Still Point Meditation for Stressful Times

Sometimes life hits us from multiple directions at once. It can be hard to know which front to deal with first and the stress can build to a point of overwhelm pretty quickly. No matter which issue we give our energy and attention, the others still pull and we get drained.

I have a meditation that I use for just such times that actually developed out of my love of storms when I was a kid. I still love them, probably because I live in So Cal! Some of my favorite times were spent snuggled down in bed, listening to a storm outside and feeling completely safe inside. It was like being in a protective bubble where I could see and hear the violent winds and rain around me, but remain safe and undisturbed where I was. I call the meditation Still Point, as in the still point in the center of a hurricane, or tornado. If you can imagine what it might be like to be sitting in the center of a tornado, legs curled up comfortably underneath you, while the wind whips things around you at hundreds of miles per hour with deafening noise, rain, and hail. There you are, in the center, where it is safe and calm. You are surrounded by drama, distress, disaster, violent change and everyone’s stuff. But in the center you are peaceful, you are grounded and you have the choice to reach out into the storm to connect to something or not. If you decide to connect to something in the storm, and you leave your still point to reach it, you risk getting sucked into the storm with it where you will be whipped around and around and end up some place in Kansas under a house. If you connect from the still point and stay sitting there, you can bring what you wish to connect to into the still point with you and deal with it there where it is calm, and where you know that you are safe.

Try it for yourself.

Get comfortable and imagine yourself sitting on a cushion. Your legs are crossed, you are comfortable and your body is relaxed. As you relax you start to hear the sound of a storm all around you but you are not disturbed. You can see and hear the storm, but where you sit it is calm and there is no storm. As you look into the swirling winds you see people, places and things that have been troubling you. Relationships, money, work, health issues, whipping past you as you watch from your still point. Pick one that has energy to it for you. Take a breath and exhale and then reach for it staying planted on your cushion inside your still point. Bring it to you and examine it closely. What does it hold for you? Sadness? Fear? Anxiety? Loss? Helplessness? Hurt? Longing? Is there something you need to do? Something you need to say? Or is this just about feeling and letting things be for now, or maybe letting go? Now let that one go back into the storm, reestablish yourself in your still point and then repeat this for any other ones you want to deal with for this meditation period.

When I do this meditation I am immediately hit with the feeling of the situation or the relationship that I have chosen from the storm. I am not distracted or defended which allows me to see much more clearly what is actually in front of me. We are constantly surrounded by the people, places and things of our life and it can begin to feel like we are being sucked into the swirl of it all. I find that this simple meditation can create a space where clarity and mindfulness become the ground of our engagement with our external lives. In this space, we can find equanimity in chaos and amazing change can take place.

Do You Believe That Love Trumps Hate?

"Hatred paralyses life: Love releases it. Hatred confuses life; Love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it." Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

There is so much hate in our country at this moment in time. Polarizing camps spewing angry rhetoric and claiming ownership of the truth. The situation is much like the situation during the struggle for civil rights in the 60's. Dr. King knew then what we need to remember now that hate will never win against hate. That only ends in violence and more hate. The only thing that wins against hate is love. Someone once said that "hatred and anger are powerless when met with kindness."

History has proven that to be the case and it is still the case today. It has been proven again and again that positive thought directed at a situation can diffuse the tension. In a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Social Indicators Research reports on one of the most dramatic sociological experiments ever undertaken. Researchers predicted in advance that the calming influence of group meditation practice could reduce violent crime by over 20 percent in Washington, D.C., during an 8-week period in the summer of 1993.

In fact, the findings later showed that the rate of violent crime--which included assaults, murders, and rapes--decreased by 23 percent during the June 7 to July 30 experimental period. The odds of this result occurring by chance are less than 2 in 1 billion.

The demonstration project involved assembling nearly 4,000 practitioners the Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi programs from 81 countries. Participants were housed in hotels and college dormitories throughout the District of Columbia and at the University of Maryland.

Hagelin says previous research had shown that these meditation techniques "create a state of deep relaxation and coherence in the individual and simultaneously appear to produce an effect that spreads into the environment, influencing people who are not practicing the techniques and who have no knowledge of the experiments themselves."

I am proposing that we take this information and use it to diffuse the hate that is bubbling in this kettle of fear and threatening to overflow at any moment. In the study they had 4000 participants. I have over 2000 Facebook friends and another 500+ contacts. How many people do you have on your Facebook page, email list, etc. who would join us for 3 minutes per day to stop Hate? I think we can top the 4000 participants from the gate.

Here is what we will do. At noon everyday for the next 90 days, we will stop for 3 minutes and send Metta, or Loving-Kindness, into the heart of the Hate in this country. Metta is like a prayer that is born from our compassion, from our understanding that at base all human beings are alike in their desire to be safe, happy, healthy and at peace.

Do YOU believe that LOVE trumps HATE as Dr. King did? If so, then join my group People Who Believe That Love Trumps Hate where you will find the instructions for sending Metta and more information on the group. Then add your positive energy to ours everyday a noon by doing 3 timed minutes of meditation focusing on the people who are filled with anger and hatred that we see and hear in the media daily, and sending them our Loving-Kindness. If you are at all uncomfortable with my suggestion you can use a prayer, image, thought or just the intention to send peace for that timed 3 minutes instead. It is all about energy and intention and if that is there, we can't help but make a positive difference.

So, please send this out to all of your friends and family. Let your spiritual leaders know and encourage them to put it out to their congregations, sangha, and groups. Spread the word on Facebook and Twitter. Let's really try to blast the cancer of hate with a huge laser beam of Love.