THANKFUL FRIDAY

There has been a lot of conversations this week that has centered around time, particularly the passage of time. I have heard parents lamenting on children graduating from kindergarten and those lamenting children graduating from high school. “How can our babies be old enough for this?!?” It is how we talked about Cati graduating. It was how a woman talked about her son graduating kindergarten as we stood in the coffee line together. At times, this whole aging and time passage thing seems unfathomable to us. For me, it is just the passage of time itself that bewilders me. I mean, I can’t keep up what is happening to the month of May and how there is only a week left of it.

This week I had the opportunity to teach a lesson on meditation, just a simple format for getting started. One of the things I like to do for this class is to start with everyone sitting quietly with their eyes closed. I tell them to open their eyes when they think five minutes has passed. There are those who last seconds before opening their eyes. Then there are those who almost make it, but not without lots of fidgeting. It is rare that someone makes it the whole five minutes without movement. I follow up this exercise with some tips on making a meditation practice easier. Things like committing to a time everyday and making a nest so that you can sit comfortably. I have them do five to ten rounds of alternate nostril breathing and then twelve to twenty four rounds of a mantra of their choosing, guiding them to count by pressing their thumb into each digit. That tactile sensation helps keep the focus on what you are doing and something you can always come back to during your practice.

During the moments of stillness, no alternate nostril breathing, no mantra, the part of the practice where you’re just sitting still, those are the moments where you can choose the speed for the passage of time. Albert Einstein showed that the speed of light in a vacuum is the same no matter the speed the observer is traveling. Time and how we perceive time is relative and today, I am choosing to slow down time. That means stopping to savor the moment before mindfully moving on to the next thing. I am doing this in practice today because I have a lot on the calendar for this summer. I have a lot of really good things on the calendar, things I want to marinate in.

I want to be ready for marinating.