Transitions

A snowbird friend of mine recently had to return home from a shorter than usual season here in the desert. I asked her how their season was and she replied, "It felt short. It's the transitions that kill me!". The statement really stuck to me as how changing locations can hold so many challenges -- routines needing to be re-established, connections to your favorite services like your hairdresser, dentist and yoga studio! As I thought about this further I realized that we are always in some state of transition, although some may not be as large as others.

Think about what you were doing just before reading this. Could you replay the last 10-minutes in detail? How did you transition from where you were to where you are at the present moment? Did you notice or were you projecting ahead to what was next? To paraphrase the Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh-'When we are focused on a goal that sitting is front of us, we can miss the appointment with our own life'. It's as though we look toward the future and lose our connection to the richness of the present moment and the experience we're having within it.

Think about your breath for a moment. It has been in transition since the very first one you took and is never the same breath. We go our entire lives, breath after breath, aware or not that the breath we are breathing in this moment is unique unto itself. As I breath in air molecules, they will have been touched by other beings on this planet. When the air enters my body, it is now touched with my own unique "body-print" before being released, in a different form, back into the world. Our breath is not only always in transition, but is the one thing that is always in the present moment. When we slow down and become conscious of it, we begin to awaken to a subtle wisdom that is lies deep within us.

The first time I saw Deepak Chopra speak was in the early 90's in Melbourne, Australia. He was talking about quantum physics and suggesting that we try to find the gap between our thoughts. I thought to myself, "We have gaps between our thoughts??" as I certainly didn't believe that I had gaps but just one thought abutting the next. He went on to say that within the gap is where we tap into profound insight. Okay...he had me hooked. I was curious to know more and was probably the first time that I started to see if I could find any space between my endless choo-choo train of mind chatter. This is one of the moments that led me to want to learn more about meditation as that seemed like the space in which to explore the questions that arose. I wanted insight...I had to do something and this seemed like a great idea!

For any of us who've sat on a meditation cushion, we know that the process is anything but easy. It sounds simple enough-- sit down, follow your breath and when your thoughts distract you and you notice the distraction, simply bring your awareness back to the breath. It takes consistent practice to begin to truly get a sense of what this process reveals as we are constantly jumping out of the present moment. But if you're like me and curious enough to explore a deeper connection and gain inner wisdom, then sitting on a meditation cushion or stepping onto a yoga mat is a great place to hone our skills. 

This past week in classes the focus has been to try to stay connected to how we move between the poses, rather than focusing on being in a pose. And if the pose is held, then the focus shifts to the ever-transitioning breath. It has invited all of us to slow down, to truly taste the experience that we are having. And it's challenging because a part of our habituated mind asks us to go at the speed that is familiar, so we can enter this tug-of-war between unveiling something new and being enticed to hang out with what we know. On another level, the slowing down connects us in a different way to our practice, revealing what it can feel like to be radically awake in whatever we are undertaking.

My thought of the week is to slow down, explore the physical sensations of the breath and to deeply embody the moment. You can practice this as you complete the reading of this blog by noticing what it is that you do next...and really pay attention to how it feels as you do it. Transitions...the sweetness that you'll taste if you allow yourself the time to do so!