Mindfulness: Day 1

I had my first "sit" today, beginning my effort to try daily mindfulness meditation. I flipped off my shoes, pulled on my favorite sweater and sat indian style on the couch in still silence for twenty minutes. I have to say this time was very relaxing, but I felt pretty amateurish--my thoughts kept drifting out of control. Based on what I've read, the key is to focus your mind on one thing, such as your breathing. I had a difficult time doing this, particularly as I fell into deeper relaxation and maybe even began nodding off a little.

A book I read when I was younger kept coming to mind. I'll have to find the title later, but the gist was that a character had to spend a night without any thoughts in his mind. It's a herculean task, and he fails, falling asleep and dreaming I think of being in a movie theater with all of his friends. He's very disappointed in himself, but I think things work out for him in the end. So it's clear the author was incorporating parts of his experience with meditation; it'd be interesting to go back and read this again now.

And I think I'm beginning to get it, at least a little bit: the brain isn't meant to think about one thing. We juggle and multi-task, always wondering about something and flitting back and forth. To try what for me is basically impossible at this point--to focus on one thing alone for an extended period of time--is a work out, simple as that.

No wonder you see an increase in grey matter after regular meditation, as described in Sindya Bhanoo's neat blog post on Well describing some of the health benefits of regular meditation that inspired my meditation foray.

I don't plan on describing every session or anything like that, but I will try to post intermittently about my experience beginning meditating. I did bring my old (unread) copy of Hesse's Siddartha back with me from the states. It seemed appropriate. I'll be sure to report how that goes.