Being With What Is: A Gentle Approach to Meditation

When we think about meditation, we often imagine a peaceful state of mind - calm, quiet, and free from disturbance. But this expectation itself can become an obstacle. You set yourself up for failure by wishing meditation to be peaceful and pleasant, since meditation is all about being as you are, aware, whatever is going on.

Pain and Escape

When we're stressed or in physical or emotional pain, being with the body can feel impossible. It's natural to escape into action or thinking - or worse. These are understandable reactions; we just want to feel better. But these escapes don't work, at least not for long. The problems remain or even intensify. We might try more of the same medicine then - more action, more thinking - and it spirals on. (Thinking itself can cause stress, tension and headaches if we overdo it, focus too much for too long, and block out the body.)

Sooner or later, if we want things to change, we must face what we're hoping to avoid. We need to really go into the body and all its emotions and sensations.

Preparing the Ground

If you've been spinning like an airplane propeller all day, it's hard to just sit down and suddenly be calm. Before attempting meditation when you're wound up tight, it's helpful to first do things that calm your nervous system:

• Take a long walk through the forest
• Visit a sauna or take a hot/cold bath
• Try yin or restorative yoga
• Practice gentle breathing exercises - this is why I created the app - it really works

These things help connect you with your body, calm your nervous system, and create a foundation for meditation. Try to bring calm into your life instead of adding it as an emergency measure.

What Meditation Really Is

Meditation is ultimately not something you "do" - it is just being as you are, aware, whatever you happen to be doing. But since this isn't possible yet for most of us, we practice.

What we practice then is to be able to be still and quiet and aware. It is not about sitting in a certain way but about a certain alert effortless openness to what is, comes and goes. At the beginning, we do this in sessions in some quiet place for perhaps 20 minutes morning and evening, but the aim is to bring it into your life and make it continuous or unceasing.

When we start out, it can be good to use the breath as something to turn our attention to and to just feel it go in and out, without controlling it in any way. We can then sense the body too in the same way, without wanting to change anything.

When dealing with tension and headaches, the practice is to be in your body, not your head. Notice what's going on in the body (including the head) through feeling - not by describing it, but by feeling it. Don't look for anything in particular or become overly interested in what you find. And importantly, don't wish for it to be different. It may change or stay the same - who knows? That kind of attitude.

Working with Difficulty

When you're dealing with anger, stress, or pain, see if you can be open to these experiences. Be curious about what they really feel like, allowing them in rather than wishing them away. When you open up like this, things often change, and you feel better. The meditation becomes less of something you do and more of an effortless state.

A Word on Thoughts

Don't beat yourself up about thoughts - they're normal and not a problem. But also don't get interested in them, don't follow along, and don't wish them away. Let them hang around as long as they like, just turn your attention gently toward your breath or body, again and again, without frustration if you can, toward something in there that feels good. Until some day you find you don't need to turn away or toward anything.

Be Gentle

If you're dealing with long-term pain or tension, it takes strong resilience, courage, and determination to keep practicing. But remember to be gentle with yourself too - tension does not like gentleness toward yourself. Through this gentleness, combined with awareness and acceptance of what is, we can develop a healthier relationship with our experience, whatever it might be.