The Four Keys to Living Mindfully

The Four Keys to Living Mindfully

If we want to live a meaningful life with attention and intention, developing the freedom to live consciously, we need to start training our busy, distracted mind and be able to make healthy choices that are beneficial to the life we want to live. The four key areas of mindfulness to make this transformation possible; attention, values, wisdom and an open heart.

Attention – The first step is to begin developing our attention by establishing a daily meditation practice. In this way we will start training the mind to attend to what we choose to attend to, instead of having it constantly drag us around. In order to live a meaningful life, we need to be present in our life. This means we have to be able to consciously bring our awareness into the moments of our life, instead of constantly being distracted with thoughts, worries, desires, or lost in some past event or future possibility. One of the best methods to cultivate attention and train the mind is the practice of concentration or shamatha meditation.

Shamatha is often translated as calm abiding, allowing the mind to calmly abide on its object of focus. Our mind is usually in one of two states, excitation or laxity. It is either overly active or dull and tired. Our mind gets distracted and is constantly jumping from one thought to another, or is tired and cannot focus. The practice allows one to bring their mind into balance, not too excited or lax, making it serviceable and productive. The building blocks of this meditation practice are relaxation, stability and vividness. The foundation is relaxation, without it there is no sustained progress. First we relax our body and our mind and then direct our attention to our object of meditation. By continually bringing our attention to our object of meditation, over time we develop stability. Eventually, having cultivated relaxation and stability we increase the vividness and clarity of our meditation practice. All of this takes time and a continuous practice. However you will make progress with every meditation session and see great benefit from simply learning to relax. While there are many forms of shamatha practice, we primarily focus on mindfulness of breath.

Values – Values are a critical component of mindfulness and yet, unfortunately, it is left out of so many programs. The source of finding inner peace, genuine happiness and wellbeing is living a life that is in alignment with one’s values and is of benefit to oneself, others and to the greater good. This is an easily verifiable, universal truth that we have learned our whole life. Lasting happiness does not come from outside sources such as other people, places things and events. It comes from how we live our life and what we bring to the world. When our actions are not in harmony with our values, it is easy to recognize that we don’t feel good about ourselves or others. However, when we live a life of integrity, ethically, in alignment with our values, it is much easier to find inner peace and a lasting sense of well-being. When we are mindful, we are aware of when our thoughts and actions are out of alignment with our values, creating disharmony with ourselves and others. The point of mindfulness is to cultivate healthy habits that are beneficial to yourself and others and in alignment with your values.

Often people think of their mindfulness practice as their time in meditation. While this is in fact practice, the majority of your true practice is how you live your life. All too often there is a disconnect between meditating on loving-kindness in the morning and yelling in anger at someone later in the day. Unless you are one of those rare individuals that has the precious opportunity to devote the majority of your life to meditative practice, most of your day will be spent engaged with others as you participate in daily activities of work, play and family life. The bulk of our mindfulness practice is learning to live in harmony with others and the demands and challenges of our daily life. It is easy to be peaceful and calm on the meditation cushion, but much more challenging to be kind to a neighbor that we don’t like. Our meditation practice provides us with the fuel to take our practice into our daily life. It’s hard to make good choices if were not present in the moment. In order to make a choice we have to be there. Conversely we will find that as we make healthier choices in our life, living ethically and in alignment with our values, we will find more inner peace and this improves our ability to meditate. These practices are interrelated and help each other. The more we progress in our meditation, the better able we are to be present in our life and make healthy choices. As we are more mindful in our daily activities and able to make healthy choices that are beneficial to oneself and others, we develop a sense of well-being and calmness which improves our meditation sessions.

Wisdom – As we begin to increase our attention through meditation, we are now more able to consciously bring awareness into our daily activities. We can start observing ourselves, others and the world more accurately, recognizing unhealthy habits and tendencies, biases, projections and emotional triggers in our lives. With this level of awareness, we recognize the impermanent nature of emotions, thoughts, events, and identify the true sources of our suffering as well as the true sources of our genuine happiness and wellbeing.

We often hear that mindfulness is supposed to be nonjudgmental. The context of that is true in mindfulness meditation where one does not judge any thoughts or emotions that arise during meditation. It also applies to making absolute judgments, prejudging people and events in our lives and judgments based on our biases, projections and labeling of others. However, the whole point of mindfulness is to cultivate wisdom and clear discernment, essentially to have good judgment. “Mindfulness, when it arises, follows the courses of beneficial and unbeneficial tendencies: these tendencies are beneficial, these unbeneficial; these tendencies are helpful.” In fact it’s impossible to live without judgment. We use our judgment constantly to make the choices in our lives. To eat healthy or not, to exercise or not, to return a phone call or not, what to wear each day, and the list goes on.

Every time we make a choice we make a judgment. The key is to be able to make healthy choices that are beneficial to yourself and others with discerning wisdom that is based in reality. Bringing discerning awareness into our daily lives we are able to identify three primary misperceptions – ways our mind causes confusion and create suffering:

Impermanence – We try to make things permanent that are not permanent. We forget that everything is constantly changing and try to preserve things that cannot be preserved. Our relationships, our jobs, our homes, our towns, our bodies, our feelings, our attitudes, our personality, etc. are all impermanent and constantly changing. We create a lot of suffering in our lives when we forget this and try to unrealistically keep things as they are. We make a plan for a day and when things don’t go our way, we get frustrated rather than simply adjust and make a new plan.

Unsatisfactoriness/Happiness – We keep trying to find lasting happiness in things that can only provide a temporary pleasure. There is no person, job, relationship, house, car, vacation, family or activity that can provide any lasting happiness. The most that any person, thing or events can provide us is a temporary pleasure. In fact, when we look at the source of our worry and suffering, it is usually the very things that we thought would bring us happiness. There is absolutely no problem with enjoying our friends, relationships, activities and vacations. We just need to be realistic about what they can and cannot offer us. This is also true of suffering, we can exaggerate even very small troubles in our life, allowing them to dominate our whole day.

Misperception/understanding of self – We tend to have a strong sense of “I” that is independent of others and has a unique set of characteristics, qualities and personality that is the same from day to day. However, when we investigate this we find that we are actually very interdependent. The food we eat, the clothes we wear, the books we read, the ability to read, to drive, to recreate, to communicate, etc. is all dependent upon others, as well as our environment, culture, society and government. The “I” that we grasp onto is also actually very fluid, changing day-to-day. We are not the same person that we were five years ago, ten years ago, or even yesterday. Another way we misperceive our self is by strongly identifying with our feelings. Imagining that “I am sad,” “I am angry,” “I am happy,” etc. You are not your feelings, you experience your feelings. Feelings will come and go and you will still be here. The misperception of our self and our relationship with others, create much suffering, such as jealousy, pride, low self-esteem, fear, resentment, and discontent and prevent us from engaging fully with the world and opening ourselves up to all our potentials. Not only can we change, we do change all the time.

The more we are able to recognize and assimilate these three truths into our own lives accurately, the less we will suffer.

An Open Heart – It is a universal truth that we cannot feel both love and anger at the same time for the same thing. Love can switch to hate in a second and hate to love, but they cannot be simultaneous. It is like turning a light on in a dark room. It is also a universal truth that what we water grows. That is to say the mental states and tendencies that we nurture grow. As the neuroscientists say, “neurons that fire together, wire together.” Or as an old wise Cherokee parable states:

One evening an old Cherokee Indian told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, ‘My son, the battle is between two ‘wolves’ inside us all. One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.’ The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: ‘Which wolf wins?’ The old Cherokee simply replied, ‘The one you feed.’

When we cultivate equanimity, loving-kindness, compassion and empathetic joy in our hearts and minds, we grow the antidotes to attachment and aversion, hatred, ill will and jealousy.

© 2015 Mindful Life Program Inc

The Problem of Being Delusional

If we take a moment to truly examine our lives accurately, we will find that nearly all of our worries and stresses are actually unnecessary. In fact, we will discover that compared to most of humanity, we get to experience an incredible quality of life that is filled with both opportunity and leisure. We have abundant resources such as food, clothing, electricity, education, healthcare, and running water in our own home. Most of the world’s population do not have access to these resources that we take for granted. We have an incredible amount of leisure time to pursue activities we enjoy, while most other people in the world are simply trying to survive. Yet with all of these resources, time and opportunity, we suffer with increasing levels of stress, anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, high blood pressure, and high degrees of overall dissatisfaction. We have an incredible amount of technology to make our life easier, yet we find it difficult to relax, to be calm, or find contentment and well-being in our own life. Even with deluxe beds that we can customize to just the proper level of firmness, climate control in our own homes to make our environment as comfortable as possible and a myriad of resources to entertain us, it is difficult to find true comfort and inner peace. In our quest for the good life, we wind up needing whole industries dedicated to reducing our stress and mental suffering – the pharmaceutical industry, the mental health industry, massage and relaxation therapies, as well as a growing healthcare industry that deals with the physical symptoms resulting from our stress and poor coping strategies.

How is this possible? We are intelligent people with education, opportunity, and resources and yet we find it difficult to be content, at ease and present in our own lives. The root of the problem is clearly described by Alan Wallace when he explains that we suffer from a mind that is obsessive, compulsive and delusional. Instead of us directing our attention where we like and responding to life with reflective and healthy choices, our mind constantly is dragging our attention from one thought or feeling to another and, all too often, we are simply reacting rather than responding to life. Our mind is obsessive in the sense that it is constantly producing thoughts. We are unable to stop thinking even for a minute. So even when we try to calm our mind and relax, we notice that the mind continues to produce thought after thought over and over again. It’s one thing to be obsessive, but it is also compulsive. The mind does not merely produce thoughts, it compulsively draws our attention away from what we are doing and directs it to the referent of the thoughts. It tells us what to worry about, what to desire, what to be irritated about, etc. Even when we know we have nothing to worry about, the mind will insist there is! We can tell ourselves, “Oh no, that’s not a problem”, and the mind will say, “Oh yes it is”. We can see the difficulty of having a mind that is obsessively thinking and compulsively directing our attention to the thoughts and the stories it’s creating. Unfortunately, it gets worse, our mind is overwhelmed with delusion. The thoughts and stories, worries and fears the mind is obsessively and compulsively telling us is rarely based in reality. Essentially this is the crux of the problem, we have a very distracted mind and it spends most of its time in a world that doesn’t correspond with reality.

Our mind lives in a world that believes that if we exercise and eat right we will be healthy and live long, if we maintain our car it won’t break down, that if we get just the right job we will have it made, and that if meet the right person, we will live happily ever after and find lasting happiness. While these are admirable goals and a valuable way to participate in life, unfortunately that world does not exist. Because we have such unrealistic expectations we are often ill-prepared for the realities of life.

In truth, life is messy. People get sick even if they exercise and eat healthy, cars break down, relationships are not perfect, they require effort and compromise, and no matter how good they are, at some point they will end. In the real world, fatal diseases are common, jobs come and go, accidents happen, injuries happen, traffic happens, recessions happen, and even the government shuts down from time to time. The amazing thing is that even though we see this every day, for some reason our mind believes that it should not happen to us. There is a whole industry built on the principle of cars breaking down. It is called the automotive repair industry. Yet we are constantly surprised and frustrated when our car breaks down. We see hospitals, medical clinics and cancer centers, but we surprised and often devastated when we, or our loved ones, get sick. This same phenomenon applies to getting stuck in traffic, a flight getting delayed, luggage getting lost, laid off from a job, canceled vacation, loss of a relationship, our children not getting good grades or getting in trouble. We know they happen but still don’t expect them to happen to us, causing a reaction that adds to our suffering. These are just a few examples, but you can see how this phenomenon applies to nearly every facet of our lives.

When we really take a moment to reflect, we will see that nearly all of our mental sufferings such as anger, resentment, jealousy, depression, stress, low self-esteem, etc., have no other source but our own mind. As Venerable Pema Chodron states, “It isn’t the things that happen to us in our lives that make us suffer, it’s how we relate to the things that happen to us that makes us suffer.” Unfortunately, we usually relate to people and events in our life in unrealistic ways. Let’s look at two ways of relating to finding out that our car won’t start:

Delusional and reactive – We think our car should not break down. We become angry, upset or panicked, quickly calling to mind our bad luck and asking why now? Our mind presents us with how terrible this is, possibly looking for who to blame such as our mechanic, our partner or the car company, how inconvenient this is, how much money this could cost and what a bad day this has turned out to be. Eventually, we do make an alternative plan to get where were going and have the car fixed. However, we carry our frustration and perceived bad luck throughout our day, sharing it with our friends.

Realistic and responsive – Understanding that it is natural that cars sometimes don’t start, after a moment of surprise, we accept and assess the situation and move into solution mode. We get a jumpstart or other needed help and make an alternate plan to get where we are going. We then make a plan to get the car fixed. Instead of asking, “Why me?” and thinking of our bad luck, we find that it is more realistic to be grateful that we have a car when so many don’t and a place to go when so many do not. Instead of letting this ruin our day, it reminds us of our resources and friends that can help us.

In both of the above cases, the event is the same but the outcomes and level of suffering are very different based upon the attitude one brings to the situation. It is a very common practice and complete misunderstanding to blame the source of our mental and emotional suffering on other people, events or things. However, the true source is our own mind that lives in an unrealistic world and wants things to be different than they are. When we investigate the root of our sufferings it is inevitable that we will discover at least one of three primary delusional activities at work; our mind is constantly trying to find lasting happiness in things and people that cannot provide it, trying to find permanence in things that are constantly changing, and grasping on to a misperception of self and others.

The good news is that we can tame our unruly mind, cultivate wisdom and learn to cultivate genuine happiness as we live in the real world. We do this by learning to live mindfully.

Mindfulness is much more than present moment awareness, mindfulness includes and facilitates the cultivation of concentration, wisdom, and the ability to make healthy choices that foster genuine happiness and a meaningful life.

The tools of mindfulness empower us to be aware of our thoughts, feelings and the environment with clarity and discernment. It enables us to recognize healthy tendencies from unhealthy tendencies, harmful habits from beneficial habits, delusional grasping from clear understanding, and be able to make choices that are in alignment with our values, healthy, beneficial and meaningful. In doing so, we cultivate inner peace, genuine happiness and a meaningful life.

© 2015 Mindful Life Program Inc

Stimulus Driven Pleasure vs Genuine Happiness

Stimulus Driven Pleasure versus Genuine Happiness

One of the constant problems in our lives is that we confuse stimulus driven pleasure with genuine happiness. We are constantly looking for lasting happiness in people, places, activities, jobs, relationships and other outside elements. The pervasive delusion of our time is that the source of our happiness or our suffering is somewhere outside of ourselves. We keep thinking that if we get the right job, the right relationship, or the right house, we will be happy. Of course, we all know that we can have all these things and still be subject to anger, frustration, depression, resentment, and more. All of these things outside of ourselves can provide a short-term stimulus driven pleasure. They can also provide the conditions for suffering. The things in our lives that cause us the most amount of worry, stress, anxiety or fear are often the things we care for the most such as our relationships, job and family. In other words, the things that we think will bring us lasting happiness often become the conditions from which much of our mental and emotional suffering come from. We’re essentially looking for happiness in all the wrong places.

Quoting B. Alan Wallace, “Genuine happiness does not come from the world, rather it comes from what we bring to it.” What we mean by genuine happiness is an inner flourishing, a lasting sense of wellbeing, inner peace and connection. It does not mean that we are giddy all the time, but it does mean we know tranquility and are able to respond to the ups and downs of life with stability and loving-kindness. The main point here is to not confuse stimulus driven pleasure with lasting happiness. Our genuine happiness is not contingent upon outside sources, requiring things to go our way. It does not come from the delicious meal, the job, or our relationship. It comes from how we prepared the delicious meal; making it to keep our bodies healthy and sharing it with others. It does not come from the job. It comes from how we do our job; being helpful to our coworkers and being ethical at work. It does not come from our relationship. It comes from how we show up and participate in our relationship. The amazing discovery is that we already have inner peace and genuine happiness. It is always present underneath the worries and busyness of our obsessive, compulsive and delusional mind. When the mind is balanced and clear, there naturally arises a feeling of well-being and inner flourishing that is often described as bliss.

Another model we can use to illustrate this point is the Eight Worldly Concerns. The worldly concerns are motivating factors in our life quest for happiness that can sometimes lead us away from our ethics and wisdom. They are:

Gain and loss – We are very happy when we get what we want and then not happy when we lose things or people we like. Thus we spend a lot of time and energy trying to get what we want and avoid losing these things.

Pleasure and pain – We enjoy pleasurable things. In fact, that’s the definition of pleasure. Of course, we don’t enjoy pain and we seek to avoid it.

Praise and criticism – We like it when people praise us and are unhappy when people criticize us. On very subtle levels, we spend a lot of our time seeking validation of others and trying to avoid their displeasure.

Good reputation and bad reputation (also called fame and insignificance) – We want people to think highly of us and don’t feel very good when others think ill of us or that we don’t have much to offer.

When we examine our lives we will discover that the above worldly concerns are a driving force in all of our activities of mind and body. There’s nothing wrong seeking the things we need and trying to avoid losing them, seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, appreciating validation from others and having a good reputation. The problem comes when we allow these temporary concerns to override our long-term well-being and happiness. The worldly concerns are stimulus driven, short-term pleasure. They are temporary and often create the ground of much worry, rumination and unnecessary suffering when they are our primary guiding motivation. We need to remember their limitations.

Our genuine happiness does not come from the worldly concerns. It comes from how we live our lives, mentally, emotionally and physically. It is grounded in wisdom and ethics.

When our actions in life are motivated by the desire to live a meaningful life, in alignment with our values and is of benefit to self and others, were able to create long-term happiness and well-being.

The problem is that most of the time we are motivated by worldly concerns without reflecting upon our values and wisdom. In the quest to get what we want, be accepted by others, or just feel good, we often go against our own values in very subtle ways without even being aware of it. When we are in alignment with our values, we do the right thing regardless of gain or loss, pain or pleasure, praise or criticism, or reputation, and feel much better about ourselves in the long run. What others think about us is not nearly as important as what we think about ourselves. It is important to bring wisdom into our choices. Often it’s very healthy to endure a little pain or to put off some pleasure for a beneficial long-term result. We teach our children about delayed gratification and often forget to apply it in our own lives. As we make choices in our life, rather than reacting to feelings and desires that arise, it’s important to take a moment to reflect upon making healthy choices that contribute to long-term benefit and the life you define is meaningful.

© 2015 Mindful Life Program Inc

Establishing a Daily Practice

Establishing a Daily Practice

One of the keys to establishing a successful daily practice is to actually start the evening before. Instead of waiting till you wake up to set your intention for the day, set your intention to wake up with some time dedicated to reflection and/or meditation before you go to bed at night. You will find that this is extremely helpful as you’ve already laid the groundwork to wake up with intention.  

1. Upon awakening, as soon as possible, start shaping your motivation by calling to mind that you have the opportunity to awaken to another day in recovery. It is helpful to bring this to mind as quickly as possible a reminder of just how fortunate you truly are and set the intention to use this day as an opportunity to develop yourself and live it meaningfully. Ideally, it is best to do this while you’re still in bed and as you place your feet on the ground to get out of bed, consciously step into your day with attention, gratitude and optimism.  

2. Before your day gets busy take a little time for reflection and/or meditation. We suggest that every day your reflection includes a little time dedicated to three thoughts to inspire your day:  

  • Call to mind an accurate assessment of your life – Reflect on how fortunate you are to have a life in recovery. So many in our world are overwhelmed by their addictions. Also, much of the world’s population don’t even have the opportunity to have an education, have drinking water in their own home or freedom to make choices in their own lives. Bring to your awareness all of the things you have to be grateful for. Make it relevant and personal.  
  • Having called to mind the opportunities you have, take a moment to reflect on the impermanent nature of life. Call to mind the truth that death is certain and the time of death is uncertain. Think of all those you have known that have passed away. Don’t do this in a morbid way, but as an affirmation of the precious gift and fragile nature of life. To remind yourself that this day will never come again – you have it but once. It is filled with opportunities to improve, learn, heal, and develop the qualities in yourself that you want grow.
  • You have a life of recovery, filled with support and opportunities, but it won’t last forever. Every day is a new opportunity and fresh start if we chose to take advantage of it. Take some time to reflect on the person you want to be. What is a meaningful life to you? How do you want to live this day? Set your intention to not waste this day and live it with attention and intention, cultivating the qualities that you find meaningful. Remember, the only thing that separates the person you are from the person you want to be, are the actions you take.  

The above three thoughts are merely a suggestion. If you find all three or any one of them beneficial, then include them in your daily reflection/contemplation time.  

3. In order to cultivate attention in your life it is important to include some meditation. We usually suggest a mindfulness of breath meditation as it is extremely efficient in developing attentional balance. We have some guided meditations available for your convenience varying in length from five minutes to 24 minutes. If you are just starting a practice, it is important to not try to do too much too soon. Quality is much more important than quantity. We suggest you start off with a shorter time and then gradually increase the amount of time that you meditate. There are further directions and helpful tips in the meditation section.  

4. After your meditation, we suggest you take a little time to read and reflect upon the daily quote and the activity for the day. If you find the activity to be something you are inspired to engage in, set a strong intention to do it for the day. Otherwise, call to mind something you do want to focus on today such as patience, listening, or another quality you would like to develop. Each activity invites you to stop a few times throughout the day and note some reflections. Included in the Resource Library is a “Daily Mindfulness Check In” form to print and use as a guide. If you can do this, you will find it extremely beneficial. If you found a particular activity very beneficial and would like to do it for more than one day that is absolutely appropriate.  

5. At the end of the day we suggest that you take a few minutes to reflect upon the day. Take a little time to note what went well and what you would like to improve. If there is something that was difficult and you did not handle it skillfully, take a little time to reflect upon what happened and how you would like to handle it more skillfully the next time. Set strong intention to handle it skillfully next time. We have a meditation that can help you with this titled Transforming Unskillful Events. Remember to be gentle with yourself, and that this is practice, not perfection.  

6. Before bed, set again your intention to wake up and dedicate some time in the morning to your mindfulness practice.

 

© 2015 Mindful Life Program Inc

 

 

Concentration and Meditation

Concentration and Meditation

One of the key components to living mindfully – is learning how to tame the unruly mind and cultivate attentional balance. In other words, we must learn how to direct our attention where we want it and hold it there. Ultimately, this is the only way to establish free will in our lives.

It is a common myth that we have such free will and use it daily. Most of our choices and reactions are triggered by an unruly mind; they are not conscious choices based in reality. If we are to have free will in our lives, we need to be present in the current moment with clarity and wisdom. Instead of having the mind drag us around from one thought or feeling to the next, we need to train the mind to serve us in the healthiest way possible.

If we observe the mind, we will notice that it tends to be either very active – ruminating, planning, reminiscing (often referred to as monkey mind) – or tired, such as when we can’t muster the energy to pay attention. These two states are often described as excitation and laxity – the mind tends to be either too excited or too lax. Rarely is it relaxed, stable and attentive. This dual tendency – excitation and laxity – is a common one that has been noted in many wisdom traditions throughout time. It is so common, in fact, that people just get used to it and accept is as a normal state of mind. While this acceptance is a pervasive human experience, in truth it is not our natural state of mind. The natural state of the mind is blissful, luminous and non-conceptual.

Unfortunately, the obsessive, compulsive and delusional activities of the mind obscure its true natural state. This state is verifiable – consistently replicated by meditators over thousands of years – yet it eludes us. When we are able to cultivate attentional balance, avoid getting caught up in excitation or laxity, and develop the ability to rest our awareness in a relaxed, stable and clear way, only then will we discover this natural, blissful state of mind.

The method of cultivating attentional balance that has been refined over thousands of years is available to us in concentration meditation otherwise known as shamatha (calm abiding). This specific practice is the antidote to the most detrimental mental affliction we have: the obsessive and compulsive mind. Before unveiling this method further, let us say a few words about meditation.

First, the form of meditation we are suggesting is very simple and can be done by anyone. You do not need to climb a mountain, sit in full lotus position, or learn any complicated visualizations. It is as simple as learning to relax your body, breathe naturally and pay attention.

Second, there are many different types of meditation, and all of them are designed with a specific purpose in mind. The great teachers of all traditions will emphasize that it does not matter so much that we sit this way or that way, do this meditation or that meditation; what matters is whether our meditation counteracts our mental afflictions. This is a very important point, and one that is overlooked far too frequently. So often we hear studies indicating that meditation has all sorts of wonderful benefits. Nice posters state that, if we all meditated, the world would be a peaceful place. Unfortunately, these claims are often out of context and not entirely true. Meditation can have a beneficial, non-beneficial, or neutral effect on us. We can use meditation to escape the responsibilities and challenges of life – or to face them. We can use meditation to concentrate all our energy on selfish means – or on helping others. We can do elaborate meditations working with energy and, without proper guidance, actually damage our bodies. We can also use certain meditations – understanding their specific purpose and with guidance from a qualified teacher – that enable us to alleviate, if not eliminate, mental and physical afflictions, thus improving our quality of life.

So remember that when learning to meditate it is very important for us to understand the purpose of the meditation, the directions of the meditation and how it addresses our afflictions. The concentration meditation that used in MLP is very safe, easy to learn and can be extremely effective in cultivating attentional balance.

Because many of us do not have a great deal of freedom and time to participate in hours of training, practice and meditation, it is also important to use what little time we do have to meditate in the most effective way. Most people are fortunate if they have 30 minutes a day to dedicate to formal meditation practice. We lead very busy lives, and it can be challenging to break old habits and create the time for a meditation practice. So, if you are able to meditate for only 10, 20 or 30 minutes, why not choose the meditation that directly counteracts our biggest obstacle, the unruly mind? That is the very specific purpose of concentration meditation practice.

Meditation practices are divided into two categories: concentration and contemplative/analytical. Concentration meditation such as shamatha is a concentration practice designed to develop attentional balance. The unique feature of this meditation is that we focus all of our awareness on one object to the exclusion of all else. In this way, we are able to train the mind to attend to what we choose, rather than have it drag our attention around. This meditation practice is also very healthy for our bodies. It allows us to rest body and mind in their natural states, which, in itself, is very healing. An added bonus to all of these benefits is that this meditation is a simple and straightforward practice that all of us can learn. It has three stages of development: relaxation, stability and vividness. It is often explained using a tree as a metaphor.

The roots of the tree represent relaxation. For us to truly progress in this practice, we need to be able to relax the body while keeping the mind alert. As simple as this sounds, we find that it is a skill to be cultivated. Rarely is the body physically relaxed while the mind is clear and mentally alert. We notice that when we relax, we have a tendency to feel very tired, or even fall asleep. Most of the time, the nervous system is quite active and ramped up. So, initially, our practice is simply learning how to relax our bodies without falling asleep. This is the root of our tree.

As we develop in our practice and are able to be alert while relaxed, what will become the trunk of our tree – stability – begins to sprout. Stability occurs when we are able to maintain our attention on our chosen object of meditation. If we have a consistent practice, even if it is only a short time daily, we will learn to have a relaxed body and an alert mind that is eventually able to remain focused on what we have chosen to attend to. This is a gradual process; trying to hurry does not help.

At first, the mind will wander many times, challenging us to maintain stability. At this point, many people struggle and begin to believe that they are not capable of meditating. However, this is when we are actually making progress! If the mind wanders 10 times during meditation and we bring it back 10 times, we have just had 10 mindful moments that we would not have had otherwise. Every time we notice that the mind has wandered, we become mindful and are able to direct it back consciously. This is the process of training the mind.

Most the time, when the mind wanders, we are not aware of it; it just takes us along for the ride. But gradually, with consistent practice, the trunk of stability will develop, and we will be able to rest our awareness on our chosen object for longer periods of time. Eventually, this will lead to a high degree of clarity and a vividness; these are the leaves of our tree. There is a sequence: First relaxation, then stability and, finally, vividness. Of course, in our goal-oriented modern Western world, we often try to reach for the leaves first, before we have developed healthy roots and a strong trunk. Rather than being beneficial, this actually hinders our progress.

There are two primary reasons people struggle to develop a consistent meditation practice. First, we don’t really know why we are meditating. We have a vague idea that it is good for us, we have read about its benefits and we believe that it will bring us inner peace. Then we try different meditations with hope that we will find . . . something. However, because we don’t know the specific qualities of the meditation we’re doing and how it is targeted to specific afflictions, it is difficult for us to see any progress, and our practice fades away.

Establishing any new habit is challenging; to be successful, we have to have a clear, realistic goal and a measurable path by which to arrive at that goal. As we prepare to meditate, we like to remind people to take a little time to remember why we are meditating – to call to mind that this is an opportunity to develop ourselves fully and cultivate a meaningful life with attention and intention. By choosing to meditate, we are developing the ability to direct the mind and attention where we choose, to no longer live unconsciously, to stop falling victim to every thought, feeling, worry or desire that pops into our heads. We give ourselves permission to relax and nourish ourselves, allowing body and mind to heal and become resources we can draw upon.

The second reason we struggle with meditation is that we try to do too much too soon. It is much better to start with short meditations of good quality than long meditations of poor quality. Quality is much more important than quantity with meditation. When we begin a meditation practice, it is best to choose a short one and learn to do it well. Venerable Thubten Chodron states that the best meditation practice occurs when we finish and feel as if we could have done a bit more. This encourages us to look forward to our next session rather than seeing it as a chore, which we might do after a painfully long session.

© 2015 Mindful Life Program Inc