A Quiet Mind

Great, now I’m worrying that I really am worrying and my mind hides that worrying.

I meditate. Mostly I’ve learned how to do so from reading, not from someone teaching me. I do that a lot. Learn on my own. I don’t know why I’m that way, but teaching never seems to be how I learn. I couldn’t tell you what flavor of meditation practice I have, I’m non-denominational like that. I have on occasion called my practice ‘Vanzen,’ but you’d need to know something about Zen and my commute to get the joke.

I recently started trying a more directed meditation practice. I downloaded the app ‘Headspace’ onto my iPhone a few months ago and finally decided to give it a try. What the heck, maybe I’ll learn something new. I like guided meditation, but I find the teaching like most things in my educational career. Slow. Repetitive. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get the idea of a quiet mind. I already have one. Show me your Kung Fu!

Okay, it’s not that bad. It’s just my brain latching on to an old radio skit (Boot To The Head). I do find myself thinking that I’ve already got a handle on this meditation thing though. By the time the voice on my phone is telling me to feel myself sitting I’m already into just breathing and being. I wouldn’t say my mind is devoid of distraction, but it’s pretty empty. I am male, maybe that’s the key. The stereotype is that we don’t have too much going on upstairs.

Being me, this leads to neurosis. What does it mean that I’ve already got a fairly quiet mind? Was there nothing there to begin with? Do depressives have less going on? Am I missing something that I should see? Am I actually obsessed about some thought that I can’t tell I’m thinking? There’s a bit of paranoia for you. Is my mind hiding my thoughts from me? Do I secretly worry without realizing it? Great, now I’m worrying that I really am worrying and my mind hides that worrying.

What’s really going on is the fact that I’ve been meditating on my own off and on for over twelve years. The initial Headspace series is a program for beginners. I’d built up this idea in my mind that I couldn’t really understand meditation, because I hadn’t been taught meditation.

Isn’t that an interesting nut? The idea that you can learn something without being taught, and the accompanying bias that learning without teaching is inferior. Sounds like another thing to let go of.