Water Horse Writing Studio

I am taking a class to become a meditation facilitator. The approach is a type of effortless becoming, an unfolding if you will of one’s inherent gifts. It seems to rely on the assumption and understanding of one’s own basic goodness and self-worth. The leaders gently and repeatedly invite us to bring this understanding and assumption into group meditation. I easily accept this invitation and feel relief to be asked and to be allowed to be myself while communing with others. I have been meditating with a similar focus for almost 30 years, first as a way to affirm the good in my life and to teach myself mindfulness. I remember sitting cross legged on a sunlit lawn at my alma mater in between mid-term exams, deciding to focus on my breath and see if it was posible to choose my thinking and ulitmatly my orientation to life. Over the years I have been gifted with ability to sit and focus my breath and attention and to learn about love, devotion and happiness. My practice has been centered in my relationship to a spiritual teacher. It was an act of devotion. I think meditation will always be an act of devotion for me but I am starting to understand that it doesn’t have to be. I find that when I approach meditation with a wider focus of just being myself, letting myself and the world be that a type of tranquility over comes me. I find myself in a state of consciousness that I have not enjoyed since before developing memory. A very early stasis of nurturing calm. I am finding that there is value and healing to observing reality through meditation without any external motivation, whether it be for enlightened thinking or devotional communion. and that thinking can be inconsequntial. I find this a radical act and the feeling of tranquility leads the way to more practice. The big question I am sitting with is how do I engage with others as this new element of tranquilty arises? How do I wakeup to being myself in community while being in what feels to be an altered state? I am so curious how this will unfold.