Like most,
the greatest majority of my character has been derived directly from the nature of my early childhood conditioning.
And like many,
in time, the nature of that conditioning left me probing for insights into why I am the way I am,
and the exact role that I play in the reality that I experienced.
And as I pored through western psychology and Eastern Philosophy,
looking for answers to the same questions that man has been asking since before time everlasting,
one practice more so then any other continued to resurface as a cornerstone of living a self realized and conscious lifestyle:
meditation.
Now, I had tried meditation before,
and to put it mildly,
it hadn’t stuck.
In the beginning,
I struggled to sit idly for even 5 minutes at a time,
and trying to visualize my proverbial ‘happy place’ didn’t exactly inspire the stillness of mind one might hope for when taking on such an endeavor.
For the most part,
I found that I desired to be perceived as someone who meditated,
More than I wanted to be someone who actually practiced mediation.
But still, as has become a defining trend in my short life,
I chose to proceed forward as if it was my only real option.
And if it was 5 minutes of stillness that seemed to push me to my internal limits,
well, then 5 minutes a day, 5 days a week seemed like the perfect place to start.
I didn’t know if I should start by listening to meditation tracks, or by visualizing,
or by simply sitting in place with my eyes closed and focusing on my breathing;
but knowing that imperfect action beats inaction any day of the week,
I just got started.
I got started with the clear eyed and realistic goal of 5 minutes a day for 5 days straight.
And the next week I aimed for 6 minutes a day,
and the next 7.
Each week I increased my goal by 1 single minute and before I knew it,
I found myself sitting with myself for 20,
and then 30 minutes at a time.
Soon my exploration into meditation became as much a cornerstone of myself love practice as the disciplines I’d been diving head first into for years.
As more time passed,
I practiced, I studied,
I pushed myself to stretch beyond those places I once perceived to be my boundary.
Now I’m proud to say that I’ve increased my meditation practice to around an hour a day,
every day of the week, most weeks out of the year.
That said,
it really isn’t about how much you meditate, or for how long,
it’s ultimately about how deep you go.
And after all the hours and all the work,
if there’s one thing that I can genuinely say I’ve learned,
its just how much I struggle, even still today,
to separate myself from my thoughts,
and simply just be.
Still,
what growth has occurred is often apparent,
if not to me than to those around me,
and at the very least there are a few ideals that I’ve learned to meditate on each day that are directly responsible for a shift in the way I perceive myself and the universe I experience.
Now, before moving forward, I should say that each of these insights has been passed down through the ages by one prophet, sage, wise man, or another,
and in that, are in no way, shape, or form original to me.
Once more,
each of these guidelines is just that:
A guideline.
An ideal.
Its not about living them to perfection,
its about keeping them in mind as we face decisions in our effort to realize our intended place in the cosmos.
There are of course other great pieces of wisdom that could be included on such a list,
and there are those who would argue that you could get by well with much less,
but today,
in the right here and right now,
these are mine.
1st) Every day is a new life, and in that, I will take life one day at a time.
As an entrepreneur, an artist, and a man living in such times as these,
I’ve always found it to be one of the great catch 22’s of life,
to try and begin each new endeavor with an end in mind,
while also taking each endeavor one day at a time.
In fact, one could argue that keeping our thoughts in the present day
(much less in the present moment)
goes against our very prehistoric human nature.
For thousands of years our ability to survive as homo sapiens hinged on our ability to anticipate and recognize the hidden dangers that lurked around each and every corner.
Even today we tend to wake up in the wee hours of the morning and spiral about the greatest fears we have in life,
or even just the fears we have of the coming day.
Mankind will always be willing to do more to flee from pain than run toward pleasure,
because in our earliest hours if we remembered where we found food the previous day, great,
but remembering how we avoided becoming food the previous day was always more imperative to our immediate survival.
After all,
a man can go days without food or water,
but he can’t survive one single instance of being eaten.
Still, thousands of years later,
in times when we hardly have to leave our home to provide for ourselves,
and we find ourselves comfortably at the top of the food chain,
we’re left with the tendencies developed by our early cave dwelling brothers and sisters.
And after all of human existence the fact remains,
that we have never and will never be able to directly influence what happens in the future,
and most of the scenarios that we so vividly imagine in our mind will never come to pass.
As Mark Twain famously said,
“I’ve been through a lot of terrible things in my life, and some of them actually happened.”
You see, living in fear of our future,
distracts us from the present,
which is where we make the decisions that inevitably create the quality of life we experience further down the road.
So while looking to the future through our minds eye is what comes most naturally,
living in the here and now is not only what brings our soul its greatest sense of peace,
it’s also fundamentally where we need to spend most of our time if we are to recognize the opportunities, the inspirations, and the people that walk into our lives that could change what little time we have for the better.
So for the sake of our own peace, and for the sake of our long term wellbeing,
we must live one day at a time,
knowing that each coming day is the day
that could change everything.
2nd) I will play the role of the witness and the observer.
From the day we’re conscious enough to recognize those influences imposed on us by both our parents and our peer group,
we risk falling into the trap of believing that we are nothing more than the cumulative sum of our genetics,
and that which our early childhood experiences have molded us into.
Upon further review however,
as we’ve explored deeper into the struggle of the human condition and into the nature of our psychology and consciousness,
we’ve found that we are in fact not our thoughts,
and that the emotions we experience on a daily basis are more a product of our evolutionary nature as animals on a planet billions of years old,
than they are a part of our identity that we can never change, adapt, or improve upon.
And in that,
if we can just try to remember to separate ourselves from these thoughts and emotions,
if we can learn to play the witness and simply observe them as they come and go and rise and fall,
than we will not only find a greater sense of peace within this less adulterated sense of self,
but will too better align with that which is our highest and best self,
and stand better odds of realizing that self
on the material plane of the here and now.
So I continue to remind myself each day to play the role of the witness and the observer,
and to stand steadfast in the eye of the storm that is my thoughts and emotions,
so that I may become the master of my own mind,
and not the victim of my own current state of ignorance.
3rd) I will live in nonjudgement and acceptance of what is.
As human beings,
we love to make assumptions.
We make assumptions about what other people are thinking,
we make assumptions about the nature of certain conditions we experience on a day-to-day basis,
we even make assumptions as to how things will work out in the future,
and how they must have played out in the past.
Once more,
we love to make assumptions as to what things must mean.
Our friend isn’t late to lunch because they’re stuck in traffic,
they’re late because they don’t value our friendship.
Our significant other isn’t quiet because they’re tired from a hard day’s work,
they’re quiet because of something we’ve done,
or because they just don’t want to talk to us.
Because our efforts have resulted unfavorably in the past,
we’re certain that they’ll result unfavorably in the future.
We take what little objective information is available,
we give ourselves the latitude to make as many assumptions as needed to fill space,
and we pass judgement as to what meaning this narrative must hold.
And we do all of this knowing full well,
just how bad our track record has been when passing judgement and assigning meaning to things in the past.
We do all of this knowing full well,
that many of the most challenging experiences we’ve faced in our lives,
have led to our most empowering revelations down the road,
and that many of the people and events we once perceived to be the best things that have ever happened to us,
never really changed anything at all.
And what’s more than all this,
we don’t just pass judgement and assign meaning to people and situations that we have very little insight into,
we also refuse to accept those objective qualities of our reality that we find unpalatable,
particularly those that lie outside of our control.
Be it death, taxes, or the weather,
anytime there’s an open ear,
there’s somebody willing to fill it with thoughts of how it’s too hot,
they’re too high,
and how there’s never enough time.
In other words,
we humans are constantly drawing disempowering conclusions that we don’t have the information to verify,
while simultaneously resisting those incontrovertible qualities that we can’t do anything about.
In this way,
we act as the source of our own disillusionment with the very lives we experience.
But if we can learn to resist the urge to pass judgement on the people and events we encounter on a daily basis,
and if we can better accept those qualities of our reality that lie outside of our ability to change,
then we can find ourselves living with a greater sense of peace in the realm of the here and now.
Not only relieving us of the weight of our premature assumptions and allowing us more joy in this new world of possibility,
but affording us a clear-eyed view of our aspirations and the immediate roads that must be taken to achieve them.
4th) I will remember that ultimately there is no other and I am only meeting the self.
Our lives consist of a seemingly infinite number of experiences.
We observe sunrises and sunsets.
We meet new people and we fall in love.
We listen to great music, behold beautiful art,
and discover new lands.
And each of these encounters,
from our earliest memories to our final days,
passes first through the filter of every other encounter that has come before it.
Each experience leaves its own unique influence on us,
and we in turn reflect that influence onto every other experience that comes after.
As they say,
we do not see the world as it is,
we see the world as we are.
We walk through life,
facing new challenges at each new turn,
often feeling as though we are simply a victim of our circumstances,
and that our lives have been defined by the things that have happened to us.
But to paraphrase Tony Robbins,
it is not the things that happen to us that define our lives,
it is how we interpret and respond to the things that happen to us.
Which is to say,
given that each new happening first gets filtered through the same mind that houses all of our previous experiences,
it is never actually a matter of the conditions of our external world;
instead, it is a matter of which filter we decide to view our external conditions through.
In this way,
be it a triumph or tragedy at first glance,
the responsibility ultimately falls on us to choose the meaning we assign to it in the end.
In this way,
be it a triumph or tragedy,
it is really ourselves that we meet with each new challenge
and at each new turn along the road.
Or to quote Dr. Deepak Chopra,
"The self always as both the object and the subject of observation."
We reflect ourselves onto,
and see ourselves reflected back to us
in everyone we meet,
and in all we see and do.
If we can simply practice being more conscious as to which part of ourselves we are reflecting onto the reality we experience,
if we can learn to view the world through a filter of compassion,
empathy, and love,
in time we can dramatically change our perspective on the universe
and the role we play within it.
Emerson said,
“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful,
we must carry it with us or we find it not.”
So I remind myself each day to be the beautiful I wish to see in the world,
as it is truly the self that I meet at every crossing.
And 5th) In all these things, I will do the best with what I’ve been given.
Again,
at the end of the day,
each of these notions are really just guidelines.
They are ideals meant to be used as a True North.
It's not about perfection,
it's about progression.
After all,
life isn't about getting everything you want and being better than those around you,
it's about appreciating and nurturing the unique gifts you already possess,
so as to harness them in a way to better serve those around you.
It isn't about haves and have nots,
it's about seeking constant growth in the interest of becoming the best version of yourself.
So lastly,
I remind myself each day,
that the most I can ask is to simply do my best in the pursuit of other grander aspirations.
And as a bonus, one last thing I try to remind myself of each day is to avoid the “3 C’s”: complaining, criticizing, and comparing.
In his book, Think Like a Monk,
Jay Shetty tells a story about a monk he lived with during his time in an ashram in his 20’s.
He says this other monk was constantly complaining about the conditions of the ashram;
the kind of guy who always had a problem with the food,
but there was never enough of it.
Jay says that before too long,
he found himself complaining about the monk to the others at the ashram,
and in this way,
saw that the other monk’s negativity had directly bread additional negativity.
As like begets like,
so do emotions of anger, greed, and lack,
give birth to further feelings of anger, greed, and lack.
So Jay reminds us to try and avoid the “3 C’s”:
Complaining,
Comparing,
and Criticizing.
Now, just to make sure I drive this point home,
this is certainly not to claim that I never complain about others or about certain conditions in my life,
nor is it to say that I never compare myself to others or criticize their decision making.
It’s simply to say that the more I’ve tried to heed Jay’s advice to bring a little more awareness to my dependence on the 3 C’s,
the more conscious I’ve become of my tendency to complain about, compare, and criticize myself and others,
the less drained I’ve felt by the disproportionate amount of energy it takes to carry such disempowering thoughts around.
And as I’ve begun to free myself of the burden of my own self perpetuated negativity,
I’ve not only enjoyed a lighter,
gentler day to day disposition,
I’ve experienced a greater since of peace toward the universe and my role within it.
So I remind myself each day to try to avoid the 3 C’s,
so that I can conserve my energy for those thoughts most likely to bring more abundance and joy into my life and the lives of others.
So, there they are.
The 5 thoughts I like to meditate on each day:
1st) Every day is a new life, and in that, I will take life one day at a time.
2nd) I will play the role of the witness and the observer.
3rd) I will live in nonjudgement and acceptance of what is.
4th) I will remember that ultimately there is no other and I am only meeting the self.
5th) And in all these things, I will do the best with what I have been given.
And as an additional bonus just to make sure you get your money’s worth:
I will avoid the “3 C’s”.
Much like meditation itself,
keeping theses ideals in mind is certainly not a cure all,
and it certainly won’t make all your troubles disappear overnight.
But with small, daily, incremental improvement,
in time you’ll find these thoughts to not only profoundly affect your internal world,
but to improve how successfully you exist interdependently with the world around you.
In certain hours you’ll find yourself focusing your consciousness toward one value more so than others,
and at some point you’ll likely drop a few for some of your own,
but by always nurturing the habit of rooting your perspective in firm ground as you move through reality,
you will inevitably find a greater sense of peace and abundance all along the way.