I started practicing mindfulness in 2011 and up until I first plonked my derriere on a cushion, I had never given any thought to meditation. My GP had suggested I try mindfulness as a way of managing stress and anxiety but to say I was sceptical would be quite the understatement!

I was a “hardline sceptic”, someone who considered meditation as nebulous and esoteric at best (I’ll spare you the other judgements that ran through my mind when thinking of the subject). I was convinced it couldn’t possibly help me, but I had been suffering with stress and anxiety for so long that I thought “what have I got to lose?” And so off I went with a sceptical skip in my step to an 8-week course and despite my reticence, I stuck with it.

This decision to complete that 8-week course is up there with the best decisions I have made in my life.

Although it would be wrong to say that initial 8 weeks completely changed my life, it did sow the seeds of behaviours and practices that would change my life for the (much!) better.  Within those 8 weeks I noticed changes that I wanted to develop.  I was happier, I was responding to stress triggers differently and I was much kinder to myself in the face of my inner critic. I knew I had to continue so I signed up for the MSc Studies in Mindfulness and this time the course really did change my life.

Those three years were profoundly impactful.  I developed my practice and built friendships in a community that shared this wonderful practice, that offered kindness and support.   I felt more connected to my direct experience, had less stress and rumination and I was more content, happy even.  Because of this I made the decision to abandon a safe career in the NHS and to teach mindfulness to others.

I wanted to offer other people what my mindful teachers had given me, to share with them the simple yet profound capacity of this practice to change your life. It soon went beyond reducing my stress and anxiety and opened up a whole new way of experiencing life. I meet the richness of life and appreciate the good and ride out the difficult and painful in a way that I would never been able to if I’d not sat down on that cushion, close my eyes and breathed.

Each time I now sit, I remember that first step (scepticism and all!) as part of my ongoing journey.  Why not connect with your motivation again and simply be?

Spring comes, and the grass grows by itself.

by Matsuo Bashō, translated by Nobuyuki Yuasa

What a simple set of words by the 17th-century Japanese haiku master Bashō, and yet what a world they open into! A world of effortlessness, of non-doing, maybe even of no doer. Which seems very appealing in the face of busyness and the sense of things being hard work at times. But obviously, striving for effortlessness will only get me further away from it. What does seem to help, is occasionally dropping the question in: could I do less? or: can I use less effort? Can I trust the grass growing by itself, a little bit more? This may not exactly be transcending the ‘doer and deed’ as described in Buddhist teachings, but it can make a surprising difference.

Shall we sit for a while, quietly, doing nothing – and see what happens?

PS if you’d like to sit together quietly, doing approximately nothing, there’s a new level 1 mindfulness course starting soon… because although it’s simple, it’s not always easy, and it helps to do it together!

Photo by Валерия on Unsplash

by Brad Aaron Modlin

A couple of days ago I spent a whole day next to the beautiful River Monnow not far from where I live, in the most blissful solitude. These days solitude is something I long for more of, so sitting there by the river I felt myself melting and drinking it all in. When I first set off on my mini retreat I noticed anxiety at play in my chest – Will everything go ok back home? Where am I going? What will I encounter? So, for the first half hour my mind, body and heart were still staccatoing tightly at a high frequency. I found my spot on a tangled mat of roots inches from the flowing water, underneath weeping boughs of alder, and sat. And sat. And sat. And time stood still. I could have remained there indefinitely. The river gurgled and rushed, the sun sparkled and ran dapples across it, a grey wagtail bobbed by and then a kingfisher. Before long I noticed the anxiety had evaporated and I sank into a deep melody of being, staccato tightness gone.

Later I sat underneath a grand oak on a little ledge above the river. Again, I entered a flow allowing my awareness to rest into just being, enveloped in the solace of nature, vitalised by a gentle awe – I just loved the river. At some point a cockerel crowed from a distant farm, its voice carried free into the summer air. There was something about the sound of the cockerel crowing and of really being there to let myself experience it. I realised that over the past bunch of years I had not let this sound into awareness, even if I had supposedly heard it. My mind has been too preoccupied with a thousand and one things. It was as if every cockerel crow I had ever heard was held in a dream within this present one. And the bittersweet thrumming present touched deep into my veins and ran through me to flood my heart. I long to always hear a cockerel crowing in this way, free of the crush of inner and outer ‘stuff.’

In this moving poem I wonder whether Brad Aaron Modlin, a contemporary poet who teaches at the University of Nebraska, Kearney (find out more here), is saying something a bit like what I am trying to convey about my day by the river. There is something about the timeless span of the poem and its precious life lessons, reaching from now to that fourth-grade day and back. And there was something similar in that crow of the cockerel – as if all existence – both the beginning and end of it, had no beginning or end when encapsulated in a moment. It is something about living life mindfully, with humility and with feeling. It is about letting yourself be called towards what has meaning and soul for you. It is about allowing life to teach you of itself – the hard lessons and the good. It is about risking the significance of the moment and following through towards this and letting it be the way you live. And maybe it is about not getting lost in academics, technology, and stuff. And yet it is about getting lost – because we all do, and so finally it is about finding ourselves and each other and the world within an encompassing embrace of presence.

Ps. It’s not long until our next Mindfulness meets Mystical Poetry course begins on the 12th September. Sign up to enjoy the plethora of gifts that being with poetry mindfully has to offer towards living fully and with heart.

Photo by Jack B on Unsplash

You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep.

People are going back and forth across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.

The door is round and open.
Don’t go back to sleep.

by Rumi, translated/interpreted by Coleman Barks

Freshly back from a wonderful retreat, the words of this poem (from the classic Essential Rumi as translated/interpreted by Coleman Barks) urge me to stay fresh and open to the world, as awake as possible. And like with physical sleepiness, it’s possible to encourage myself to awakeness, which in this context might look more like remembering to show up, to setting intentions that honour what’s important. At the same time, I seem to see with more clarity where the groove of the ‘sleep’ of habitual patterns and automatic reactions is deep, but where something new might be possible… Freshly back from retreat, it’s easier to sense that door that “is round and open”, the welcome into full-hearted living and the poignancy that is possible to step into.

Does what I say here make any sense to you? What do you see, when you look in the direction these words point at, as if they were fingers pointing at the moon? What sleep do you habitually slumber into, what do you intuit that lies beyond the door that’s “round and open”? And how can any of us live our life meaningfully, and wholeheartedly? Let’s listen to the breeze at dawn…

PS In my experience, retreats (whether a day or a bit longer, whether at home or in a beautiful place, alone or with others) are a powerful way to reap the benefits of our practice – maybe simply because we spend a longer time immersed in it. And also when there’s distraction and discomfort in the mix of it, often the fruits of the practice are no less juicy. Do join us in a retreat if you’re inspired to see what it brings this time…

Photo by Myriam Zilles on Unsplash

Slow down, breathe deeply,
and open your eyes because there’s
a whole world right here within this one.
The bush doesn’t suddenly catch on fire,
it’s been burning the whole time.

Moses is simply moving
slowly enough to see it. And when he does,
he takes off his sandals.

Not because
the ground has suddenly become holy,
but because he’s just now becoming aware that
the ground has been holy the whole time.

Efficiency is not God’s highest goal for your life,
neither is busyness,
or how many things you can get done in one day,
or speed, or even success.

But walking,
which leads to seeing,
now that’s something.
That’s the invitation for every one of us today,
and everyday, in every conversation, interaction,
event, and moment: to walk, not run. And in doing so,
to see a whole world right here within this one.

by Rob Bell

How does Rob Bell‘s symbolic suggestion to walk rather than run, land with you? To me it feels like a reassurance, the old ‘less is more’. I receive so many messages on a daily basis that say efficiency is important, speed is good, busyness gives kudos and success is essential in order to be happy, that it’s a relief to hear someone sing the praise of slowness, of seeing and discovering. I wish this invitation was offered more widely, because surely more happiness and meaning are found by living this way.

It certainly is in keeping with the practice of mindfulness – noticing what is happening, while it’s happening no matter what it is. And this present moment awareness leads to seeing the preciousness (or even holiness, as Rob Bell calls it) in each moment, each encounter. Let’s see!

PS if you’d like to practice walking, and seeing, together with others and guided by experienced teachers, there are many opportunities for doing so, here…

Photo by NEOM on Unsplash