Meditate, meditate, meditate. Here on Maui, you hear it all the time. Sometimes I get sick of pretending like I know what it’s all about. But then again, I may just be jealous, because for the life of me I can’t quite get there.
I was raised as a Christian and was always given the message that “clearing one’s mind” was a recipe for disaster. And by disaster, I mean opening the portal to evil and negative sprits, which would be a major bummer.
As I’ve gotten older and a teeny-bit more open minded, I realize that this type of thinking is probably a major crock-o-crap, but then again, what if it’s true? A rotating head, skittering up walls and regurgitating slime is not something you want to mess around with.
Granted, I have tried meditation a few times in the past. Once was in high school during our world religion class. It was a guided meditation and we were supposed to walk down the beach and meet up with God who in turn was supposed to tell us something deep and meaningful.
So, I walked down the beach and met God (who, by the way looked kind of like a Paia hippie). The visualization bubble burst when God opened his mouth and asked, “Whom do you serve?” It was a little creepy.
Other meditation attempts have also freaked me out. Several years ago a small group of us decided to meditate and I started tripping out–flashes of people and places raced through my mind. This white house kept popping up like a flash card from hell while I heard, “Someone will be murdered here” over and over. No, I wasn’t on drugs—at least not that I recall.
Anyway, I haven’t lived in a white house since, but to be fair, I haven’t saved any lives from my vision either.
Speaking of visions, sometimes I have them and they are utterly and completely useless. For three nights in a row before the tragic plane crash into BMW Maui a year or so ago, I dreamed of plane crashes. Repeatedly. It really bothered me, but what was I supposed to do about it? It’s not like I’m Sylvia Brown and can send a message via the Montel Williams Show to tell people to not fly any planes for a while.
Just today, I figured out that I’ve had the whole meditation thing all wrong. You see, meditation is actually concentrated attention on an object of thought or awareness. It’s the act of turning your attention inward to a single point of reference.
Come to find out I rock at it! I meditate all the time… Just not on the good stuff. I can go for days thinking about something that really gets my goat. I go through the motions of daily living, but inside I’m seething on the subject. It really is a point of focus. I can get so worked up about something that it affects not just my health, but my relationships as well.
So if meditating on the positive brings you to a higher state of altered consciousness, dwelling on things like anger and resentment will bring you to a–you guessed it–lower state of consciousness. I think that we all meditate, but we call it different stuff like “focused on,” “wrapped up in” or “can’t stop thinking about.”
So now that I’ve realized that I’m a meditation whiz of the dark-side, I want to change it. Who wants to be the bad-vibes girl?
Starr Begley has an eBay addiction and is requesting an intervention. MTW
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