Category Archives: Mindfulness

Only a few more days of winter remain, and though the technical arrival of spring doesn’t instantly equate to better weather, I’m allowing myself some hope. The pool is thawing out and Andy is eager to get it open. The last few years we’ve been opening it early to catch that first spell of 80-degree days that have been creeping up earlier and earlier. I don’t know if that will be the case this year, and I’ve made my peace with enjoying it if it happens, and not being disappointed if it doesn’t. There is wisdom, and contentment, in learning to roll with the punches. 

On a deeper level, it’s like the proverbial rock at the bottom of a river bed. The trick is to sit still and be ok with whatever washes around you, no matter how wild and crazy and mucky it might get. Especially when Mercury is in retrograde motion. 

I’ve been religious about maintaining my daily meditations this winter, and it’s been a consistent and comforting respite. For that little section of the day, I sit in complete silence and reverence. Every day we are alive deserves such an honor, even if it’s just for fifteen minutes. Even if it’s just counting breaths and letting other thoughts fall away. 

Winter’s waning light rises from a candle, in a purple-tinted bit of glass that once belonged to my grandmother. 

This posting slot is usually reserved for our weekly blog recap – and it’s still coming later today – but it feels like a good moment to pause in our usual schedule, to put off our usual Monday morning madness, and practice a bit of mindfulness before beginning the work-week.

The other night, while writing a blog post not far removed from this one, I sat on the bed in the attic and listened as the wind wailed and howled outside the window. The whole roof creaked and groaned beneath its force – a reminder that winter was still very much here, and in no rush to move along despite the insistent ticking of the calendar. The wind makes its own music, especially in the winter. It’s strange that the more tumultuous and cacophonous it becomes, the calmer and quieter it feels inside. That a simple roof and a basic windowpane might afford such protection is a wonder of the world and how we survive in it. 

The next morning I perform an early meditation – a luxury of a weekend – and I light a candle as part of the process. Candles only appear to give off a different light during the day – no less wondrous or powerful, and sometimes warmer from the act of joining in the daylight rather than being the sole source of illumination. On a frigid Monday morning, a little candlelight and a little mindfulness make for a proper starting moment of calm.

Full moon fuckery must be in full effect because early yesterday morning I gave myself a stiff neck simply trying to put my head through a shirt without messing up my hair. I felt the sudden twinge in my neck immediately, and the dull pain soon began to spread. By the time I got to work I was in robot motion, where your whole upper body has to move when you turn your head. It was a reminder to be more careful in my advancing age, something I’ve been more mindful of in the past few years but always seem to forget when going about the motions of daily life. Getting older is not for the faint of heart or weak of will or unobservant of circumstance.

It was also a reminder to be mindful in a more general sense. For me, focusing on what is immediately around us, and what is immediately happening, is the essence of mindfulness – it occupies the space where worry and stress would otherwise arise. My formal and structured daily meditations help, but being mindful on a more constant level is often more helpful. It’s easy to be calm and at peace for fifteen minutes when sitting lotus-style beside a burning stick of palo santo incense – how to translate that peace and calm into the majority of the day is the more valuable practice. It also bleeds into the idea of thinking – or too-often overthinking ñ that derails the calmest of countenances.

As our days become increasingly saturated with dismay and uncertainty, the only thing we might possibly be able to control is our reaction and perception to the world around us. If we are able to find focus and meaning in the actual moment at hand, it occupies the mind and prevents all the dangerous and frightening what-ifs from entering that space. (My head can only focus on so much these days.) And so I take this stiff neck as a persistent, if slightly bothersome, reminder to focus on the moment right before me, at what is going on in the here and now. I notice the sting when I turn, and I have to smile at something my younger self would have called the motions of an old man. I acknowledge the pain, let the comparison to the past fade, and go back to the doings of the day.

A blue line between flame and fuel distinguishes the twin flames of this candle – a dinner party gift from an old friend. Glowing in the dimming afternoon light, it crackles slightly, providing illumination and sound and delicate scent, along with a gentle source of warmth – touching on all the senses and setting a soothing scene for a daily meditation. 

In these icy winter days, meditation has become a necessary custom, one in which I indulge gratefully. It usually marks the moments between the work day and the afternoon if I’m working from home, or the wind-down time after a day in the office, or sometimes the dim period right before retiring to bed. In all circumstances, it provides a literal grounding, as I sink onto the floor, assume the lotus position, and slow my breathing, narrowing the windpipe until I approximate the sound of a distant ocean. 

My stiff neck, work overload, and the start to holiday mayhem are all brought to you by Mercury in retrograde, which is set to last until December 15. It’s already working its disruptive ways, but I’ve decided to make a concerted effort to go with the flow, no matter how wayward it may seem and feel. The only other option would be to fight what will ultimately be a losing battle with the fates. At this point in my life, ease and comfort are more important than waging war. 

In order to be as prepared as possible for this malleable attitude, I’ve been focusing on my daily meditations more than usual – fully making use of those moments for deep breathing, clearing the mind, and focusing on not focusing. Sitting lotus-style, I acknowledge the slight pain that now appears in my left leg when stretching in any way, and I feel the stiffness of my neck – an affliction not caused by strenuous efforts of lifting or moving, but some errant quick motion of the head – which makes the resulting pain all the more annoying; it would be worth it for some uncharacteristic exertion of effort. Simply turning around quickly shouldn’t do such a thing. I accept the annoyance, the agitation, the twinge of pain. 

Thoughts and worries race across the mind, and as they pause to gain traction, I honor them, then allow them to move onward. It’s not that I want to forget or bury them – they exist and they have their reasons for existing – and I am learning to exist beside them. A stick of Palo Santo sends sweet curls of smoke into the air before me, its scent now familiar and rich when it once was challenging and repellant. 

This is how I greet the holiday season. Not with bombast or excitement, nor with dread or worry – but with a steadiness and resolve to breathe deeply, to be mindful, to be present, and to be forgiving. 

My therapist recently indicated that in the last two years I’ve checked off most of the major boxes for a mid-life crisis, starting with the death of a parent. Since I first started seeing her about five years ago when I went through what may now have to be called my first mid-life crisis, I did balk and complain that I’d already done that. She laughed a bit, then said I was able to handle one better now, and in a moment of humble-bragging, I had to acknowledge that she is correct. 

While the fade-to-black theme of this fall has taken dark root here, I’m actually feeling ok. And, more strikingly, I’d categorize my present state of mind and existence as less a mid-life crisis and more of a mid-life awakening. That’s not something I thought possible five years ago, but it feels genuine and true now.

I’ve been maintaining my daily meditations, working on a stable base of mindfulness and taking each moment and whatever challenge that arises one thing at a time. Breaking life down into manageable minutes rather than a long pre-planned onslaught of months and years ahead. I’ve wasted far too many years pre-planning, overthinking, and preparing for scenarios that may or may not ever come to fruition.

I’ve also learned to speak my mind and let things out, even when they’re difficult to say, and difficult for others to hear. There are boundaries that I’ve set as well, and ways that I’ve started to distance myself from those who have somehow only ended up hurting me no matter how much I have tried to get closer to them. I find sanctuary in my home, with my husband, and the visits of friends, and I forge each day with the intention of being mindful. 

It’s a different sort of life, even from what I could have imagined five years ago, and a better one in many ways. Slowly, I am learning. Slowly, I am making a place for peace. Slowly… 

Credit the impending arrival of the full Hunter’s Moon, or just my own dwindling sanity, I spent a day at the office wherein I forgot my belt, and was without cologne or contacts thanks to some pesky allergies. After almost getting stuck on an elevator on my way out of the building (we bolted and then walked the remaining flights when we couldn’t get down past the fourth floor) I gratefully collapsed on the floor when I got home and began my daily meditation.

A literal grounding is the ideal way to start meditating these days. I lower my body to the floor, stretching out my legs and arms and letting all of me sink into the ground. There’s something very powerful about grounding yourself like that, and letting gravity exert its full effect on your entire body. It levels everything out for a moment. It also reminds me how one day we will all become part of the earth again, no matter how we choose to exit the place. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, you know the routine. There’s a peace in that if you allow the thought to fully expand. 

When I look back at day planners and calendars from my younger years (not usually a wise way of passing the time) I marvel at how much I used to do in a single day. Waking early for breakfast before class, finishing a reading due just before the course started, three or four classes in a row, rushing to a commuter rail into Boston to work a retail shift from 5 to 9 PM, scarfing down dinner amid some more reading for school, trying to hammer out homework on the commuter rail back to campus at 10:40 PM, then showering and trying to finish more schoolwork – it makes my head spin. 

The idea that some nights I would skip the 10:40 PM commuter rail and wait for a 12:30 AM train just to have a couple more hours in Boston boggles my mind. If I tried that today I’d be dead.

Contrasted with my days now, that life of busy business feels far away, and largely foolish. What really came of such busyness and all the rushing around? Graduation from Brandeis? Big deal. A retail job I could hold down and do well? Bigger deal. A day in which every hour and minute was filled with being busy for the sake of being busy? Biggest fucking deal of all. 

These days I find more value and worth in simply taking a quiet day and mindfully meandering through it – a walk in the garden, a spell of reading on the couch, a bit of writing while sipping a cup of hot tea. I didn’t realize then how much being busy was simply filling a void that could have better been spent meditating or working on calming the runaway train of thoughts that once barreled through my mind. It still chugs along at varying speeds, but I’m better at enjoying the ride rather than worrying about whether it’s going to fly off the rails. And perhaps that’s just me getting older and a little wiser. 

It’s a lifestyle change that has made me more calm. It feels strange – because all that running around and going non-stop was always in the purpose of finding contentment. That peace was within me the whole time – I simply hadn’t paused to find it, and hear it, and truly listen to it. 

Having meditated daily for several years now, I find myself sinking into the sort of lazy going-through-the-motions rut that any daily activity often ends up eliciting. Right now, my meditations are fifteen minutes long, but it’s not a solid fifteen minutes. I take my time to begin – pausing at the front door and looking outside, sometimes stepping out and sitting on the front step if the weather is nice. Trying to inhale and savor the scent of summer – or spring or fall if that’s where we are – I begin my deeper breathing. (Even in winter, a moment outside in the fresh air can tip the day into something more hopeful than what it might have been in the moment before.) 

From there, I return inside and light the tip of a stick of Palo Santo, ringing the Tibetan singing bowl I found in Maine. Sinking into the deep breathing fully, I close my eyes and begin the meditation in earnest. Sometimes the mind wanders, refusing to be brought into the focus of that sought-after blank space. Sometimes the mind calms itself, pushing thoughts away like a room slowly emptying and simultaneously expanding, the walls and floor becoming whiter and blanker until there is just the breath and the space and the stillness. 

Lately, I’ve been pushing my meditations closer to the end of the day in an effort to ease into slumber, instead of doing them as soon as the work day was done. There are benefits to both, though in the summer it’s best to get all the outside work done during the daylight hours, saving the calmer tasks like meditation for darkness. We strike the summer when it’s hot – and summer is always too short. 

Meditation is sometimes like sleep – either restful and impactful or restless and uninspiring. To make the most of it, I’m going to return to the focused work with which I began this meditation journey. It’s all within grasp, and I’m likely going to need it in the next few weeks as the anniversary of Dad’s final decline and passing arrives. 

The bare reddish branches of our Japanese maple tree crackled and dripped with ice while the snow changed to sleet and freezing rain. A pretty sight, it was also disheartening, coming as it does at the point where we have already, in mind, heart, and calendar days, moved into spring. Not wholly unexpected or undeserved, our mild winters tend to make up for their lack of early zeal with an extended and drawn-out few weeks of wintry nonsense. 

There is no rushing what nature is going to do. Keeping this in mind, and accepting it sooner rather than later, is a key component of one’s daily peace, and a helpful lesson for life in general; there will aways be things and events and people who are beyond our control or influence. These things don’t know or care whether you may be affected or bothered by their actions, and they never will be. Giving oneself over to this bit of powerlessness is part of growing up. It’s also a part of being at peace as a grown-up. 

Some music then, for rumination and contemplation. Sit with me for a moment while it plays. It’s called ‘Spring Snow’ because being literal is usually the easiest course to take.

Even the sturdiest branches, as bare and light of leaf as they are right now, bend and droop beneath the weight of the ice. Looking as forlorn as some slow-moving funeral procession, the branches of dogwoods and grasses gently sway in their mournful stance, waiting for the hug of spring to offer comfort – though none is to be had on this frigid day. The temperature is moving in the wrong direction, and so they shudder, still unable to shirk off the ice on their backs. 

Whenever I want to rush ahead, especially in the first days of spring, the universe has ways of forcing a pause, and rather than finding frustration or antibusiness here, I find a welcome pocket of time in which to slow down, to let the day crawl for a bit. Rushing through life is no way to live; you simply miss too much.

Apparently taking three days off from work means hundreds of e-mails and a catch-up period of a full week, as I’m still in the midst of digging out from the avalanche of last week, but it was all worth it for this. Now that most of us are returning to work and school, and the endless doldrums of winter spread out expansively before us, it’s a good time to reconnect with things that bring us calm and clarity. For me, that’s meditation. 

The great Betty Buckley introduced me to the writings and teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh several years ago, and since then I’ve been an avid disciple, devouring his books and doing my best to incorporate his meditative methods into my own life. It has helped immensely, and on dour Tuesday mornings in the middle of January, I lean gratefully into being more mindful, less consumed by what may or may not happen, and wholly intent on being as present as possible. 

Another way of looking at this is in the words of one of my favorite former retail managers, who often said this to me whenever I started spinning out of control: “Calm the fuck down, shit will get done.”