the meditation experiment.

“Om Hari Om” Why would you mow your lawn on a Friday night? “Hari Hari Om” Shit, I forgot to buy those little crouton things for the salad “Om Hari Hari” Should my back hurt this much? “Om Hari Om” Is it seahorses that are both genders? “Hari Hari Om” Gawd, that garlic is repeating on me…

background.

I’ve tried meditating many times over my adulthood, but it’s not a practice that’s stuck. You’ll have heard of Transcendental Meditation (practiced by the likes of Russell Brand), well I’m more of a Transient Meditator, that is, I do it in short-lived bursts.

But I’ve never lost the intrigue and desire to make it part of my daily routine. My hairdresser meditates one hour every morning and night and swears by it, Tony Robbins reckons you’ll be more successful if you do it, Russell Brand bangs on about it, Arnie, J-Lo, Ellen, Madonna – you name it, they’re all at it.

My main brain-block is that it seems like a lot of time to spend just sitting there, trying not to think – shouldn’t the mind be working out all your problems or arranging your day? Buddhists call this the “monkey-mind” – the inner chatter that takes us away from the present moment. The monkey-mind is more connected to your ego than reality, it get’s distracted easily and stifles creativity. It’s the negative talk that acts out pretend arguments with somebody that pissed you off earlier – and the best part is, that person doesn’t even know they got your goat!

To meditate is to still the mind, to detach from that little monkey in your head, to withdraw your senses.

On an intellectual level I know what meditation purports to achieve – a calmer, more grounded state of being that is detached from observation – one is aware of their surroundings but does not become mindlessly involved in thinking about it. Meditation practitioners are more focused and alert and their intuition is heightened. When done “right” your whole body tingles and you’re said to transcend your physical body. I’ve had glimpses of it and I’ve chased that virtuous dragon ever since (with no real success). The “You” in this context is your consciousness; in the never-changing, all-pervading sense. It’s hard to pin down what consciousness is, and the moment you think you’ve got it you lose it, but perhaps think of it as the opposite of self-consciousness. You are simply being.

There’s a famous 13th century saying by Zen master Dogen: “To learn the Buddhist Way is to learn about oneself. To learn about oneself is to forget oneself. To forget oneself is to perceive oneself as all things”

I’ve been on Yoga retreats, I’ve used apps and completed online meditation courses, I’ve got qualifications in Ayurveda and Yoga, I’ve lost myself to Savasana at the end of every Hatha class. I’ve done hours of Nidra (sleep meditation), I’ve even instructed Yoga Nidra. I’ve read books on it, I’ve written about it. So, why, oh why, have I never taken meditation up as a daily practice?

I can tell you exactly why, so… 1) it seems like a lot of effort, 2) it makes my back hurt, 3) I don’t even know if I’m doing it “right”, and 4) gasp, horror, I could be wasting my time!

Something so seemingly simple though can also be unnecessarily complicated – there are so many ways to meditate: watching the breath, repeating mantras, staring into a flame, doing rings around the mala beads, deep guided relaxation, and the list goes on. Just choosing how to meditate can cause choice overload and decision paralysis. Don’t get me started on the philosophical rabbit hole an average human could fall down if you begin to wonder what it’s all about – one article I read pondered:

Is presence something we can be aware of at all? Is presence something that is itself present? If consciousness has no content of its own, beyond what it is conscious of, it is not so clear what we should be conscious of in order to be conscious of consciousness itself.

Fasching, W. Consciousness, self-consciousness, and meditation. Phenom Cogn Sci 7, 463–483 (2008)

Far out, anyone need a coffee yet?

It’s also been a great source of personal disappointment that most of the texts and meditation teachers recommend sitting whilst meditating to stop you falling asleep and to allow for deeper breathing into the lungs. Sitting, specifically “with a straight back” also grounds the muladhara (base chakra) and allows energy to flow through all the chakras. Unfortunately, sitting unsupported with an erect spine is just not something most of us do from day-to-day and my back has about a 10 min limit before it starts to seriously complain.

This has been enough to stop me from taking it up as a way of life. Alas, I have this niggle that never goes away – what if meditation could actually do all those things these practitioners say it does? Also, a confession. I suffer from the modern-day infliction known as FOMO – I totally fear I’m missing out on something – what if these people are having a better quality of life because they meditate?

objective.

I would love a still mind, a lower resting heart rate, better moods, more focus, plus inner content and I don’t want to wonder any longer whether it works or not, I want a lived experience. Call it my mini-meditation-experiment for the next 28 days. A short meditation (10-20 mins) in a seated position as soon as I wake up, before even checking my phone.

methodology.

But first and foremost, how do you actually meditate? Here’s Eric Barker’s tips on how to meditate, taken from his blog Barking Up The Wrong Tree:

• Get comfortable. But not so comfortable you’re gonna fall asleep. This ain’t naptime.
• Focus on your breath. You can think “in” as your breath goes in and “out” as your breath goes out if it helps you focus.
• Label Lefty (the overthinking left side of the brain). When Lefty brings the circus to town in your head, use a word to label his chatter and dampen it (Eric’s example is worrying)
• Return to the breath. Over and over. Consistency is more important than duration. Doing 2 minutes every day beats an hour once a month.

results.

Week 1

Day 1: I set my alarm and woke at 6am to sit for 20 mins in our office/meditation room. I’ve even bought a little round embroidered meditation cushion – so I’m half-way there right? I set my timer, just in case I got into it so much that 2 hrs passed by without me noticing; I really didn’t need to. Firstly, I fussed over whether I wanted music or not and settled on a Tibetan Spa playlist on Spotify; this proved too much of a distraction so instead I decided to listen to the noises of the birds singing (until I heard the noises of the birds of the Amazon and realised I’d pressed skip instead of pause). I had acquired some red mala beads from a Yoga & Meditation day I was on the end of last year, so I started chanting the word “calm” as I twiddled each one. Then my root chakra suddenly felt full and I decided I needed the toilet before I could concentrate. I came back to just the sound of me chanting “calm”, which quite quickly I did not feel as my middle back started to throb and let me know it was not happy. After getting round these beads a few times I wondered if I’d set my alarm for AM or PM, it felt like more than 20 mins, surely? When the alarm finally sounded, with relief I went to make a coffee and check my phone.

Day 2: the session went a bit quicker today (but I’m not sure that’s the point of this?) and my back didn’t ache at all, maybe I will get a strong back after this month? I chose to chant “Om Hari Om” with my mala beads, but quickly felt I’d chosen the wrong chant, so my monkey mind teased me about that for a while. I realised I am ridiculously tired in the morning though, almost drugged, and the last thing I feel like doing is sitting on a cushion and chanting – but like any practice, the point of it is that the more you do it the more you strengthen your resolve. I’ve always preferred the lying down kind of meditation where I can relax, but I can see that this doesn’t replicate “real-life”. When you’re walking around and you want to bring your attention back to your breath, focus and calm your nervous system you need to have practiced this upright, or semi-upright so that it becomes automated.

At the end of the first week I actually felt more level-headed, and beneficial thoughts were quicker to access.

Week 2

I’m struggling to settle on one particular method and not finding the whole process easy. I am at least more mentally alert in the mornings and going to my meditation spot without too much effort, but I find my mind wanders first thing – it’s like it’s trying to make up for lost time and wants to make sense of all my scattered thoughts in preparation for the day. Chatted to my friend who has followed a Guru over the years and been taught the Dzogchen meditation – she advised to choose one path or method and learn it well rather than changing or trying to find commonalities or my own way. Again though I’m struck by the thought, “should it be this hard?”

I’ve been doing some background research on meditation, reading various blogs, watching Ted talks and YouTube videos of Buddhist Monks talking about the phenomenon – I particularly enjoyed the light-hearted humour of Tsoknyi Rinpoche. One unexpected revelatory source was social commentator Adam Curtis’ provocative documentary Can’t Get You Out Of My Head (7 hrs long!) where he speaks of the experience of the world outside as “an ongoing chaotic rush of biochemical data that flashes up and fades away” and “what humans think of as their ‘self’ is actually an accessory that tries to make sense of this chaotic mass of incoming data” but “to do that it has to simplify and turn that data into stories that are sometimes so simple that they bear little relationship to reality”. Curtis concludes “It gives people the feeling that they are in control, but that is just a comforting illusion”. Put another way, our thoughts are a random mess, and so we create our life story and opinions because we crave order and cannot handle chaos. Meditation, it would seem, serves to diffuse your “true self” from this chaotic rush of data, with an enlightening realisation that we are not truly in control. When we make peace with this boundless truth it can be liberating.

“The goal of meditation isn’t to control your thoughts it’s to stop letting your thoughts control you.” 

Anonymous

Week 3

I think I’ve experienced my first physical effects of meditating. I had my suspicions last November – I did a month of regular deep release Yoga at a local studio and the most amazing thing happened – my resting heart rate dropped right down to 49. I’m typically around 60, give or take, and if I have a boozy weekend it’ll go up into the 70s. I could only put it down to the relaxing Yoga. Last year even when I gave up alcohol for 3 months my resting heart rate wasn’t lower than 58. This week my heart rate has been as low as 54 – and that’s with the odd glass of wine!

My head does actually feel like a peaceful place at the moment. This is subjective of course. So in the name of the experiment I also asked Lee “do I seem more chilled out to you lately?” to which he responded in the affirmative, and I took as irrefutable scientific proof that the meditation is in fact calming my nervous system (!)

It is, exactly as “they” describe, as though there’s more space between my thinking and doing and therefore I’m less reactive. I’ve also noticed the nervous energy that sits in my chest and has my stomach in knots at times has stilled for once – it’s as though my body is no longer held physiological hostage to my mental activity. Again, additional space has been made that wasn’t there before and I have more room to breathe.

Week 4

FULL DISCLOSURE: I got sick this week and missed two mornings. On the very final day (28) my body was still recuperating and I woke late for work with only 15 mins to get ready so I completely ditched my meditation. The best part was that this incident didn’t bother me in the slightest, I calmly got ready, made a coffee to go and had a chilled drive to work. In the past getting up late would have sent me into a frenzy.

conclusion.

The most useful thing I got from the 4 weeks was following the mornings I skipped my meditation – I noticed my old thought patterns resurfacing after a couple of days. So, ironically, it proved to be the absence of meditation (contrasted with weeks of practicing) which revealed to me the benefits of meditating. It reminds me of giving up caffeine once upon a time – you don’t actually feel fantastic from doing it, but it’s a revelation that you’ve been feeling crap for a long time without realising it and cutting out the tea and coffee just makes you feel normal again. Not fantastic, not super energetic or out-of-this-world healthy – just an even, steady, nothing-to-see-here, sort of normal.

After the best part of a month of actually doing it, I can see now how meditating brings you back to you and nurtures a sense of balance and equilibrium in your state of being. Life is filled with choices – perhaps the choice is no longer should I meditate or not, but do I want to feel at peace or not…?

Seems like a simple answer to me 🙂