11-22-18

MEDITATION NOTES 5

COLLOQUY FOR CLASS 5

Class 4 examined what creating a meditative space might look like. The idea of contending with the mind's commotions to clear a more pristine and quiet area is one of the most difficult aspects of meditation. There is something about sitting to be quiet and calm that invites noise and entanglements. It is these cacophonous forces that discourage many people from pursuing what could be a most helpful and healing interaction. We think there is a real difference between the environment of our outer lives and that of our inner lives. Just as we expect some perfect ideal of ourselves, so we expect that when we make the decision to sit quietly we will have a carpet of soft comfort unrolled before us. It is surprising when that doesn't happen and frustrating when we encounter commotion every time we sit to meditate. It is so easy to adapt to the commotion we can see and hear in our awake lives than to struggle with sometimes even greater disordered forces that collide in our minds.

The clamorous cacophony of our minds when left to themselves is classically referred to as “monkey mind,” that state in which wild and unbidden animal sounds and images impinge on orderly thought (refer here to the quote of Michel Montaigne). This is normal for the mind. It is what minds do when left open to the elements of meditation. It seems that the monkeys are always playing in the background and we only notice them when we expect quiet. If we sit and open up the mind without grounding or resourcing, then we are thrown in with all those wild forces. If we at first ground ourselves in our bodies, sensing the breath and enlisting the parasympathetic nervous system, then choose our strongest and most meaningful resource, we have cleared space over which we have control. If then we become the participant/observer of our thoughts, we can begin to choose what we want our minds to consider, if anything. The point is that we get to choose. If we are once again besieged by monkeys, then we can return to the breath and to our personal resource to quiet the noise. The process of quieting is just that, a process, one that is always being altered in one way or another. I would say that in any given meditation period I do this oscillating between noise and resource many times, always beginning again but always in a slightly different place in the stream of thought. Isn't it said by wise people that we can't step into the stream twice in the same place? So it is with meditation and the context of our minds from one moment to the next. Sometimes that new beginning feels like progress and sometimes it feels like a rescue. But what it feels like will come from our own exertions and it will be ours to claim. Even if the stake we claim turns out to be a dud in that moment, we will have made the choice and hold to the freedom that brings.

I would like to suggest that this commotion and confusion is creative. In addition to being a normal phenomenon of mind, it is also the context for understanding ourselves and the world more fully. It is in this understanding that we are able to break away from the tethers of being controlled and oppressed to a state of liberation. To do this, we need to begin to understand better what being human entails. We have already observed how debilitating it can be to strive for some ideal self, to create a pain gap between who we aspire to be and who we truly are. We have explored how “self” is constituted in the brain and how our unique identities evolve from our autobiographical experiences. To go a bit further in understanding how the self can become the ground of creativity we need to consider more ways in which the self can be profiled.

To this end, let me add to the definition of self the qualities of imperfection, impermanence, interdependence, insecurity, unpredictability, uncertainty, and mortality. These are forces that may intrude on our meditations repeatedly and with varying degrees of force and noise. They are the same forces that lurk in the backs of our minds during waking hours when we are tending to tasks of mundane life, like doing laundry or making school lunches or flossing our teeth. When we sit expecting a quiet space, they are there to bedevil us. Yet, it is in giving ourselves over to them that we are able to embrace a more fully rounded emotional life. Because they are embodied and true to our existence as human beings on earth, we add them to the pain of our divided selves when we push them away in hopes they will disappear. When we have fooled ourselves and they return in full force to our desired quiet space of meditation, we are outraged at their presence and persistence. But are we not railing against what rounds out our human character? Are we not dishonoring our true selves? Are we not disowning who we are? And in doing so, do we not create our own suffering?

When we encounter monkeys, we often treat them as we do other threats and stresses. We trigger reactivity (the hard-wired fight, flight, freeze), frame a relationship with them, and formulate judgments about them. (“Is this a dangerous situation?”, “Is it safe to pause and respond?”). Beyond the protections of the reactive state, layers of judgment can build up and these become unclaimed baggage, emotional and otherwise (“I was so weak”, “I shouldn't have said that”, “I am a failure”).

If, instead, we are able to recognize our impermanent state and our vulnerability, then aren't we in a good place to pause and create the conditions for creative action and interaction? Are we not then participant/observers of our own life and able to make choices about what happens next? While life has its unpredictable aspects (how much can we truly predict or control?), we can say we don't know what “next” means. When we do ask “What then shall I do?” (see notes for Class 1), we open up the infinite expanse of possibilities and we get to choose what comes next. The notion of choice, of having options from which to choose, gives us control over a certain number of elements in our lives, especially within our inner lives and the meditative space (forces in our outer, mundane lives, are less respectful of our choosing and we will look at them in Class 6). All of this process is part and parcel of sitting in meditation and moving beyond grounding and resourcing. And what seems effective in the meditative space of our minds, also becomes effective in the mental space of our waking days. It is for this very reason that dividing up our lives into “inner” and “outer” doesn't make much sense because effective mental processing applies to the wholeness axis. With practice in meditation, we practice how to be in every part of our lives, always progressing to greater integration, even if it doesn't always feel that positive.

In the last two classes we will look more closely at how we might choose to respond to simple dualities that divide us and that arise all the time in the meditative space. We will also explore how to approach the judgments we make based on them. Are we held prisoner by our judgments or can we consider them and then let them go?

So, the inner commotion that surges up in meditation is the creative ground for greater flexibility, resilience, and adaptability. We are more balanced on our feet and in our thoughts. We have made friends with the monkeys and we have tamed them to some extent. Yes, they will be there when you return, but they will be different every time. The key is to show up for the show and to address them with kindness, for in doing so, one shows kindness and acceptance for what it is to be a human rather than a monkey (so little separates us genetically, but in crucially important ways) and to be who you truly are.

The kindness and understanding we show to ourselves and the ways in which we deal with our personal monkeys also contribute to what is referred to as neuroplasticity of the brain. Neuroplasticity is all about exercising within the resilient zone, modulating between activation and responsivity but attempting to spend as much time as possible in the calming phase. When we are able to accomplish this, we are in a position to literally change our minds. The firing and wiring that occur in the brain from repeated channeling in specific networks reinforce the kindness and compassion that are healing and allow us to become more adaptable in a world that appears increasingly out of anyone's control. So, a good case can be made for meditating as a habit and repeating all the basic steps that lead in the direction of more personal freedom over what initially seems intractably constricting and inescapable.

In Class 6 we will take a look at how the meditative space interacts with the wider world. We have already noticed how “inner” and “outer” are a somewhat false duality, but encountering the “full catastrophe” of life has additional dimensions. We will go from “monkey mind” to “full catastrophe” and see where it takes us.