Good Morning

Mindfulness meditation is about keeping it simple. One way to think about this idea of keeping it simple is to look at the “add ons.”  We come into relationship with the basic building blocks of experience through mindfulness meditation. We feel into our experience and notice the sensations, the feelings that are present, and the thoughts that form and drift through. The “add ons” move in so quickly that we often have little awareness that we are embellishing our direct experience. We have a sensation that is followed by a thought. Another thought arises and we are now actively engaged in planning or problem solving. Meditation practice asks that we come back to our breath to establish ourselves – once again – in our direct experience. This practice of returning to our experience is the heart of meditation practice. This is how we learn to rest in the present moment and to learn to see all the “add ons” that flavor our day and become solidified as opinions, points of view, and ultimately get incorporated into our personality and world view enough that we know longer question their presence.

Our experience gets constricted by this process and our capacity to experience the world directly diminishes. Beginner’s mind is the opposite of this practice of adding on to our experience.  A fresh view is always available to us – no matter how caught up we are. Simply returning to our bare experience is where it starts. I’ve been thinking about the common custom of saying “”.  We wish  each other well with this phrase but we also encourage  each other to make a fresh start. A new day has arived and we have an opportunity to start anew. Grumpiness from the previous day can fall away and we can open to the freshness within us and around us.  Recently, I have been using a mindful yoga cd to do my morning meditation practice. I found myself exploring the possibility of connecting to my experience by greeting each nuance of feeling and sensation with the phrase .  to the residual ache in my hip. to the pressure of my back against the floor. This practice supports me in seeing the subtle evaluative energy that so often lies underneath our experience. Often I am simultaneously wishing myself well and thinking “Why can’t I stretch my leg more than that today?” This practice of saying to my experience exposed the tendency to evaluate and ultimately to judge my experience. When I rest in the seeing and well wishing without add ons, I am more accepting and more present to my experience.

It is easy to see evaluation as neutral. What is the problem with noticing that me led isn’t stretching as far as it did yesterday? Yet, this is a fabulous opportunity for seeing what arises. My investigation has allowed me to see the slippery slope between evaluation and judgment.  It starts out feeling fairly neutral – but what arises out of seeing and naming is the strong human tendency to improve, impact, adjust, or fix.  If I allow my mind to pursue a line of evaluative thinking, I am quickly lost in comparison and judgment. The “ practice” gets underneath my tendency to evaluate and brings me back to the direct experience of my body – just as it is – with all the places that are tight and all the muscles that do and don’t stretch. I feel a sense of grace when allowing replaces evaluation, but I also feel closer to my experience and kinder to myself. When we really see what is true for ourselves or another – it is often compassion that fills the space once occupied by evaluation and judgment.

Check out these questions as you move through your morning. How does greeting your experience with freshness and allowing impact what comes next? Is evaluation neutral or does it in some way invite judgment? What contributes to a sense of happiness and well being in your mind and body as you meet your direct experience and the add ons that arises?

Karen Beetle is a therapist and mindfulness teacher in Albany, NY. You can reach her at 518-424-7516 or kabeetle