POSITIVE POSSIBILITIES
MEETING THIS MOMENT AS IT IS
Image credit: Roy Cheung
W
hen I am not on tour, my life is busy preparing to go back on the road. These past
months have been full on with new musical works, video and show production and
website launching. Thankfully, I have a dedicated meditation practice that helps me revitalize and keep a big picture while being able to be present in the here and now.
Every day, as soon as I wake up, I wash up and head downstairs to my cushion to start
my day from a centered place. When I arrived at my meditation seat the other day, all I
could feel was my pounding head. I had not had
enough sleep, and woke up with a headache.
For most of us, our knee-jerk reaction to pain is to
either try to push it away with denial, medication
or temporary pleasures, or run towards it by projecting judgment or anger at it, as though it were
“Our ego
a roadblock to our happiness.
and mind
thrive on
resistance
and againstness. ”
In a meditative mood, I welcomed my headache
into my field of awareness and allowed it to be
part of my practice. After all, it was what this moment contained. Sitting quietly in a relaxed yet attentive manner, I opened to it, as though it were
trying to communicate something to me. I did not
prod. I did not dig in. I did not poke at it or try to
push it away. I just sat quietly in a relaxed, yet attentive manner. Rather than getting entangled in
not liking it, or trying to change it or fix it, I allowed