Day 41

A friend of mine jokingly likes to say "I suffer from ADS - Attention Deficit SHINY!". We all recognize that distracted quality when we see it in conversation with another. And it's humbling to realize how, when all I have set is the simple task of focusing on my breathing, my mind displays full-blown Attention Deficit SHINY.

Many great ideas tonight - which was not exactly the goal. But one new development: I was in the middle of a very emotional thought. The emotion attached to the thought was unease about change. I dropped the story/thought, got interested in how the emotion felt somatically, relaxed my muscles and breathed into it.

I was wracked with involuntary shudders and a tear or two. There was no attempt to choke off either of these phenomena. There was no judgment. Just a curiosity. The moment felt like it was probably important. And soon enough it was gone, as I became distracted by the idea of making gluten-free, organic, 100-mile muesli.

Attention Deficit SHINY!

Day 40

Still at it. Despite my intention last week to return to a consistent 20 minute sit per day routine, I again missed two daily sits and made up for it with a 60 minute sit on Saturday.

When somebody first told me about meditation, one of my first rections was "What's wrong with getting lost in thought? That's where my song ideas and show ideas and work ideas all come from. Are you asking me to give that up? That sounds a lot like giving up my creative process."

It's not that traveling down the byways of your mind in search of inspiration, nostalgia, or a grocery list is wrong. Meditation is about making it a voluntary process, rather than an involuntary process. Maybe like toilet training your mind?

Tonight's sit was interesting. Very distracted, but in a lovely way. If you get caught up in a thought with a lot of emotion attached to it, the instruction is to keep the emotion and drop the story. Usually that's applied to stories that stir up anger, fear, resentment etc. Happy tonight to drop the thought but keep the feeling of joy.

Day 33

During my meditation this evening I got repeatedly distracted by re-playing something in my mind. Earlier in the evening I was texting with my friend about how meditation was supposed to train your mind in being more present, less lost in thought. And now, here I was, lost in thought about this text about not getting lost in thought.

This same friend recently bought me a jasmine plant. It has been blooming in December. Whenever a new bloom opens, there is an intense burst of sweet scent that fills the room. A new bloom opened in the middle of my sit. It was sensory and experiential and immediate.

I got carried away from the present moment with my own clever theorizing about meditation, and carried back by a simple, elegant, living gift.

Day 24

The last two sits have been during periods of extreme exhaustion. My work schedule has been such that I am often meditating just before bed, when I really would prefer to be IN bed, or on days when I have had far too little sleep the night before.

It is more difficult to keep the mind focused when I am tired. It wants to drift off, yet it seems as if it does not have the energy to really get off and running down a fantasy path.

That is all for tonight. Bed would be a good idea. I am going to a Christmas party instead.

Day 22

Yesterday's sit was qualitatively different from any other meditation session I have had in my life. Usually, I am able to remain present for a few minutes at a time, if that. Then I am off on some train of thought - career, sex, food, revenge. Yesterday I remained present for what seemed like ages. A few little thoughts attempted to take root, but I was able to quickly recognize them and gently ease myself back to focusing on breathing and noticing my body. It was an interesting experience. There was emptiness but no boredom. Graphic designers talk about the beauty of negative space. This was like a mindscape version of same.

Fortunately I have heard many times that one should not be surprised when after a breakthrough session like that you go right back to a cluttered, discursive mind again. So I was not disappointed today when that was precisely what happened in today's sit. Not TOO disappointed.

Day 20

People often say that it's essential to have a to-do system of some sort. If you don't, you're bound to remember that letter you have to mail from the office when you're at home in bed. Or remember that you need to take out the bedroom garbage when you're at work. With a to-do system, you can relax with those things, knowing they're covered & written down somewhere. You can stay present rather than obsess on them.

All of which is to say that the mind has a way of picking the least opportune moments to go down certain pathways. Today I was present in my meditation for periods of time, but I also got carried off by creative ideas for my musical. Good creative ideas. Creative ideas I was sort of unhappy to let go of and come back to the present. Creative ideas I wanted to get up and write down so I wouldn't forget.

I guess the trade off with meditation is that I am training my mind to remain present to whatever it is doing. So that when it is time to be creative, I will stay in that zone, instead of thinking about hot fudge sundaes or erotic photographs.

And for the record, the best creative idea my mind got distracted by was putting a song called "Day Job" back into the show with an earlier edition of the lyrics, and having the dancers do polyrhythmic percussive choreo that's somewhere halfway between "Stomp" and Tom Waits' pipe-clanging hijinks on "Sixteen Shells". I didn't forget.

Day 17

That post a few days ago where I said I get carried away more by career fantasies than by sex fantasies? I may need to re-think that...

Day 12

Today was a run-of-the-mill sit. Periods of presence and focus alternating with periods of discursiveness. I find it interesting the fantasies that take me away for the longest periods of time. Most people report sexual fantasies as being the most compelling, followed by food fantasies.

Mine seem to center around career. I imagine my musical becoming successful, with critical accolades pouring in. The wealth of a hit coming my way is a minor detail in this dream. Conspicuously absent form my fantasy of success are images of joyous, entertained and possibly mind-broadened audiences exiting the theater in great smiling droves. In meditation you get to face yourself, without filters.

Knowing what hooks me the most often on the cushion helps me keep aware of my obsessions & sensitive areas & blind spots off the cushion. It's easier to say "Ah... this email makes me angry because it threatens my desire for praise and good reputation." or "Am I prone to trust this guy too much because he's promising me exactly what I desire?"

I suppose it's also a good barometer of where my abundance lies, too. I'm fortunate to have lots of love and sex and good food around me, so my mind doesn't go searching for it obsessively when it travels away from the breath.

Day 11

It is very difficult to sit in meditation when you know that right after you finish you will go to a fetish party where people wearing next to nothing will flog other people wearing next to nothing. In cages.

Day 10

Another sit. I notice that what often takes me away is a piece of music. An earworm. These are more persistent for me than any sort of story-based thought. Yet they quickly become the soundtrack for mental images - music-video style. And once the images come, the stories begin, and I'm off to Japan in my mind.

In fact, my earworms are SO persistent that the effort of re-focusing away from them towards breath can become a once-every-three-seconds activity. Which can often seem similar to pushing away, choking off etc. Which is not helpful to the intention of peacefully abiding with the breath.

I wonder if this phenomenon is more pronounced in musicians?

Day 9

I missed posting yesterday, but not sitting. The last two sits have been similar in that my mental discursiveness has been fairly consistent. I do not seem to be gaining much discipline in terms of being able to focus on my breathing for progressively longer periods.

I do, however find I notice more quickly in my day-to-day life when I have become lost in thought when my attention should be present: conversing with a boring person, trying to find an elusive song lyric, riding a bicycle in heavy traffic etc. This has immediate tangible benefits.

And finally, I find I am less attached to the idea of progress when it comes to the meditation practice. It has been documented over and over that one's practice will fluctuate in terms of focus and discipline. To expect a linear progression is to add something extra to the sitting-with-what-is. Someone said of meditation that we are all always beginners. So the lesson is to keep coming back. Which will sound familiar to anyone who has done the other '90 in 90'.

Day 7

Very late sit tonight. Unexpected work snafu meant I did not get home until 11:20. Fairly focused, all things considered. I notice I have been less drawn to junk food and to pornography since I have started this practice. I've been intentionally trying to kick the junk food, and have had no opinion or intention about the porn. These last two sentences brought to you by the department of too much information.

To sleep.

Day 6

Today was without a doubt the most difficult sit yet. My mind was absolutely all over the place. Sexual fantasies, lyric ideas, career concerns etc. Totally swept away over and over and over again. I was able to catch myself and return to the present on a number of occasions, but remaining there was simply not happening today.

The idea that the relaxed 'here & now' is the natural state of my mind was not able to hold me. In fact, today's sit felt like a total rebuke to that idea. Dog owners know that a dog simply doesn't want to walk in a straight line, all you can do is pull it back on course. That's what my mind felt like today. Which is where faith comes in.

People often associate faith with the acceptance of wild supernatural ideas without a shred of evidence. It gets a bad rap. But faith can also be about accepting something that you have no direct experience of, based on the experiences of others. Sometimes solely on the experience of others.

The reason ninety sits in ninety days has resonance for me is that 12 step programs recommend that newcomers go to ninety meetings in ninety days. The idea is that this persistence will establish new patterns of thought and behaviour and create a habit for life. To the newcomer, the question "How is sitting in a bunch of mildewy church basements for three months going to change my life?" is a reasonable one. The answer usually is "It just will. You have to experience it to find out."

So to hear that Thich Nhat Hanh recommends ninety sits in ninety days as a way to establish new patterns of thought and behaviour and create a habit for life seems very familiar. I have direct experience with the benefits of ninety meetings in ninety days. It was perhaps the first big leap of faith I took in my life. And there were days when it all felt like a bunch of weird-ass creepy voodoo and I wanted to quit. But at the end of it, my life was changed.

So this meditation persistence is about experiencing it to find out. Back at it tomorrow.