being now.
And when you aren’t here, and you aren’t now
You’re nowhere.
What is Concentration?
It’s a bit like when you throw a dart towards a dartboard, or hit a snooker ball towards a pocket.
There’s a certain focus of attention you need, a certain kind of being in the zone.. Concentration is alert, in alignment, locked on; just enough sufficiently relaxed to be free of tension.
There’s intention, but no tension.
The concentration is not grim. (I haven’t got my Stephen Hendry face on)
The concentration is not dour (like John Higgins)
The concentration is not nervily concerned (like Graham Dott)
The concentration is not intense (like Peter Ebdon)
The concentration is not blank or impassive (pick any Chinese snooker player)
The concentration is like me. I’m the World Concentration Champion of me!
I’m the Ronnie O’Sullivan of Mindfulness. Lol
Quite alot of attention available to me this morning.
More than enough. To go round everything that needed to be attended to.
Or even if it didn’t “need” attending to. I gave attention. I didn’t discriminate on a need to know basis.
Whatever was there is there, is here, is now.
I’m simply passing it through, my mind like a hand handling each now and then handing it on. Now the next now. And the next now. From one mindful hand to the next.
My mind like a hand in the now.
Mindfulness like a “passing between”
Sitting with a “paying attention” intention.
To whatever comes up, however big, however small.
Alot of small stuff is coming. The kind of small-change that drops through the slots of everyday mind to every mind.
Hardly anything to be bothering with, or spending the currency of my awareness on.
But i’m paying attention – so i do.
So: there’s an itch going on in the corner of my left nostril.
Now it’s jumped.
Into the other nostril!
How to make meditation “actual” – as in applicable?
Bringing it to the everyday stuff, so that the “stuff” isn’t sqaushed or quashed or stifled?
Allowing a normal or usual experiencing of things without becoming self-conscious, without becoming conspiciously mindful. Not getting in the way of experiencing, feeling, sensing.
Simply allowing mindfulness to curl around the edges of everything. Be a befriending presence, be like an embrace that holds but doesn’t hold on; that touches but doesn’t tighten into a clinging grasp.
These are the thoughts i was contemplating, waited in line at Tesco’s this evening (Lol)
I’m still not concentrating.
How can you “not concentrate” if that is what you are wanting to do?
I must obviously not be wanting to concentrate. That is what i want : not to concentrate.
So therefore let me follow, let me pay attention, to what i do want.
What i want is for my mind to be complaining and moaning. Or maybe my mind is simply taking over what “I” want.
It’s more of a “Me” want.
And the Me want usually does want all the moany and complainy stuff going on – seems to thrive on complaint, seems to exist merely to moan.
Struggling to concentrate.
I don’t like “struggling” at the best of times. I’ve always wanted to let myself off the hook of being caught up with struggling and wriggling (like a worm)
Struggling is something i avoid. I don’t want my life to be about “struggle”: to survive, to stay alive. I got enough of this struggle mentality coming at me from my parents (especially my mom)
I want a life that goes in the opposite direction to struggling and wriggling (like a worm) I want a life of ease.
But sometimes that need of ease has lead me astray; into a life of complacency.
And complacency easily slides into apathy.
No awakening of awareness can come out of apathy and complacency.
So maybe some “struggle” is good. Only lets call it something like “good will”, or “right effort”, or “enlivened interest”.
I used that expression yesterday: “this very present moment”.
All of this being mindful and meditating seems to be about getting a sense of “very” into as much of my life as i can.
Where “very” means: “more than” what is usual, or more than what is normal, more than what is obvious or ordinary.
It’s about trying to extract whatever juice there is from these moments – and to drink from these moments, savouring their juicyness.
Of course there’s a danger in setting up a craving for “more than”; because then can come quick dissatisfaction when not experiencing a “very” state – and a mind that is telling me that my experiencing is insufficient, less than, not enough – because not enough of the “very” juice seems available to be drunk.
And of course, “Just to be alive is enough” can never been satisfied or settled into from a condition of mind that constantly seeks “more than”.
It’s a tricky one.
Maybe “very” is simply about stripping away and stripping away the present moment, to lay it bare, to expose the essence of experience that is very straightforward, ordinary, normal.
Sometimes i sit in the evening rather than the morning. Sometimes i sit morning and evening.
Sometimes it doesn’t always feel like meditating.
Sometimes it seems more like “sitting”.
Sitting quietly, to feel the texture of whatever is current touching and being touched upon.
Sitting with a kind of absorption that has slipped a few degrees under the surface to somewhere inside that feels different; a denser, more enriched sense of Being.
Sitting that is simply noticing: this very present moment; noticing what is occuring within me – and around me.
Not judging anything of course.
Simply sitting.
It’s often difficult to meditate on Monday mornings. I suppose it’s the associations with Monday mornings i bring that make meditating difficult.
I mean, Monday morning is just Monday morning. This Monday morning is just this Monday morning. This Monday is just this Monday.
In fact “Monday” is merely a name being given to the morning. The morning couldn’t care less what it was called.
And of course the morning isn’t any name, isn’t anything thing.
I could unMonday this morning, set it free from all my (negative) assumptions.
Next Monday morning I’m going to liberate it.
From all its (my) Mondayness
