Meditation

Is meditation one of those things where people think you're a crystal-toting new-age hippie if you do it? Because I've been hesitant to talk about it, but I've been thinking about it a lot.

Let the record show that I don't believe in the healing power of crystals, and I don't even own a pair of Birkenstocks, nor have I ever. (I'd much rather sport a hot pair of stilettos any day!) And although I admit to lighting incense on occasion, it's for air-freshening purposes rather than... I don't know - whatever new-age hippies use it for.

Apologies to any new-age hippies who might be reading this!

Was I going somewhere with this? Oh yeah. Back to meditation.

Anyway, I've been thinking about it for a while. Specifically, that I'd like to learn how to do it, you know, to help me manage stress and give me a better outlook and that kind of thing. I've done it once, sort of by accident, and it was an incredibly peaceful, wonderful experience that I want to recapture. But it's hard trying to get my brain to be quiet!

Yesterday I tried. I sat myself down on the couch, closed my eyes and got to it. I did pretty well for the first 15-20 minutes, trying to just concentrate on one word and my breathing. For a while I thought I was getting there. I felt very relaxed. Atticus jumped up next to me and then started attacking the arm of the couch, but it didn't faze me. A few more minutes passed and my neck started hurting. I stretched it a little. It kept hurting. I tried to ignore it. Then I peeked to see if the cat was still in the room. He wasn't, but he was standing in the hallway staring at me. I shut my eyes again. I wondered if it would help to contemplate the burning candle across from me. I tried. It didn't help. Finally after 40 minutes my phone rang and I gave up!

But not gave up gave up. I'll try again, I think it takes practice.

Life is not fair

No, I'm not in a "woe-is-me" mood today. Quite the contrary. I've actually come to accept that life isn't fair. My problem lately has been how to have faith in light of that knowledge, and I think I've found a way.

It's been a long time since I've been to church. I think the last time was on Easter, and before that maybe Christmas. I used to love it. I was really involved in my confirmation group as a teenager, sang in the choir until my early twenties, and even taught catechism for two years. I made lots of like-minded friends, and I was happy and comfortable.

In my young, blissful ignorance I'd wonder why anyone would ever turn away from God, he seemed pretty cool to me. I took it for granted that it would always be easy to keep the faith. Life started getting harder and more uncertain, and finally infertility put me over the edge. This past year I've struggled with and questioned literally everything I thought I knew about God and life. My very own Crisis of Faith. I didn't entirely lose faith, but it had pretty much dwindled down to the size of a mustard seed.

That little mustard seed was there because of the basic question, "Is there even a God?" I can't deny the answer: there has to be. There is no other way anything in the universe could exist. Even if science proves beyond any doubt that planets, stars, and everything else out there was put there by a giant explosion of a tiny speck of matter - you still have the question of "how did that speck get there?" Nothing comes from nothing, so it must have come from something.

So now I'm working on cultivating my little seed of faith. I'm thinking about the nature of a God that would bring all this into being. He must be good. If he's good he must not want us to suffer, etc.

Back to the point. This morning I was pondering these things and it occurred to me that there might be some explanation out there as to the unfairness of life. I searched for understanding through the epic power of google, and I found some wisdom.

And my seed has sprouted.