musingsonwomenshealth.com

Reflections on 40 years as a doctor in Women's Health

My mind is seldom like the flame of a candle in a windless place…


Maybe I’ve been doing it wrong all these years; maybe I’m not supposed to fall asleep just because my eyes are closed and I’m bored -even if the reason I’m doing it is because I think I’m meditating; or trying to calm down; or maybe because it’s a way to kill time until lunch or something. Meditation is supposed to solve things, calm them down isn’t it? Not just postpone them. I may have to revisit my methodology…

But let’s face it, meditation has many of the trappings of enduring a long sermon in a summer church with its windows closed: my main thoughts are of escape, not enlightenment. It’s hard to find spiritual release -or growth- when I can’t stop my thoughts from running out the door like a young schoolchild at recess. It’s hard to unshackle my mind when it only seems to bumble around in its untethered freedom; I don’t realize any benefits as I wander aimlessly with my thoughts as if I were a toddler following its mother in her perambulations along the labyrinthine corridors of a supermarket.

It seems to me that there are very few advantages of stochastic mind-travel, followed by blankness (sleep, I suppose) and then finally opening my eyes again because I realize I’m hungry. Is that what sermons, prayers, or meditation attempts, are aiming for: stultifying irrelevance? I’m clearly missing something… results, perhaps?

Maybe I’ve been approaching it the wrong way, though; maybe my peregrination during meditation is actually a signal; maybe it’s trying to tell me that something is misaligned; that I’m not really getting anything from trying to unfocus as I sit with my eyes closed. The inevitable subsequent brief sleep that signals that I’ve managed to disengage (meditate?) for a while as I sit impatiently -or at least until the phone alarm I’ve set goes off- is surely not what meditation, or maybe prayer, is supposed to feel like. Is it…?

Apart from a restless mind and often random thoughts that seem to Ferris-wheel around behind my eyes, none of my friends want to want to admit they feel the same thing; they all tell me I must be doing it incorrectly because they get such a relief from the short break they claim as meditation.

“Meditation is like sitting in a restaurant and staring out of the window at the people passing by. After a while, unless they’re truly unusual, they seem to blend into a pudding, don’t you think?” Well that’s how Sarah tried to explain it to me as we sat doing the same thing and stared out of the window of a coffee shop at nothing in particular.

We were both going through problems and after our argument, I suppose we had run out of things to say. But at least we weren’t scowling at each other; and staring at nothing in particular seemed to soothe our moods, I guess. She picked up her coffee cup and rather mindlessly had a sip from it.

“Look at that guy with the cowboy hat, eh?” She smiled and put her cup down again.

I nodded, and then lost myself in a group of laughing business men strolling past in their oh-so-tidy suits. They all seemed smug at the attire they had each chosen for the day, and I mentioned it to Sarah.

“There you go again, G,” she said with a wan smile; I must  have stared at her curiously, so she explained with a disappointed shrug, “Judging people… Again!”

I raised an eyebrow. “And what about you with the guy wearing the cowboy hat?”

“Just commenting on the fact that it’s a little unusual to see somebody wearing one here in Vancouver.” She stared at me for a moment. “It wasn’t a criticism, G,” she added with a frown. “Just an observation…”

I sighed and attacked the remaining crumbs on my plate.

“Its probably like the difference between Meditation and Mindfulness…” When I rolled my eyes, she decided to explain. “A lot of stuff is going on behind our eyes, and if we can’t distract ourselves, it takes over. Details surface and tug at us like my dog on his leash at the playground, wanting my attention. Some things are important; others, like a shiny red car driving past, less so.” She reached across the table and stroked my hand.

“If I hadn’t drawn attention to the cowboy hat passing by, the crowd would still be nothing more than a stew bubbling on the stove.” She smiled and continued to stroke. “That’s sort of what meditation becomes: losing yourself in the randomness of the patterns.

“Mindfulness, on the other hand, is the non-judgmental observation of the stew; the acceptance of the fact that it is doing what stews do; you are merely present while it carries on…”

She squeezed my hand gently -more of a caress, really. “Meditation is a practice; Mindfulness is a state.” She sent her eyes to rest on my cheek for a moment. “You can be mindful in everyday life; it doesn’t require a quiet place or a special time…”

I smiled at her attempt to comfort me. “But I can never seem to calm my mind down when I try to meditate, Sar; I just fall asleep -or give up on my attempts altogether and get up and walk around.”

“What were we both just doing, G? Didn’t staring out of the window at the passersby calm us both after our little argument?”

She had a point.

“And wouldn’t you have felt better if you hadn’t decided to criticize those people in their smart business suits, but just let them pass like you would have that guy with the cowboy hat if I hadn’t drawn your attention to him?”

I had to nod; Sarah calms me down better than meditation ever does.

“In a way, you were practicing a sort of Mindfulness with the cowboy hat: non-judgmental acceptance of its existence. You were out there with it, you were present, and yet you were letting it pass…”

Sometimes, I wish I’d met Sarah when I was younger, but usually I’m just happy that she’s such a good friend. That’s a Mindful observation I think…

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