Meditation - The What and the WHy By John Gerard Murphy Below is an article I wrote for the Annagh Magazine, published December 2019. "I remember one evening many years ago, I overheard my Uncle on the phone. He was chatting to his friend who was enquiring, ‘what was I up to these days’, “To be truthful, I haven’t a clue”, my Uncle said, “he’s doing something called meditation. Couldn’t tell you what it is but it’s better than sitting around doing nothing”. There is a sense that meditation is sitting somewhere, quietening the mind and entering quickly and simply into a state of peace. However, for most of us sitting and quietening the mind is not easy. We get agitated, restless, we always have to do something or be somewhere else. But before we can look to what meditation is, we must first explore where this restlessness is born. The Pursuit of Happiness. I think it is safe to say that we are all seeking happiness, but not just temporary happiness, we are seeking continual, permanent happiness. Nobody wishes to be unhappy. We may look for it in misguided places perhaps, but still we are looking for that happiness. Happiness is mortgaged out to external factors - when the weather is good, we’re happy. When the stock market is down, we’re unhappy. When fun Friday is here, we’re happy. When misery Monday is here, we’re unhappy. Such a volatile existence. No wonder we are restless, agitated, constantly chasing happiness here, there and everywhere. And yet, even when we speed up our chasing of happiness, we never seem to find it, it is always temporary. Perhaps we are not looking in the right place. In this quest for continual happiness, there is one ever-present factor - our ‘selves’. We are in everything we do and everywhere we go – we can run to every corner of the earth and yet we cannot outrun our ‘selves’. If we are to find permanent happiness, then surely it can only be found in the only permanency we know – within our own self. We are in pursuit to know everything from the subatomic level to the event horizon, but ask ourselves the question, ‘Who am I’, and we have no idea. The Journey Inward First we must understand that our whole conditioning in society is centred around the body and the mind. We work the body and mind to try and define who we are and carve a place in society. We cling to name, reputation, body beautification, possessions, all sorts of body-mind attachments. But if we took away every label, possession, everything we think we are, what remains? Who am I? The simplest question but the hardest to answer. The only way we have a chance to know the answer to ‘Who am I’ is to go beyond the body and mind and experience another state of being. So let’s explore this a little. I am not the body Firstly, I am not the body. The body has its own intelligence that functions beyond our input. We are not responsible for the circulation of our blood, the digestion of our food, cellular rejuvenation - our body looks after that for us and independently of us. We may pick up a banana, peel it and place it into our mouths, we start to chew and we think 'I am eating a banana'. But what do you do beyond chewing? Somehow that banana becomes us, it is no longer a banana. Our body accepts what we put into it, breaks it down, distributes the useful nutrients around the body and gets rid of what is not needed. That banana has become a part of our body. And yet, 'I' did none of that, it was done for us, by this body we have. Perhaps this helps to clarify what I mean by, ‘I am not the body’. I am not the mind This is where the complexity arises. We are so consumed and lost in thought that life passes us and we barely notice. You may have heard of Descartes who coined the expression, ‘I think therefore I am’, defining existence as thought. But have you ever experienced a moment of no thought, a beautiful sunrise perhaps and you felt you were not there, you just melted into the moment? And then the moment ends, mind comes flooding back and once more you are lost in thoughts. But for that moment, 'mind' was not there - but 'You' still existed. So how can we separate ourselves from thoughts. Please try this little experiment: ‘Close your eyes and wait for your next thought to come. When it comes, open your eyes’. If you have not tried it already, stop reading and give it a go. Was there a moment you were waiting for a thought? Who is the one waiting in silence for the thought? Or the same question another way, ‘Who am I’? There is no answer to this question exactly as anything you can think of is of course the mind, so let’s call it ‘Awareness’ for now. This is the part of us which is aware of thought, which knows we are thinking but is not of thought itself. ‘Awareness’ is the key to that permanent peace, that place of stillness that is inside us all. The Clear Sky ‘Awareness’ is beyond body and mind, it observes thought without prejudice or judgement. Thoughts are like clouds and ‘awareness’ is the clear sky – it may be covered by clouds but just beyond them, clear sky remains. Thoughts have no life of their own, it is only when we feed them that they grow. So instead of feeding thoughts, we learn to relax into awareness, letting clouds float on by until only pure sky remains. This learning to relax into awareness is called meditation. Meditation – the Benefits Meditation offers the techniques to allow us catch a glimpse and experience clear sky. With consistent meditation, the benefits are numerous - we notice reductions in stress, fatigue and improvements in health and wellbeing. It helps us to not get lost in ‘chasing a living’ at the cost of not experiencing ‘life’. It is a fast paced world, but we can learn to ‘make haste slowly’, where we remain active in the world but with a still mind – and perhaps then, we may come to know, ‘Who I Am’. If you are interested in meditation, visit www.lecarrowfarm.ie to find a list of ongoing meditations and retreats." Comments are closed.
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