If you are faithful to your practice, your practice will be faithful to you.
I knew I immediately liked the message of these words, but I couldn’t quite wrap my brain around what they actually meant…Until I did.
About a week ago I experienced a large-scale disappointment. The kind that feels like the emotional equivalent of being double-punched, hard, right in the belly.
Afterward, I doubled over, and had a moment of confusion and shock.
At this moment I had a choice:
A.) Autopilot, Or
B.) Mindful action.
For me autopilot would have been a combination of strategies to avoid (a.k.a get busy with a project) or withdraw (a.k.a. become an island).
I knew I did not want to do either one, and yet I felt a conditioned, magnetic-pull to do so.
This paradoxical contradiction is commonly called the “knowing-doing gap.”
However, I am happy to report, in this particular moment, on this particular day, I did not turn the autopilot switch on. Instead, I took a moment to pause, and I attribute this change largely to my daily mindfulness practices.
A moment to pause is a mindfulness skill that can be the most self-compassionate or compassionate action to be taken in a time of stress or distress.
Of course, it is not rocket science.
Hard, yes. Counter-intuitive (for some of us), absolutely. But difficult to understand, not really.
The website of the University of Wisconsin Psychiatry Department , home of scientific-mindfulness guru Dr. Richard Davidson, defines the Moment to Pause this way:
The ‘Pause Exercise’ is a brief exercise that can be used anytime and anywhere. It helps us shift gears from being wrapped up in our thinking about future or past and come to settle in the present…You can use it to pause in the middle of your day or in the face of a stressful experience. After you finish you simply make the next best choice for you and move back into your activities.
There is no “one way” to practice this skill, mainly because it is exactly what it sounds like (another aspect about mindfulness which I truly appreciate!), but for the person who is looking for more formal instruction, the University of Wisconsin offers the following:
Pause - Awareness: Stop what you are doing. If sitting, sit upright in a dignified but not stiff posture. If standing, stand upright but not rigid. Be aware of what is happening in your experience. Take a moment to take note of seeing, hearing, body sensations, thoughts, emotions. Notice liking, disliking or spacing out. Simply observe, acknowledge and register your experience, even if it is unwanted. Come home to this moment as it is right now. The essence of the pause is being aware of your present moment’s experience, however it is.
Relax- Dropping into the Body: Relax the body and gently redirect full attention to the body. Feel the support of the contact places of the body, the feet, the buttocks, the back of the thighs, the hands, the lips, the eyelids. Feel the direct experience of the sensations, touch, pressure, softness, firmness, warmth or coolness. Open to the sensations and your physical experience throughout the whole body.
Breathe: Direct your attention to your breath. Feel each in and out breath. Let it be in its own natural rhythm. Your breath and body can function as an anchor to bring you into the present and help you tune into a state of awareness and stillness.
Open - Expanding: Expand the field of your awareness around your breathing, so that it includes a sense of the body as a whole, your posture, and facial expression. Open up to the breath and body and sounds. Open up to the breath and body and sounds and sights. Open up to all senses as you move into your life.
Given the size of my disappointment, my Moment to Pause was a bit larger in scale, and I chose to spend a day hiking and biking by myself.
No children. No iPhone. No ear buds for music along the way. No talking. And one more thing, no rumination.
In the 4 hours I was hiking in the woods and in the 2 hours I was on my bike, I intentionally did not analyze the causes and conditions of this disappointment. I did not try to process the thoughts and feelings that sprung from this disappointment either (and that is really hard for a psychotherapist to do I might add!).
Nope, when I was hiking, I hiked. And when I was biking, I biked.
My mind was not blank to be sure. All kinds of thoughts, feelings and body sensations passed through during the day. Some related to the disappointment. Some completely random and unrelated. But at the end of the day, all of the thoughts, feelings and body sensations, as a meditation teacher Michael once said, arose, expressed themselves and then disappeared.
When I went home at the end of the day, I felt kind of proud of myself that I had taken this new approach to a life event that historically could have really knocked the wind out of me for some time.
And then I realized, a few months ago, on a snowy February day, I had taken another Moment to Pause.
I know I didn’t call it a Moment to Pause at the time, but when I reflect, I realize that is exactly what it was.
It was a time when my mother was about to have her 3rd cancer surgery in 2 months, and I was beginning to burn-out with all the classic symptoms of care-giver fatigue.
I remember deciding to walk down this bike path that was covered in snow, and, as I had not planned to take this walk in advance, I was not even wearing my snow boots.
About 30 minutes in I found myself just stopping right in the middle of the path, and turning to the side so that I could see both where I had been, where I stood, and where I was going all at the same time. It was like I needed to just stop, pause, and take stock of the moment before I could proceed any further.
I remember it was not a long time that I paused. Maybe 60 seconds.( In part because my feet were so cold!) But it was enough. Enough to be able to turn around, and as the University of Wisconsin website suggested, simply make the next best choice for myself and move back into my activities.
I think off-the-cushion moments like these are becoming more readily available to me as I continue to practice. Perhaps that is what was meant by: If you are faithful to your practice, your practice will be faithful to you.
Yours in faith,
Claire.
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