Supposedly our brains, on average, have 50,000 distinct thoughts in a day. That’s 1 every 2 seconds over a 24 hour period. (Someone actually counted. What were they thinking?) This fact will not surprise most married men, who know that by simply leaving the toilet seat up, they can observe their wife list the last 50 things the husband did wrong in about 10 seconds. This fact will surprise those same wives, however, who, based on experience are pretty sure their husbands are barely capable of more than 2 or 3 distinct thoughts over the period of a 3 hour football game. But, back on the topic of meditation….
This factoid explains why our brain, which is a magnificent tool, capable of many wonderful things, can also be our enemy. Especially when you consider that, according to the same research, 90% of those 50,000 thoughts you will have today are the same ones you had yesterday.
The mind wants to be busy. And, like a teenager, if you don’t give it productive things to do, it will find things to do. And since your mind can’t go hang out at the mall, it thinks of stuff. Mostly stuff it already thought of many times before. Ever wonder why you get distracted while at work? Now you know.
I think a lot of this frantic thinking is a source of stress, in my case anyway. Following my stroke I insisted I was going back to work. I loved my job in high-tech sales. I was fortunate to be working for a cool company with great people. The doctors cautioned me about under-estimating the challenges my brain would face after the trauma it had suffered.
After trying unsuccessfully to talk me out of returning to a stress oriented job, one of my doctors urged me to do everything I could to mitigate stress. I am a stress junkie. Throughout my career I have pursued stress laden challenges. And, on the weekends, for fun, I would overdose on stress. Ski the steep runs, race offroad motorcycles. I was a ski jumper in high school, for crying out loud, so this stress addiction has been with me for a while…
At the doc’s urging I reluctantly enrolled in a meditation class given at Stanford University Hospital. It was an 8 week course in “Mindfulness Meditation” based in part on the work done at the University of Massachusetts by Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn on the healing effects of mediation. (For more, check out this piece on YouTube). The course was taught over the course of 8 weeks. 2.5 hours every Wednesday night plus 1 all day Saturday session. The instructor told us on the first night that we should plan to meditate in silence everyday for 45 min. plus that the Saturday “retreat” would entail a full 6 hours of silent meditation!
At this point in my life I could not imagine being quiet for 30 seconds. Remember the 50,000 thoughts a day? The first couple weeks were tough. I could force myself to be quiet (mouth shut), but no way could I convince my mind to be quiet. But, with a little perserverence, I started to learn the trick of ignoring those thoughts, what we called “monkey brain” in class. I learned to treat all the thoughts as a tv that is on in another room. I can hear it if I choose to focus, but mostly it is backround noise. I can’t tell you how to do this. It’s better explained by professional instrutors. There are many techniques or “tricks” to help. What I can tell you is that if I can do it so can you.
I can also tell you that meditation has become a regular (but inconsistent) practice in my life, because it works for me! I had the common expectation that during meditation I would have some remarkable experience like “enlightenment”. Fact is that this can happen, but is reserved for the most experienced and dedicated practitioners, most of which live on mountain tops in the Himilaya.
For me, the 20 minutes I spend in quiet meditation in the morning is simply relaxing. It feels good.
So what? Watching tv or listening to music or reading a book is also relaxing. So why meditate?
For me, it’s about what happens during the rest of the day, and this was the pleasant surprise. Once meditation became a regular part of my routine, I started to notice a number of subtle but still positive changes. My mood was better. My mind was more focused. I was generally more relaxed. AND FELT LESS STRESS, even in the same stressful situations I had become addicted to most of my life. I still enjoyed the stress, maybe even more, becasue it didn’t seem as stressful…. did that make sense to any of you?
By the time the all day silent meditation retreat came around, I was anxiously looking forward to it. It was an amazing day of guided meditation in a group with no talking. I felt great for days following.
The benefits for me are real. I have not forsaken my worldly posessions and joined an ashram in India wearing orange robes all day. I’m the same stress addict I always was. The difference is that the stress is not causing me the physical and mental problems it was causing in the past.
It is my intention to meditate each day. Like anything, if I can get in the habit it is easier to find the time. I slip from time to time, but do notice the negative impacts of stress.
The leader of the meditation group I attend told us of the practice of RPM for making meditation a habit. Rise, Pee, Meditate. Try it, it works.
Also, you may want to find a group to meditate with on a weekly basis. I find that meditation in a group is somehow more effective at keeping my daily practice on track. Don’t know why. There are groups all over the place. I found one by going on the site MeetUp.com, entering my zip code and putting meditation in the search.
Meditation can help you cope with whatever stress you have in your life. Try it. Learn the art of ignoring yourself.
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