Category Archives: Mindfulness

“My first big insight came when I realized that my reactions to these experiences were causing me more pain than the experience itself.” – Matthew Sockolov

Let’s begin this work week with a scene from the start of the recent weekend. Thinking back to a hopeful and exciting Friday morning on a Monday has usually been a source of annoyance and agitation. Withdrawal from relaxation and fun during a mundane start of the week has never been a favorite mindset. But lending such negative feelings to what is past and done takes away from the memory of good weekends, while also serving to depress and upset what could otherwise be a perfectly sunny Monday. 

And so it was this past Friday, when I woke to head out to Boston for the weekend, on which I decided to set a new intention. The day was sunny – and windy – and the living room was illuminated by the sun as well as its reflection off the snow, unmitigated by leafy canopies as the branches were bare. It made for the brightest this room gets – a lovely anomaly during what is typically a darker part of the year. As the wind raged outside, I sat down and lit a stick of Palo Santo, watching its flames almost disappear into the light, then studying the curling tendrils of smoke once the flame went out. 

The wind was almost thunderous in its power and might, churning and moaning like a restless ocean. We don’t get such wind, even in the winter, and it was a reminder of nature’s magnificence. Listening to the ebb and flow of its drone, knowing that what I was hearing was already muted and blunted, and the actual force much stronger were I to open the door, there was a strange sense of calm and peace. The sun’s strength undulates as well, with passing clouds moving swiftly across the sky, changing the light in the room in gentle waves. 

When a series of strong wind gusts rolls over the house, I hear the cracks and clicks of the trees, and the cracks and clicks of our home, all standing in brave defiance of the wind, in defiance of the winter, as if we could hold it off forever, as if we won’t one day be leveled by it all. But that doesn’t scare me, because there is no point in being scared of what may come. The best and surest way to get through life is to do it one moment at a time. On this morning, there is sun shining through the wind, there is the promise of a weekend away, and there is a meditation playing out with slow breaths in and out. 

“Mindfulness is simply being aware of what is happening right now without wishing it were different; enjoying the pleasant without holding on when it changes (which it will); being with the unpleasant without fearing it will always be this way (which it won’t).” – Matthew Sockolov

“I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape—the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn’t show.” ~ Andrew Wyeth

A standard winter scene – bare branches against a subdued blue sky – makes for an ideal pausing point for a Sunday meditation, or a few moments of mindfulness. Rather than clutter this space with words and my own take on mindfulness, I’m leaving it mostly empty and sparse, allowing for your own interpretation of the above quote, for your own story and thoughts to flow and be released. We are too afraid of quiet and an expanse of space. 

One of the things that prevents many people from meditating is their perceived inability to sit still and quiet their mind. It’s completely understandable, given the nature of this fast-paced world and how we have been trained to expect stimulation at all times. It’s not easy to turn off the mind, especially in the middle of the day. If it’s helpful to meditate first thing in the morning or last thing at night, that’s certainly a good plan. The other technique I’ve found when thoughts impede on my meditation is to focus on a series of images or ideas. In this case, a fall of snow. 

An apt idea, as some of us have had more than a brush with winter storms. So take the image of a snowstorm as it nears its end, and the last few snowflakes are falling to the ground. Or better yet, think of a day when there’s a brief snow squall, and then it stops, as if it hadn’t been snowing at all. In those last moments, picture the snow gradually clearing from the sky, the distracting pings of frozen water landing softly on the ground and leaving an airy stillness in their wake, a wide expanse of clarity and clearness. 

If you can, think of your thoughts the same way – they may flurry, they may fluster, they may rage – but eventually they should slow and subside, like the snowflakes. And if it doesn’t happen today, try again tomorrow. Every snowstorm comes to an end, and eventually even winter will limp away. Spring and summer will come again, and the snow will stop; the same can hold true for your worries and concerns. That’s when the beauty of meditation begins. 

We wait here and take in a deep breath – all the way in, expanding the stomach and the lungs and the chest, letting the breath push into every last available space before slowly letting it out again – and in the span of this breath we acknowledge the wonder of winter. Almost halfway through the last full month of the sleepy season, mid-February doesn’t always feel like spring is around the corner, but it’s actually not that far off. 

On this day, I find solace in my daily meditation, to which I’ve incorporated one of the activities in Mathew Sockolov’s somewhat-cumbersomely-titled ‘Practicing Mindfulness: 75 Essential Meditations to Reduce Stress, Improve Mental Health, and Find Peace in the Everyday‘. Currently I’m on #14: ‘Energizing the Mind’ – no comment from the peanut gallery, or any gallery for that matter. I’ve been doing one per day, so by the time I reach #75 we will be well into April, which should be a very happy place to be. 

Even in these socially-isolated times, it’s difficult for some of us to find the quiet in a day. Family obligations and care, work and living-space maintenance, and the mere machinations of an average day make true peace and calm feel like an unattainable state, but it’s not. It simply requires the effort to carve out the space of time for it. Designating ten to fifteen minutes somewhere in a day is not as tough as most of us pretend it is, and it is in this little quarter of an hour in which life can transform.

It didn’t happen on the first day that I meditated – and it didn’t happen on the tenth. I can’t even say it happened on the hundredth day, but on all the days in-between and since, that little sliver of calm grew into a more stable and contented frame of mind that I carried with me throughout the intervening times. That’s the real secret and power of meditation – the way it subtly raises the level and peace and calm that is in all the in-between moments – and those moments form the bulk of our lives. 

During the last hours of a winter storm, the snow slows and falls more delicately. The wind has subsided and the evening has arrived, and at this late hour I began my daily meditation. After going through my usual litany of meditation focuses and intentions, I opened my eyes and watched the snow fall, choosing to make the pretty scene part of the practice. In the same way I once sat outside in the summer and did my daily meditation by the pool, listening to the birds and the insects and gentle rustling of the leaves in a warm breeze, I made the winter snow part of this meditation.

It is a decidedly different feeling when meditating on a winter evening. That one world could look and feel so completely changed in just a few months is a remarkable wonder, yet as far away as summer felt, and as distant and dim were the echoes of its memories, the warm heart of it all still beat beneath the ice and snow. It was there in the candlelight, there in the hints of blue that the sky insisted on bleeding into the night. 

During the past two years of my meditation journey, I’ve been using an imperfect piece of rose quartz, found at a little gift shop beside the Red Lion Inn in the Berkshires. At first I wasn’t sure of it – it was off-center and assymetrical, and looked weirdly off-balance depending on how one viewed it – yet in my hand it felt at home, and so it was home where I brought it, embracing its imperfection, hoping some of that acceptance would rub off on myself. Through the ensuing two years, I held it in my hands for each of my daily meditations – by the end of each it was warm and seemed to glow with the energy and spirit of the calm that came by the end of every session. 

Last week, while holding this crystal in my hand, I noticed another imperfection in its surface, something I’d glossed over for these two years, which is odd for my critical nature. Also telling. It wasn’t perfection I was after when it came to meditation, and so my practice has always been forgiving and humble, something sorely needed when I first began meditating. By this point, I am open to acceptance. In a book I’m reading now one of the meditation practices involves focusing on what is bothering us, acknowledging it and giving it a moment, then accepting it, and finally letting it go. The practice also speaks to accepting what our body is telling us – whether in the breathing process, or whatever else the body whispers when in a state of meditation. 

Sometimes that arrives in a pain of the ankles, from sitting lotus-style on the floor. Sometimes it’s a knot in the shoulders or back from a day of work stress in an office chair. Sometimes it’s a sense of dizziness that borders on a headache. In each instance, the practice advises breathing into each little pain and then exhaling out and letting it go. If the pain or bother persists, and the focus veers from the breathing, one is supposed to focus again on the pain and what the body is saying, then shift back into deep breathing. 

As I felt the suddenly-slightly-ragged piece of rose quartz in my palm, I breathed in deeply, then slowly breathed out. Next, I listened to the body, and felt the stress-agitation in my shoulders and neck. Feeling the twinge of an ache there, I lowered my shoulders a bit, breathing deeply in and then slowly out, and somehow the pain lessened. Maybe it was the relaxation and the dropped shoulders, or maybe it was something deeper. The body and the mind work together always – perfectly imperfect. 

Over the years, I’ve had many moments of being misunderstood. It’s never bothered me much, as many of those misunderstandings lent an armor of protection to the way I was perceived. As such, I let them accumulate and become part of the person I wanted the world to see. Yet there were times when I was genuinely perceived as mean, either in my delivery, or in what I was actually saying and feeling, and I can’t pretend it was always a misunderstanding. Most of us have times when we let ourselves down, when we allow a bit of meanness and pettiness to creep into the best of intentions, when we wish we’d conveyed a thought or feeling in a kinder or less blunt manner, when we simply could have and should have been better but, whether from hurt or pain or sadness or exasperation, we chose a way that was less. I thought of those moments as I read this passage from ‘The Book of Hygge’ by Louisa Thomsen Brits:

“Like growing up with love, if we are fortunate enough to be exposed to hygge for long enough, it changes life. The spirit of hygge is spread by warm-heartedness and generosity. We can light a thousand candles, but the flame of hygge is easily extinguished by a mean spirit. If the concept of hygge exists outside the realm of our experience, that doesn’t mean it will always be unavailable. It only takes one match or a single kind gesture to illuminate the dark.” ~ Louisa Thomsen Brits

While most books slip in and out of my head these days without making much of an impression, this sentence struck me and has haunted me ever since reading it for the first time: We can light a thousand candles, but the flame of hygge is easily extinguished by a mean spirit.

The idea that I could have ever been that mean spirit, whether intended or unintended, is a deeply disturbing realization, but one that I need to confront, and one that will prove helpful in confronting. It reminds me of the humility and open-mindedness needed to continue on this journey. It reminds me that I’m still just a beginner when it comes to mindfulness and meditation. Mostly, it reminds me to forgive and to be kind – not only to others but to myself. 

And so, last Saturday night, I lit a tray of candles and read a bit more on meditation and mindfulness. I reached out to a few friends and make loose and tentative plans for the future, something we don’t do much anymore in the world of COVID, but something that feels good to do, with the caveat that anything can happen. Things to look forward to, even if some never come to fruition. It is a healthier frame of mind, and an indication that everything we have learned in the last two years has not been for naught. 

“The salient feature of hygge is the atmosphere of warm and relaxed enjoyment of the moment which it allows. While it is nurtured by thoughtfulness and mutual involvement, hygge is informal and unrestrained.” ~ Judith Friedman Hansen

The whistle of a tea kettle. 

The scampering footfalls of a squirrel on the roof.

The moan of a winter wind rattling the rafters.

These are the sounds of the season, and the sounds of this weekend. A storm brushes by, who can tell how close or how far until it happens, and Mercury is in retrograde motion until next week. A few more days of heightened vigilance and extra-careful movements. 

My friend Sherri gave me a calendar of when Mercury would be in retrograde for the next year, and this first stretch of madness has been a trying one, mostly at work. As soon as the workday was done, I’d arrive home and immediately settle into a daily meditation, sitting lotus-style beside a smoking stick of Palo Santo and decompressing from whatever the day had delivered. It was a necessary demarcation between the stresses of the world and the comfort of home, and a reminder of how helpful meditation can be, especially in the last days of January – the last days of Mercury wreaking its havoc for this cycle. 

Outside the window of the attic, a squirrel calls to me from the pine tree. I open the window for a brief moment to listen to its chatter, to hear the winter and take it in, because I know it’s important – as important as the same scene in summer, when the land is green and lush and soft. And we will love it more then because of now. 

“This is the real secret of life – to be completely engaged with what you are doing in the here and now. And instead of calling it work, realize it is play.” ~ Alan Watts

Any Alan who spells their name the right way is a good Alan as far as I’m concerned, so Alan Watts gets due homage with this quote, which dovetails neatly with the meditation and mindfulness practices that inform my life right now. Re-framing one’s life takes time and effort, but it’s a way of rectifying the past while making peace with it, honoring its place while moving onward. It is sometimes a huge lift – re-shifting things that have settled over forty plus years is no quick or easy task usually, but when the mind is ready, it is happily possible, and the rest of the world seems to aid in every step along the way. 

Seeing the work of a day as a form of play recalls the simple lessons of Mary Poppins, long and sadly forgotten by those of us well into our adulthood. “In every job that must be done there is an element of fun. You find the fun and – SNAP! – the job’s a game!”

Even better, every task you undertake becomes a piece of cake, and in these parts cake is almighty. 

On that note, ‘A Spoonful of Sugar‘ gets the full-on and proper Lawrence Welk treatment. Feel free to clap along. (I absolutely adore a clap-audience moment as Suzie well knows.)

“A happy life must be to a great extent a quiet life, for it is only in an atmosphere of quiet that true joy can live.” ~ Bertrand Russell

The universe will tell you whether or not you’re on the right path, but it doesn’t always signal loudly or blatantly. It requires stillness and quiet and, though it seems counterintuitive, a condition of not being hyper-focused or aware. A lighter touch, if you will, sprinkled with the nonchalance to be able to exist without forcing anything. I’ve always been able to follow those signs, however, even if my heart was so often and otherwise a turbulent riot, as Fitzgerald once put it. Though the signs may not be as glaring or blaring as we might like for easy notice, they are there if we know how to look for them, if we allow ourselves to pay attention to the little things that make all the difference. A case of this is my recent foray and obsession with the notion of hygge, which dovetails in ideal alignment with the idea of mindfulness. 

“It must be emphasized that hygge entails commitment to the present moment and a readiness to set distractions aside.” ~ Judith Friedman Hansen

In the above quote, hygge is posited to have the very same requirements for mindfulness. It’s about committing to the present moment, putting distractions to the side, and focusing on the immediate here and now.

The flickering candle flames that dance and wave like little oceans of light.

The curling trails of water vapor rising from a cup of hot tea.

The sound of your own breathing as you wait for the tea to cool, and the way you can deepen and lengthen it, more fully inhabiting the moment and pushing other worries and concern into the distance. 

It’s the sense of stillness and quiet when you shut out the rest of the world, silencing phones and notifications and computer screens. It’s the initial thoughts of what you need to remember for work the next day, or what you need to pick up from the market that night, or what you need to check on once you finish this cup of tea. And it’s letting them go so you can sip and come back to yourself so you can be better and calmer and kinder when you eventually end up getting to all of those responsibilities. 

This is the winter where hygge and mindfulness meet in cozy and calm connection, and it’s a meeting that will go on in magnificence the year round. 

“It isn’t easy in our complicated world to enjoy the pleasures of ordinary living – children, family, neighborhood, nature, walking, gathering, eating together. I imagine life not as an ambitious quest, but as an anti-quest, a search for the ordinary and a cultivation of the unexceptional.” ~ Thomas Moore

The happiest people often lead the simplest lives, and such a state is what I strive to achieve. One of the common components in the many studies of how to find happiness is the thread of meditation and mindfulness that runs through the practices of so many who seem to have found a sense of peace and calm in their lives. Part of that is in finding the enjoyment in the misunderstood-as-mundane moments of life. 

Take, for instance, the reading glasses pictured here. A whimsical lark of a purchase – is there anything more dreadfully dull as having to buy and wear reading glasses? – I made the most of it and found something in a fun color and pattern. More than that, however, is the appreciation for what they do for me. When I slip them on, the words on the page are suddenly easy to see again, and reading becomes the joy that was slipping away from me in my stubbornness not to be bothered with glasses anymore. There, in that one simple and mundane act of putting on reading glasses, I cherished and gave gratitude for the sight and pleasure it gave me. It’s a small ritual that will now trigger a frisson of joy every time it happens. 

“The true secret of happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life.” ~ William Morris

Take also this book I just finished, ‘The Book of Hygge’ by Louisa Thomsen Brits. A couple of years ago I’d never even heard of hygge. Suzie kept its charms to herself without sharing such a wonderful concept with the rest of us, but like the ideas of the floating world, it called to me from a deeper level, and I began my investigative journey. That’s led me to all sorts of literature and writing on the subject of hygge, and it turns out much of it aligns with the principles of meditation and mindfulness – an embracing of the present moment, a savoring of the hour and pleasures at hand, and a way of pushing distractions out of the forefront of the mind in service of clarity and calm. 

“Every repast can have soul and can be enchanting; it only asks for a small degree of mindfulness and a habit of doing things with care and imagination.” ~ Thomas Moore

We begin the work week not with a busy recap of all that came before, but with this simple bit of music and a few morning images of matcha to gradually and gratefully ease into the Monday morning at hand. We will return to our traditional recap a little later if you want to revisit some pretty marvelous posts, but this feels right for now. With Mercury in retrograde, it may be wise to go gentle on ourselves in the next couple of weeks, being mindful and present and forgiving with whatever foibles wait around the corner. 

The music here is tranquil and calming, and it lasts for an hour, which provides ample time to simply exist – breathing in and out, slowly deepening and elongating the breath where it’s still comfortable, but perhaps a little calmer. It need not be a formal, full-fledged meditation – it’s just a method of managing a Monday morning. 

A cup of matcha, warm and prepared with careful consideration, is another way to enter the week with quiet assurance and deliberate grace. When the day begins in contemplative form, when we start any endeavor coming from a place of peace and calm, such intention informs whatever may follow. We won’t always have control over it – most days we don’t have much control over anything – and the freedom in that realization lightens every burden. 

For now, it is enough to put a kettle on the stove and sit in stillness while the water takes its time to boil. It will not be rushed, and it will take as long as its going to take. Some days when the kettle is full and the water begins at an icy temperature, it may take longer than usual. Other days, when there is just a small amount of water left, when it may be warm from someone boiling it not an hour before, it may take less. 

Sit with your cup of tea or coffee. Sit with your thoughts, whatever they may be.

Sit with yourself. 

It is the hardest thing to do in an age where constant stimulation and the bombardment of all our senses is thrust upon us the minute we start scrolling through our phone or turning on the computer. Pause and reflect before that happens. Begin in the place where you want to end up. 

Here there is peace, and you may embrace it. At the very start of the day, before anyone else is up, before the world has had a chance to impart its madness, take this moment to set your daily intention. 

Returning to a daily meditation has been the best move I’ve made in a while. For a few months in late summer through fall my daily practice dwindled to a weekly, if that, routine. From the last day of the last year until now, I’ve maintained a daily meditation for 15 to 17 minutes and the difference is already being felt. What had previously taken me a few months to experience has returned much quicker than anticipated, and the practice of meditation seems to be one of those things that is akin to muscle memory of a mental sort – it inhabits the mind and the return to form is easier the more you do it. 

That illuminates the main point of meditation for me. It has never been about some transcendent moment of utter peace and serenity – those may be attainable and they do happen from time to time, but that’s never been the goal. The beauty of meditation, and the reason why I have incorporated it into my life, is that it makes the baseline of my existence more peaceful and calm. That doesn’t mean I operate on some enlightened monk-like plane – it simply means my days begin, and progress, from a place of deeper peace and acceptance, so the times of stress and worry don’t rise to the peaks of agitation that they would otherwise do. Some days that means I don’t get as close to breaking as it once felt like I did. There’s a huge difference in overall happiness that results from that. When you start from a level of calm, there’s more room for acceptance of errors and disasters. When you begin from a place of stress, there’s very little wiggle room before reaching a point of crisis. 

That’s the unsold secret of meditation, and it doesn’t get shared enough because most people don’t want to take the weeks and months and years of practice to see that difference. We are too demanding of instant-gratification and results, and we live in a world where no one has any sort of attention span. Unfortunately, the greatest gifts sometimes require the greatest investment of time and focus – two things most people just don’t want to give anymore. That doesn’t concern me. This meditation practice has changed my life for the better. 

When I find myself in situations that feel stressful, I go into my deep breathing – which can be done anywhere and at any time – and it recalls those hours of meditation – the body recognizing the slowing of breath and placing the mind back in that place of calm. It’s not an instant stroke of magic and profound revelation – its quieter and softer than that, more of a blunting of the usual reactions to stress, lessening the tendency to lash out or lose my temper or simply get annoyed. It makes for a much more peaceful day. 

When you make meditation a regular part of your life, when it becomes a habit and a comfortable place of respite, you can conjure that space wherever you may find yourself. That part does feel a little magical, and I’m grateful for the practice. 

“All winter you carved water jars out of ice.
How well will they hold the summer snowmelt?” ~ Rumi

This is the sixteenth day in a row in which I’ve meditated, and it’s starting to bring me back to a calmer baseline. In my case, that’s the whole purpose of meditation. Not for any transformative earth-shattering shift, just a calmer starting and resting point, one that remains more stable, with gentle and manageable curves rather than the spikes and rollercoasters akin to the latest COVID numbers. 

This winter has been especially wanting for something calm and serene. As my Dad declines a bit every day, and the stresses of a worldwide pandemic entering its second year take their toll, I feel the weight that most adults feel, and I understood it was time to make meditation once again part of my daily routine. 

For now, I’m doing 15-17 minutes of meditation a day, and it’s a good beginning. Gradually I’ll increase the sessions as my body adjusts to sitting still for longer periods, which will make for a deeper experience, and a lengthier place of peace. Winter always has its troubles, and it’s good to have something to keep you grounded. 

Listening to Tibetan flute music, and burning thin little sticks of Japanese incense also helps to set an atmosphere of calm and serenity, aided by the light of our living room with its bay window of ferns and tiny fig trees. It’s where I pass the winter weekends, watching the sky for signs that the light is lingering, and waiting for the gray morning to come again. 

“And don’t think the garden loses its ecstasy in winter. It’s quiet, but the roots are down there riotous.” – Rumi