the path to meditation
by patsy mennuti
Ever been in a rough ocean whose sediment murkily cloaks the majesty of an underwater paradise? Or have you ever looked over a turbulent lake whose choppy waves distort the reflection of its gently sloping bank covered in beautiful wildflowers? The mind can produce a similar effect—distorting and distracting us from our true nature or worse yet, leading us to believe that the distortion is who we really are. Sediment and chop in the mind can look like incorrect beliefs we hold about ourselves and the world, addictive behaviors, emotional disturbance, mind-numbing activities, thoughts run amuck and ways of being that build up our sense of separateness from all around us. Meditation then helps to still those muddying waters in the mind so we can begin to see and experience ourselves in a joyous, new way and begin to realize that we are not those thoughts, emotions and behaviors. The mind can be a wonderful tool for us if used in the right way and from a place of knowing that the “I” we refer to is not the mind.
Many people don’t even attempt meditation saying, “My mind runs a million miles a minute all of the time. I can never get it to stop.” What you practice is what you get. If you continue to practice the mind doing this, then you will continue to get a million miles a minute kind of life! The most important thing you realize about meditation is that it is a practice—which means you don’t do it once and say you’re not good at it. Like any sport or hobby, you keep doing it, working on better results along the way. And it’s cumulative, kind of like brushing your teeth, you do it frequently for the best effect over time. You don’t wait until you have a cavity, brush your teeth once and wonder why you keep getting cavities.
Beginning a Meditation Practice
Begin with an attitude of open exploration, trying various techniques and approaches you can find online or in your local community to see what works best for you. Then, settle on one technique to deepen your practice. Popular techniques include a focus on just the breath, repeating a mantra (sacred phrase) in the mind, looking into a candle flame or guided meditations. Your unique makeup will dictate which approach feels best to you. Start with a commitment you can adhere to, maybe even just 5 minutes a day of sitting in stillness. It’s really just this simple, and it’s really just this effective if you give it time.
Patsy Mennuti began her journey with yoga in 1999, attaining her 200-hr certification in 2000. She assembled and edited Simple Ayurvedic Recipes by Myra Lewin and continues to travel to Hawaii to further her studies and assist in yoga teacher trainings. In 2013, she received a Yoga of Recovery certification. She currently teaches yoga in Fort Lauderdale and can be reached at [email protected].