After we finished our opening twenty-minute meditation at a recent meeting with my meditation group, a new member said that he was surprised at how quickly the rest of us came out of our meditation when the bell rang. He implied that we couldn’t have been very deep into the meditation if we snapped out of it so fast.
“The rest of us are just pretending to meditate,” I said.
No, I didn’t say aloud what I was thinking. I always feel like I’m pretending to meditate because the majority of the time I sit, thoughts are racing through my head. Periodically I catch them and say, “thinking.” Then I focus on my breathing again, but the next thing I know, the thoughts are racing off in another direction.
Some days are better than others. There are glimpses of peace and serenity—moments when my racing mind takes a break.
The next week this same guy told us again that when he meditates he is in a deep state, deeper than sleep, which means he cannot just snap out of it when the gong rings. Again, he implied that the rest of us were not really meditating, or at least, not doing it right.
He said that after a few weeks of meditating regularly, if our lives didn’t get better and keep getting better, then something was wrong. He reported that his life started to get better when he began meditating, and continues on that upward climb.
Wow!
I almost wanted to ask him if I could have a few drops of his magic potion and change my life, too!
I feel sad for this man, because some day—like all of us—pain and sorrow are likely to come his way.
Sitting in meditation—being mindful of what I’m feeling—being present for my own life—these are part of my practice, but it is an ongoing journey of self-discovery, not a final state of being.
One of the other meditators in our group joked at the end of our closing meditation this week, “Did everyone get to nirvana?”
I figure if I pretend to meditate every day, I might find more moments of peace, more insight, and greater clarity.
That will be nirvana enough.
