any bench is a meditation bench
Week Four
Fortunately, this is just a personal diary. My only responsibility is to be honest with myself and observant of the process. Whatever happens…happens.
The fourth session started with a slightly different format. Instead of lying down, I was seated on a folding chair. My instructor was seated opposite, facing me from about six feet away. I was instructed to have my feet flat on the floor, feeling the ground, hands open and facing up. It felt like a solid meditation position. Compared to the previous sessions where I was lying down, this felt like I was actively engaged in the training.
We begin. The first bowl starts to resonate and already I feel the emotions. They are not connected to anything that I can identify. I don’t even know if they are happy or sad emotions. They are intense. They come and go in thirty seconds. This happens several times as we pass through the second bowl and the third bowl. My head feels like it is buzzing.
The fourth bowl begins. My eyes are closed, but slowly I realize that I am actually seeing. There is something really out there. Like looking out into a night sky, it is dark, but it is not empty. There is no color, but I understand what color I am seeing. There is a form which is quite clear, but it has no detail. I realize that this is all very peculiar, but I am fascinated. I know where I am, seated on a chair in a room, looking out into what seems like deep space, that is only an arm’s length away. This lasts for about five minutes.
The session ends. We disconnect. My instructor asks a few questions. I don’t really remember what they were except for…
“Did you see anything?”
I answered that I had. I described it briefly.
“Was there a color?”
I answered that even though I could not see a color, I somehow knew what it was.
“Purple?”
Yes, that was it. Apparently we were in the same place seeing the same thing.
My instructor had seen more, describing two cats that were playfully visiting. They were petted and enjoyed, but finally sent away as they were distracting. My instructor was confused by their presence. What were they doing there?
I had been doing my best to engage a deep state of awareness, and my instructor, also in a meditative state is fooling with two cats, presumably my cats Watson and William who died over thirty years ago.
I practiced during the week. Every morning, the five minute meditation stretches to ten or fifteen minutes. By about the third day, my instructor calls, feeling under the weather with a fever. I am asked if I will meditate, engage my strength and share it with my instructor who is eight miles away. I do not feel qualified. I am not ready. I don’t have the training, but I agree to give it a try. We hang up. I fuss around a little and begin.
I take this request seriously. I breath. I focus. I engage. Whatever the outcome, I am trying to make a difference. My head starts to buzz. I have the feeling that I am swimming in the ocean, against the swells. I am outmatched on every level, but I keep going until I have the feeling that I have finished.
Three deep breaths, slowly exhaled, I cut the connection and open my eyes. The phone rings.
“Don’t forget to wash your hands”.
Actually, I had forgotten to wash my hands after finishing the connection, but how did my instructor know? The fact that her fever was gone could be related to almost anything, but how did she know to call the moment that I finished and opened my eyes?
My instructor was actually relieved that I was able to successfully make some kind of connection. Apparently there was some real concern that I might be a frozen life form, something between an alien and a piece of stone. Perhaps there is hope. Fortunately, this is only a diary.
This article was considered, prepared and written by a student of
Mind Body Performance Management