Yesterday, I sat for an hour in Rigpa Buddhist Centre, Dublin. We didn’t talk much. One of the best sittings I’ve ever had. I realized something new and precious. Thoughts are like reflexes triggered by external or internal stimuli. Trying to control or to stop them is silly and pointless. They are like chills or tickles. The only way to remove them is to remove the causes. To remove the causes is to expect, embrace and accept the causes.
So during the sitting I opened up myself to the external world and body sensations: sounds of busy Grafton Street pouring in through the window, a fly climbing up my forearm, discomfort of meditating in office clothes. I accepted them all, stopped pushing away, stopped treating them as something out of ordinary, unexpected, something in the way of my meditation… because when I meditate the whole fucking universe should become mute. And then there was no stimuli anymore. For some time. And then I had to remind myself – there is nothing going on I had to react to. There is no need to exercise those stupid animal survival mechanisms hard-coded into my brain. And the breath became like a hammock. There is nothing surprising in the movement of the hammock. This is why it is so relaxing and soothing.
Another thing. A confidence arose in me that the natural state of the mind is stillness. Confidence. It is only because everything around me and inside me is constantly moving and because my brain is evolutionary conditioned to seeking threats this stillness is disturbed.
It’s one thing to read about it. Experiencing it is quite another. This whole Buddhism business proves itself to be true… time after time. It is both joyful and scary.
I also visited the Shambhala centre in Dublin on the same day which I will describe tomorrow. I don’t want my blog posts to be too long. Who would have time to read them?
Bad At Being Still 