Weekly Meditation Minder February 26 - March 4

"We take a simple instruction & create a drama of success or failure around it. We're succeeding when we're with the breath and failing when we're not. Actually the whole process is meditation: being with the breathing, drifting away, seeing we've drifted, gently coming back. Extremely important to come back without blame, without a feeling of failure. If you have to come back a thousand times in a five minute period of sitting, just do it.
It's not a problem unless you make it one."

Hello friends in meditation,

We have upped the sitting time in this past week to 10 minutes! How is that sitting :-) with you?

The breath continues to be the focus, the anchor. To follow the sensation of the breath at the tip of the nose, the belly, the chest, this is the intent, the place to keep coming back to. When the time we practice increases it is easy to fall prey to a judging mind. As Larry Rosenberg reminds the entire process, every element is meditation. It is the judgment, the blame, the sense of good or bad that must let go as we settle down to watch the breath come and go, a gentle floating of attention on ebb and flow. Counting or a simple in/out labeling can be very helpful ways to draw attention to breath. Experiment a little with concentrating your attention. Keep in mind that what you practice gets stronger.

Take a moment to reflect on the judgments that arise for you. No need to attach any import to them just notice, record, comment on what shows up for you. Perhaps one day not much bothers, simple breath by breath and, another moment, just rife with hardship, judgment galore. It can be very instructive, supportive, to track some of the experiences you have in sitting, building and strengthening a resolve to practice. Like the breath we come back to over and over, the cushion we must come back to over and over as well to build a practice.

And, attempt to make a connection to your daily life. As you sit in practice with the breath your sense of it out in the world may become more apparent to you. So, during the day when it shows up in the field of your awareness, really notice it, stay with a few breaths while in line at the market, or as you meet exasperation with a child or co-worker, a sigh at the end of a day, wherever you come to the breath honor it with your attention.

In closing... from Lama Surya Das:

~[practice] teaches us how to be precisely
present and focused on this
one breath, the only breath; this
moment, the only moment. Whether
we're aware of it or not, we are quite
naturally present to this moment -
where else could we be? Meditation is
simply a way of knowing this.

Check the blog, sit regularly, let us know if you have any questions!

Many blessings, much metta,
Jenn & Rebecca