Category Archives: Meditation

Moment-to-moment practices

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I take it as a good sign for our meditation practices that in packing for a brief getaway to celebrate our first wedding anniversary, my husband and I packed our meditation cushions.

meditationcushions

Last month, without leaving mid-Michigan, we both had the happy coincidence of getting time with two extremely clear, direct, accessible and accomplished meditation teachers: Shinzen Young and Sister Sayalay Susila. I’ve written about Shinzen and why I’m drawn to his scientifically inclined outlook.

Sister Susila is a Buddhist nun from Malaysia, and she was delightful. (More recently, I also had the chance to attend a one-day session with Ajahn Sucitto, whose teachings I found beautifully poetic and refined. I will be seeking out more of his teachings as well. Here is Ajahn Sucitto’s blog. )

Despite being introduced to meditation by my father at a very young age, I think it has taken years of practicing yoga to get me to be able to accept a meditation practice. Some people are naturally drawn to turning inward, but I always experienced my mind as too restles and my body as too stiff to want to regularly return to long sits; yoga was my meditation.

But these days, when Sister Susila says something like, “You must contemplate impermanence until cravings drop away” (which I took as, “force won’t rid you of your cravings”) or “The body is not solid the way you think. With concentration and wisdom, you see the body and mind as they really are . . . so you can accept your body being old with equanimity” — well, I believe it deeply, because I’ve spent years returning again and again to the mat, which is nothing if not a constant reminder of the ever-changing nature of the body and the mind. I think I needed these years of a yoga practice to get here, though. Simply contemplate impermanence? Not concrete enough.

In case anyone who happens on this post is interested in Buddhist concentration and insight meditation practice, I thought I would share Sister Susila’s handy one-pager on the mental factors of mindfulness and wisdom needed in vipassana (opens as a PDF).

The Ashtanga Yoga: Ann Arbor Facebook page frequently posts about meditation, and this little gem was posted a while back:

Real meditation is the highest form of intelligence. It is not a matter of sitting cross-legged in a corner with your eyes shut or standing on your head or whatever it is you do. To meditate is to be completely aware as you are walking, as you are riding in the bus, as you are working in your office or in your kitchen—completely aware of the words you use, the gestures you make, the manner of your talk, the way you eat, and how you push people around. To be choicelessly aware of everything about you and within yourself, is meditation. If you are thus aware of the political and religious propaganda that goes on ceaselessly, aware of the many influences about you, you will see how quickly you understand and are free of every influence as you come into contact with it. (Jiddu Krishnamurti, Collected Works, Vol. XIII, Individual and Society, p. 323)

I haven’t blogged since April because my work demands have been relentless again. There were periods that I felt a saturation — experienced as a lowered tolerance for external stimulation. And I wondered whether meditation could eventually help shield me from feeling drained during times like these. I want to achieve an unstickiness with my job — to be “free of every influence as you come into contact with it.”

In the meantime, though, I’m simply looking forward to putting down my meditation seat in a different setting.

P.S. — About the meditation seats above. The cushion on the left is the ubiquitous kapok zafu cushion. The meditation seat on the right is the very light — two pounds — and portable Salubrion Meditation and Yoga Seat that I got from DharmaCrafts.

© YogaRose.net and Rose Tantraphol, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to YogaRose.net with appropriate and specific direction to the original content

Equanimity is like . . .

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Equanimity

Ready for some formulas? Shinzen Young, the meditation teacher I blogged about earlier this week, offers some physical analogies for equanimity in his Five Ways to Know Yourself manual. It’s a comparison I find very compelling, because if you’re having trouble achieving this state emotionally or physically (and who doesn’t?), it can be helpful to look at similar processes in other models.

Developing equanimity is analogous to:

• reducing friction in a mechanical system (Equanimity =1/F);
• reducing viscosity in a hydrodynamic system (Equanimity =1/µ);
• reducing resistance in a DC circuit (Equanimity =1/R);
• reducing impedance in an AC circuit (Equanimity =1/Z);
• reducing stiffness in a spring (Equanimity =1/k); and
• A solution being thixotropic as opposed to rheopectic. (Thixotropic substances, such as paint, thin out when they get stirred. By way of contrast, rheopectic substances, such as corn starch, thicken up when they get stirred.)

Extending these metaphors, perfect equanimity would be analogous to “superconductivity” within all your sensory circuits. [p. 16-17]

I love that image of stirring a paint can.

What exactly is it, though? Shinzen explores it this way: “Equanimity is a fundamental skill for self-exploration and emotional intelligence. It is a deep and subtle concept that is frequently misunderstood and easily confused with suppression of feeling, apathy, or inexpressiveness.”

And here’s more:

In the physical world we say a person has lost balance if they fall to one side or another. In the same way, a person loses internal balance if they fall into one or the other of the following contrasting reactions:

• Suppression – A state of thought/feeling arises and we attempt to cope with it by stuffing it down, denying it, tightening around it, etc.

• Identification – A state of thought/feeling arises and we fixate on it, hold onto it inappropriately, not letting it arise, spread, and pass according to its natural rhythm.

Between suppression on one side and identification on the other lies a third possibility, the balanced state of non-self interference, namely, equanimity.

And if you read the Three Questions with Angela Jamison post, you’re hip to the idea of equanimity with an edge:

So what did equanimity look like for me this week? I had so many chances to work on this skill set:

  • When my tax preparer, who has had my files for a couple weeks now, bailed on me on Monday — the morning taxes are due — and totally upended my already packed day (all this while I was in the middle of this Ayurvedic cleanse, which made it a bit more energetically challenging for me).
  • When I found out that someone else has also used my social security number (!) to file their taxes, causing me to be unable to e-file. I am hoping this is an honest mistake and not identity theft.
  • When I wanted to write this post Monday night but ran out of both time and energy.
  • This morning, when I had some hideously bad cramps that had me KO’ed on the bathroom floor.

How has your week been? Any chances to work on equanimity?

I can’t say I was perfect this week, but I handled most things — especially the tax bail — much better than I might have otherwise. Rose circa 2009 would have lost it. Rose circa 2011 would have been really frustrated and pretty angry. Don’t get me wrong: Rose in April 2013 was deeply frustrated. I had to scramble to get a sub for my evening yoga class so that I could go to another tax preparer at the eleventh hour. But angry? I didn’t feel that internal heat of anger. In short, faced with a big obstacle, I acted — making calls, finding backups — far more than I reacted. Rose circa 2009 would have acted the same way, but would have reacted with as much, if not more, force, and would have dwelled on the unpleasantness of the situation.

Thinking last year about how to be motivated to have a solid, daily meditation practice — motivated on the level that my yoga practice motivates me, which is a high bar — I knew that what I needed to see would be concrete changes. In yoga, I have no end of moments I can point to and say, “I would have reacted this way/done things this way were it not for my yoga practice.” I needed the same thing in meditation.

I have plenty of examples these days. It’s not that my yoga practice hasn’t made me far less reactive overall — it has done wonders for me. But so far, meditation has helped make certain things — like the very conscious process of trying to not get wound up about frustrating matters in life — less effortful.

Now, about this morning’s post-castor-oil-purgation cramps, which had me on my bathroom floor for some time (I was trying to leave the bathroom to get back to bed to lie down, but I couldn’t make the seven steps to the bed). I tried to stay present and identify the sensations I was feeling, but that gave way to me just lying there, my mind wandering as I breathed with no strategy in mind at all. Shinzen has produced a lot of training materials about managing pain, and I’m curious about the techniques he teaches. Of the many changes I had at finding equanimity this week, I think I was most challenged by this one.

Don’t let this scare you away from an Ayurvedic cleanse, by the way. Everyone experiences the cleanse differently. The rest of the cleanse felt sparkling and light, and the effects are worth all the trouble of sticking to the regiment of a cleanse. I’d write more about this spring cleanse, but due to my work demands, time has not been my own since returning from Xinalani — and, as you can guess, I’ve been trying to maintain equanimity about that.

© YogaRose.net and Rose Tantraphol, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to YogaRose.net with appropriate and specific direction to the original content

Meditation as the ‘vaccination against future horrific suffering’

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Shinzen Young

As I made kitchari yesterday evening for our spring Ayurvedic cleanse — the spring version of the fall cleanse that rocked my world and transformed my eating habits  – I replayed an old interview with meditation teacher Shinzen Young. Part of Sounds True’s Insights at the Edge series, I’ve heard this interview before, but my husband has not, and since we both took our first home practice session with Shinzen this weekend, I thought it would be great for him to hear.

The interview was even better than I had remembered, and my favorite part might be when Shinzen asks the interviewer, Tami Simon (who is also awesome), “If you were to ask me personally, ‘Well, why do you do this crazy ass shit?’” She answers in the affirmative, and Shinzen offers this:

Yeah, personally, it’s because I would prefer the discomfort of a vaccination to the discomfort of getting the disease. It might seem extreme to sit without moving for four hours or to sit all night, you know, without sleeping or to do some of these Native American things, you know, these shamanic ordeals and so forth. This may seem extreme, but given what’s likely to happen to any ordinary human being, I just look upon it as a minor discomfort that’s vaccination against future horrific suffering. Let’s just put it this way, after my father died, my mother began meditating. Now, my father had all of the amenities of middle class North American life, but when it came time to die of lung cancer, he went for a week without sleeping—forget about a night—while slowly suffocating. That is physically as extreme as anything anyone ever put themselves through in the name of spiritual practice. That was nonconsensual, okay? And there was nothing to be done about it; the best of medicine could only take the edge off. So the fact is really big stuff can very likely happen to anyone and if it doesn’t happen on the physical level, it’s going to happen on the emotional level. I would rather train myself now, train my body-mind circuits now, and go through a little bit of discomfort if it means I can live my life without being under the sword of Damocles that there’s only a separation of a phone call between everything’s going fine and your world comes to an end. [at about the 47:45 mark]

What an incredible way to view the power of meditation.

A few links:

(Photo credit: Via Better Brain Better Life)

© YogaRose.net and Rose Tantraphol, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to YogaRose.net with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

 

[Retreat dispatch] Waves, vrittis and meditations

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[I had the chance to unplug during an ashtanga retreat held March 2-9, 2013 at a magical, secluded little spot called Xinalani, located near Puerto Vallarta in Mexico's Banderas Bay. While unplugging meant no social media and no online hanging out time, I did write on a few nights. (I didn't want to actually post during the retreat, though, since it would have required selecting photos and spending the time to link, format and all that good stuff -- and it was hard to justify taking that time while in the middle of a serious paradise.) I'll be sharing those posts from the retreat over the next few days.]

Xinalani waves

WRITTEN BY IPAD LIGHT ON TUESDAY, MARCH 5, 2013 AROUND 9:45 P.M. WHILE SITTING UNDER A LOVELY MOSQUITO NET BED CANOPY. :-)

The first thing you notice about the Xinalani eco retreat center on Mexico’s Banderas Bay — about a 20-minute boat ride from Puerto Vallarta — are the waves. They’re stunning, and amplified. They’re so loud it seems like the winds must be unusually high, or a storm is coming, or, though obviously not the case, the retreat center has strangely managed to mic the entire gorgeous beachfront and pipe the sounds to wherever you happen to be. And what you continue to notice — as you wake up, or practice yoga, or meditate, or get ready for dinner, or chat with your friends, or read on the beach, or wash sand out of your ears, or head to bed — is that incredibly, the waves are still there. It’s as if they’re being controlled by a larger-than-life metronome.

Descriptions of the waves that ebbed and flowed among our group members included the steadiness of a heartbeat — and the steadiness of vrittis, the fluctuations of the mind.

I don’t think I’ve ever had the chance to sleep this close to a beachfront, and I certainly haven’t had the chance to practice yoga in a place like this (though in 2009, I did get to practice yoga inside the inner sanctum of a Masonic center in Vancouver — that was totally weird). It’s the fourth night of our seven-night ashtanga yoga retreat led by Angela Jamison of Ashtanga Yoga: Ann Arbor, and the nine of us lucky enough to be on this first such trip are still so blown away by the whole experience — and especially by the waves.

We used the sounds of the waves during meditation today to explore an auditory element of a concentration-focused sitting practice. Among the questions explored: Could we meditate on the waves and experience the sounds as recordings, detached from any visual experience? What did we experience between the sensations in the auditory, visual and kinesthetic fields?

This afternoon, my friend Jade and I decided to get a little silly and play on the beach a bit. Against our better judgment, we decided to do an inversion on one of the beach’s many rock formations, even though it was late afternoon and high tide. After I got up into ardha sirsasana and settled into the relief that I was stable and balanced and hadn’t toppled over, a wave came in and, indeed, toppled me over. The exact same thing happened to Jade, even though I swore, now that we knew the pattern, that I would be able to warn her in time. Those waves move pretty damn fast.

We had such a blast getting knocked over by waves — far more fun than when mental fluctuations come out of nowhere (or at least seem to come out of nowhere, even though we should usually recognize the pattern) and throw us off course. They’re the memories from the past that run roughshod over your present moment. Or anxieties about the future that intrude on your current mood. Or the rumbling of some rambling thoughts — happy, silly, profound, whatever — that zap into your headspace at inopportune times.

Crashing waves

 

Jade and the waves

Knowing that Angela would lead a few opportunities to sit each day — and knowing that I would have time to sit beyond those periods as well — I came into this retreat with a goal of establishing a more consistent meditation practice.

I found the path to my six-day-a-week ashtanga practice back in 2011 following an ashtanga retreat to California’s Mt. Shasta with the very big-hearted Tim Miller. Meeting Tim in 2010 changed my perspective and my practice — and  by extension, my life — in profound ways.

Soon after returning from that trip, in which I let go of some pretty deep emotional baggage I was carrying around, I met Angela back home in Michigan. She is the teacher I now realize I’ve been looking for my whole life, and having this retreat time was the sweetest gift in the world.

(In case you can’t tell, I’m a big believer in retreats — they’re worth every dime you have to save up and all the sacrifices you have to make to attend, because for so many of us, daily life simply doesn’t afford the space to create a new pathway for yourself.)

So now I’m looking forward to converting the inspiration from this experience to finding a path to a deeper daily meditation practice. I’ve been meditating between five and seven days a week since this past fall, but the meditations have been at different times of days and for different lengths of time. I want some consistency so that I can reach more penetrating places. It doesn’t have to be the consistency of the waves I’m hearing as I type this, but I do want to make meditation much more of a constant in my day-to-day routine.

I know that the more this happens, the less those knock-out vrittis will get the best of me.

A momento I collected from the trip:

More from the Xinalani retreat:

© YogaRose.net and Rose Tantraphol, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to YogaRose.net with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Shut up and play the quiet

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My concert buddy and I drove an hour west to the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art in Grand Rapids, Mich. last night to watch Shut Up and Play the Hits, the new documentary about LCD Soundsystem’s final, epic (I think “epic” is the right word here) show at Madison Square Garden. It’s a superbly executed music documentary that includes snippets of a great interview of James Murphy led by Chuck Klosterman – thought-provoking and entertaining stuff.

While watching, I thought a little about how much my music tastes have changed. I used to only listen to bands that had the typical rock or pop construction of guitar chords, refrains, etc. Over time, though, I’ve been increasingly drawn to bands that don’t stick to the template — bands like LCD Soundsystem and, more recently, Caribou. These outfits create soundscapes, including lyrics when they’re needed and not including them when they’re not.

I’m a journalist by training, so words are the tools of my trade. But more and more and in different situations, the mantra of “less is more” (something my favorite journalism professor always stressed) has been sinking in. From filler lyrics to the thoughts that run on a loop in our heads, words can clutter so much of our external and internal spaces.

Over the past 11 months, as I’ve been working to deepen my Ashtanga yoga practice by committing to practicing six days a week, I’ve noticed I’m more able to tolerate stillness and quietness while working, running errands or doing stuff around the house. (A big exception is that I do already love quiet yoga rooms — the less chatter, the better.) I used to rely on having a TV on, or music playing, when at home. Basically, these days, I don’t feel the symptoms of withdrawal from chatter/sounds/white noise as frequently or intensely. And I wonder if part of my shifting music tastes is my ability to enjoy more space in my soundscapes. As strange as my description may sound, a track like “Bowls” feels like it has more room now to pulse and resonate.

Speaking of less is more on the monkey mind front: Ashtanga Yoga: Ann Arbor’s Facebook page had this recommendation yesterday:

So if you’re looking for meditation | remixed, give this meditation app a try. I’ve been so swamped lately, but I’ll check out ReWire one of these days — along with another fascinating app called Brain Wave, which says it “uses sequences of binaural tones combined with soothing ambient nature sounds and atmospheric music to stimulate specific brainwave frequencies and induce different states of mind. Includes programs for sleep.” I don’t know anything about binaural tones, but my concert buddy just told me Pearl Jam had an album that used this technique — titled, appropriately enough, Binaural.

Side note: I found out today that LCD Soundsystem-affiliated Juan Maclean practices Ashtanga yoga, and travels to Mysore. You can find the whole interview here (you’ll have to scroll down — I didn’t see any anchors) and here’s an inspiring snippet:

How has yoga now improved your working life as a DJ?

“I practice six days a week no matter where I am or what I’ve done the night before. It has been enormously helpful in keeping my body functioning while maintaining an insane travel schedule. Sitting on planes has become a major job hazard. The yoga gets my blood flowing again, stretches out all those tightened muscles, relieves inflammation, and helps with jet lag.”

How has yoga changed you as a person?

“It’s a little embarrassing but I had a bad anger problem, I would get totally out of control. There were a couple of incidents that were well documented on the internet, much to the dismay of my mother, where I had physically assaulted people while DJing. Whether my actions were justified or not, beating someone up in the middle of a DJ set is completely ridiculous. Since practicing Ashtanga, I’ve calmed down immensely. It’s also made me a generally nicer person.”

So cool to see a DJ who travels extensively make the traditional practice happen! Rock on, Maclean!

(Photo credit: Hierophant’s Facebook page)

© YogaRose.net and Rose Tantraphol, 2012. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to YogaRose.net with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.