STORY BYIf you're a first-time meditator, the experience should go something like this:
Breathe in, breathe out... I'm focused on my breathing. Why do I smell gas? Not gas, really, more like Lysol... Breathe in, breathe out. I forgot to call my mother. I can already hear it, 'You manage to call your father, what am I, chopped liver?' Breathe in...
I wonder how long I've been sitting here... Breathe out. I have my mother's toes. I never realized that. Garbage bags. I like the ones with the little loops. Breathe in... breathe out. I wonder how they make garbage bags?... Concentrate on my breathing... sure smells like gas. Breathe in. Did I pay the gas bill?... Breathe out.
Even experienced meditators muse about the gas bill during meditation. The difference is, with practice, you can gently follow your mind back to its chosen focus and stay there, longer and easier.
Think of the mind's activity as passing clouds. You watch them pass, sometimes noting a cloud that looks like a rabbit, which takes you into a memory about Easter as a child. And then gently bring your attention back to the simple passing of clouds. In that short span of time, you have emptied your mind of thousands of racing and competing thoughts. Your blood pressure has dropped, your pulse has slowed, your adrenaline and cortisol levels have had no reason to soar. You've just given yourself a life-sustaining break.
Now call your mother.
UPDATED: 4-26-2005
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Make an appointment
with your stress—
and keep it!
Set aside a specified time of day, say 3:00 to 3:20 P.M. Keep this appointment with yourself—make it as important as a client or a child’s reading time.
Now, let the stress pour out of you, all the worry, guilt, what-ifs, if-onlys. Hold nothing back. Imagine every possible scenario that intrudes on you, day and night. Funnel it into that 20-minute period.
When the bell goes off, you are done, finished, until your next appointment with yourself.
When you’re tempted to let stressful thoughts crawl across your mind, remind yourself that you have 20 minutes to address them—tomorrow.
