I started looking through the April 2021 issue of The Atlantic last night. I know that about a week or so ago, I was ragging on the Atlantic for being too bleak and dark. Then we got the newest issue in our mail this past weekend and as if someone was reading my mind, the cover was pink and gold and the cover story is about how “Private Schools are Indefensible”. The subject of classism is one of my favorite subjects to get on a soap-box about, so it was as though they crafted this issue to win me back. The Atlantic is officially now back in my favor.
What I would like to write about though, is the short essay on the last page called Ode to Not Meditating by James Parker. It is a short read about how the author used to be a mediator who practiced regularly and even went to meditation retreats. He found that mediating, “helped me enormously. It calmed me down.” But after the pandemic started, he stopped. After quitting meditating, he found that he started to feel moods that he hadn’t felt in a while, he writes in the piece “as the world went flat as a pancake, I became less interested in leveling myself out.” He found that not mediating “has brought me home”.
I felt really struck by this short piece as I pondered it this morning. I have a lot of thoughts about this subject and other tangential topics. First, while I feel bad that we, as a people, exist in a malaise right now, I am glad that it finally seems acceptable to admit that we are feeling anxious. It seems like the pandemic is normalizing casually talking about mental health and mental health struggles. While I hope that we, as a people, will feel less anxious after the pandemic is over, I sincerely hope that talking about mental health and mental health challenges, is something that we can continue to discuss openly in the aftertimes.
Yet, it does seem like to me at least there is a pressure right now to level-yourself out. This might just be me who is seeing it everywhere, as in the last year or so, I have really dipped my toes into the literature and world of “self-help” but honestly, I think the pressure to meditate and practice mindfulness is everywhere. I have encountered it to a great extent in Noom, the weight loss program that I program that I joined and have been doing for the past five months. I encounter it in the literature I read about grief and life transitions. I see it in Yahoo news, on the MSN webpage, and I hear Calson Daly and Michael Phelps discuss it on the Today Show.
I see tips about how to stay mindful and tranquil during the pandemic. I see advice about how to observe nature and breath calmly when things seem out of control.
I practice some of the things that I read. I listen to my breath when I am running. I try to slow down my breathing when my children are trying my patience.
Yet, I agreed with this piece about not mediating a lot! I think it is because I am a contrarian. I almost feel an instinctual need to go against the grain. If everyone else is doing something, I take that as my cue to do the opposite or more likely, at least think about doing the opposite. One close friend, who could be accused of being a perpetual people pleaser, used to tell me that my cue when things are going a certain direction was to ask myself “how can I undermine the system”? He’s right, I like to play the devil’s advocate. I like to look for flaws in the system.
But even if I weren’t a contrarian, I think that I would have to say acting emotionally without mindful intention might have value sometimes. It can be hard to act quickly and decisively if one is always recognizing and accessing the value of one’s thoughts before acting.
Yet, I owe a lot to mindfulness. Sometime around May last year, I developed an insomnia that got so bad that I started taking prescription sleeping aides. Mediation, in the form of a daily run, sans-headphones, is what eventually restored my sleep. I now only take a 5 mg melatonin to fall asleep, which I can forget and still fall asleep. My need for the melatonin might be like a child’s need for a favorite toy more than a physical need for melatonin.
I also feel like my relationship with food is better since I started Noom, which incorporates a lot of mindfulness practices. I can’t underestimate what slowing down and not automatically acting on my thoughts and feelings has brought to my life in the last year.
As a moody, INFJ (Meyer’s Briggs category) though, I have felt a certain amount of persecution throughout my life for being emotional and thus a feel a need to defend a non- mindfulness approach.
I also have to agree with the author that “stewing in the somethingness” is worth it sometimes. There’s a yin and yang to it all.
Both approaches have value. I like the calm. The calm has done a lot for me but I also like the emotional torrent that is in me.
Namaste, in Sanskrit, loosely translates to “The God in me recognizes the God in you”. This is something that I truly believe, and I try to keep in mind when I am interacting with other people. This is something that I especially hope I can keep in mind when I am experiencing conflict with other people or we are not seeing eye to eye. I want to remember that we are all made of the same creator and we all have a little bit of God in us.
I also think that we have a little Imp in all of us. The Imp in me sometimes comes out when I am not being so mindful. The Imp can cause trouble but sometimes the Imp brings valuable things to the surface that might not be brought out if not for the Imp. I think it is maybe important for me to remember when interacting with others that “the imp in me recognizes the imp in you.” If I am more accepting of my Imp, it helps me to be more accepting of your Imp or impish tendencies, whatever they may be.
Namaste
What are your feelings regarding mindfulness?
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