Having been on retreat all week, the inclination to silence is still strong within me. But as you will see below, not as silent as I at first thought.
I attended a 6 day retreat - the first step of a year long study of deep concentration states. The first few nights this week I stayed with the retreat schedule - only getting up a little early to do my yoga and to extend the half hour morning sit a bit. But then I felt the urge to have a longer sit which I had learned from my June retreat would work best as the first sit of the day. So I set my alarm for 5 am and went to sleep. I was aware I wasn’t relaxed. The teachings the evening before were both stimulating and unsettling and I hadn’t elected to stay past the evening’s end for a period of silent sitting.
At a certain point in the night, I realized I was dimly awake and waiting for the alarm to go off. My body was tensed against the impact of the alarm the way it sometimes does. And I began to worry how much time I had left to sleep. I didn’t want to look and discover it was only a short period. So I lay in bed attempting to sleep but worried that as soon as I went back to sleep, the alarm would go off. It occurred to my half-asleep mind that this was similar to waiting for death, not making the most of the time available, waiting for the inevitable end.
After a period of time as I became more awake and sleep still would not come, I had one of those head-slapping, “I should have had a V-8!” moments. I was lying in bed, a bundle of tension, resisting an alarm that would go off at some point so that I could get up early and practice! In actuality, the time I needed to practice was right at the moment - in the dark of the night, with my body tense, dreading the little ring from an aging travel alarm.
I did a brief body scan to discover my body resisted being scanned. So I began to offer myself loving kindness and compassion. In less than a moment, I was aware I was back in my body, opening to the suffering that was present in that moment, and the alarm was firmly back in the future.
When I finally looked, it was only 3:30! So I got up, did my yoga, and made my way to the meditation hall.
Life is what happens while we’re making plans and anticipating the future. This is such a crucial and sometimes obvious truth yet one I have to learn over and over - and over and over again. The pull of planning, which is important for sure, and the worry over future possibilities can transfix the mind again and again. Freedom comes when we wake up to whatever is our life in this moment.
Wouldn’t you know Rumi was here before me?
Don't Go Back To Sleep
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep.
People are going back and forthacross the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.Don't go back to sleep.