Mindfulness Matters

This is the final set of reflections on obstacles to practice focusing on the Buddha’s five hindrances (well not his hindrances, but the five that he set out as obstacles to meditation). The Five are a laundry list of things that are rarely a good idea–sensual desire anger, anxiety, laziness, and doubt. We’ll look at these one by one.

Someone commented upon yesterday’s entry that the “party seems to be over.” Well, yes, in a way. We are giving up the usual ways of partying and adopting a new way of approaching our experience. There is a new kind of party about to begin. As David Byrne and the Talking Heads said, “There’s a party in my mind and I hope it never stops.” Mindfulness practice is the party in our mind. Instead of getting bound by desire and strong emotions, we get fascinated by the moment to moment unfolding of our experience.

Today we’ll look at anger or ill-will. This one seems straightforward. If you are caught up in angry stories and wishing people ill-will it is hard to make contact with your experience in the now. These stories fuel negative emotions that push you further from the present. Of course, the quietude provided by sitting practice makes ripe territory for these angry stories to show up.

Anger is it own meditation focus–that ruminative story that mounts a stress response, creates tunnel vision, and moves us far away from what is happening in the moment. To work with anger we move back and forth from the storyline to the body. The narrative emerges, takes hold of your mind, sucks you in and makes ou feel bad. You replay past conversations, imagine retribution, bemoan how hurt you feel. Without mindfulness, we nurse these grudges.

With mindfulness, you recognize that you’ve been caught up in that story and then release attention back into the moment. This moment is now colored by that anger–the physiological manifestations, the sensations in the body that are present now that weren’t before the anger was nursed. You can pay attention to these new sensations, become intimate with them. The next time they arise, this familiarity will be a boon, helping you to quickly recognize that you are caught in anger and give you the opportunity to extricate yourself. The obstacle becomes the very stuff of practice.

Mindfulness mediation is an antidote to anger and ill-will. The more we practice, the less inclined we’ll be to stay in anger. The power of stories diminishes. We become adept at slipping out of the sticky mess that angry narratives force upon us. You generate good-will, naturally, by not nurturing ill-will. In other words, it’s hard to stay anger if you don’t ruminate on the reasons you are angry. No story, no anger.

The residue of that anger is the subject matter of your meditation–not in words but in energy. Not in whys and wherefores but in where (in the body) and how (it feels as physical sensations). As you work with anger in this way, you metabolize it, digest it , and thereby become free of it.

This is the final set of reflections on obstacles to practice focusing on the Buddha’s five hindrances (well not his hindrances, but the five that he set out as obstacles to meditation). The Five are a laundry list of things that are rarely a good idea–sensual desire anger, anxiety, laziness, and doubt. We’ll look at these one by one.

The first obstacle is sensual desire. The senses pull us in many directions. On the one hand, the practice is about the senses and paying attention to them. On the other hand, when that interest becomes desire we are caught up in stories–I want this or I don’t want that. That is when sensuality becomes an obstacle to practice.

Desire as an object facilitates practice; desire as a subject becomes a hindrance. I don’t believe the goal is to get rid of desire altogether. What we want is a more supple relationship with desire. We don’t want to be pushed around by it, beholden to it, and constantly in its pursuit. Sense pleasures are not bad. We are biological creatures who move through the world dependent upon these sense pleasing (and displeasing) mechanisms.

We approach what feels good. avoid what feels bad, and ignore most of what is neutral. As sentient beings, we have the opportunity to transcend these biological mechanisms. We can consider, “Do I want to approach this? Would that be a good thing?” “Do I need to put so much energy into avoiding this thing, can’t I be more tolerant?”

As we meditate, the mind may get drawn to fantasy. I say “may” when I really mean “will.” The mind will get drawn to fantasy and many of these reveries will be sensual desire. A maple creemee on a hot summer day. Revisiting a pleasing passage from a television show, movie, or book.

Sense desire can also take the form of avoidance. We want to be free from the pain that is registering in the knee at this moment, the stiffness in the back, and the general feeling of restlessness that has taken hold as we practice.

I’ve used the phrase “comfort-seeking missile” before and this image captures the sense of desire. The heat seeking missile the metaphor is based on is drawn to any heat source. In the case of the senses, the heat is desire–wanting/not wanting.

There is a target and an investment in reaching that target. If it is missed, then we’ll feel let down. If we can relinquish the investment we can be okay. We don’t have to reject sense desires if we are not attached one way or the other to their fulfillment. If it happens, great. If not, then no big deal.

Of course, these sense desires are likely not relevant to your meditation practice in this moment unless you are caught up in a desire for the pleasing sensations that may often accompany practice. This seeking, too, can be investigated with mindful interest. Once the desire is recognized, you can begin to release it back into the now.

I tend to avoid using “relaxation” in my teaching of mindfulness. As I understand it, the goal of mindfulness practice is not to relax but to know our minds. Relaxation is a reliable by-product of the process but not the main goal.

For one, meditation practice is not always relaxing. When we practice, the stuff of our life can get stirred up–stuff we may not have looked at for a long time. This may not be relaxing at all. Once we’ve sat with it, a space may open up where relaxation is possible.

For another, relaxation is a loaded agenda. We wear ourselves out at work to “relax” on the weekends. And what does that consist of? Marketing, shopping, laundry, and catching up on all the things ignored during the frantic week. That does not sound very relaxing.

What does relaxation mean anyway? To relax is to unplug. Kick off your shoes, grab a beer and the remote control and lie down on the couch. It’s letting go of the concerns of the work day. There is a more profound sense of relaxation–letting go into this moment.

To relax is to feel safe as if nothing can touch you. Not because you are invulnerable but because you are cradled in this moment much like a baby feels safe resting agains the chest of her father. She relaxes in this moment without needing to add anything to it. We can be like that baby when we practice mindfulness.

We sat our monthly mini-retreat yesterday and we contemplated this sense of relaxation. I invited everyone, including myself, to relax into the practice–letting go into this moment and letting go of all preconditions, agendas, and preferences. Instead, we endeavored to wake up to what was present–whether comfortable or uncomfortable, pleasant or unpleasant.

To relax is to be awake. How do you know if you are relaxed? If a samurai walked into the Studio and was about to chop off our heads, we could receive that action with equanimity. The sumurai is a metaphor, of course. His sword cuts through ignorance, confusion, and delusion to help us wake up to the miracle of being alive right now. The sharp edge reminds us that being is not an entitlement but a privilege.

To relax is to shift out of our incessant rumination, talking, and doing to enjoy the moment as a sensate experience. It is to apprehend our life in this moment without adding a reassuring narrative–just being. Relax.

My friend, colleague, and dharma sister Polly-Young Eisdendrathis presenting at Omega with Mark Matousek. Polly is a gifted writer and engaging speaker.

On the weekend of June 8-10, they will be teaching at the Omega Institute a workshop: Writing and True Love:

Have you noticed that writers and seekers after truth and love share some common ground? They all learn to pay close attention to the particular, bring kind attention to things as they are, surrender their ideals and develop a tolerance for the ordinary, commit to an ongoing process, and finally, perhaps most important, accept failures, loss, wounds, and rejections without making them too personal. A broken heart is guaranteed.

Two experienced teachers of writing and life’s lessons invite you to this special weekend of conversation and contemplation on writing and true love. Speaking and writing together, doing some mindfulness exercises, and working in pairs, we seek to clarify what we have learned about true love, and then refine our ability to write about it—all with an open heart.

As the renowned Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen says, when we meet our brokenheartedness with an open heart, we see the “crack in everything” and “that’s how the light gets in.”

No writing experience is required.

This workshop will also be useful for professional counselors who wish to use the techniques presented with their clients.

Required reading: Young-Eisendrath, The Resilient Spirit, and Bhikkhu,The Integrity of Emptiness. Mark Matousek is also teaching The Untold Story; September 14-16.

Polly Young-Eisendrath, PhD, is a Jungian analyst in private practice in Vermont, a consultant in leadership development at Norwich University, and a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Vermont. She is author of The Self-Esteem Trap. young-eisendrath.com

Mark Matousek is author of When You’re Falling, Dive; the memoir, Sex Death Enlightenment; and three other books. A contributing editor atTricycle magazine, he is the creative director of V-Men, an organization for ending violence against women and girls. markmatousek.com

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