Meditation and Me
In my world, I am constantly looking to improve upon my state of existence. Perfection is impossible, but you can still aim. Knowing you'll never reach it forces one to realize that it all lies within the journey. Subverting gross mismanagement of how one eats, is physically active, and takes care of their brain from an intellectual/spiritual standpoint can really make hay when looking for large improvements. But as time goes on, these win-falls exponentially diminish. And one will have to get comfortable with this to improve. Even if the steps forward are small, you're still learning and getting better. Fortunately, these little battles won will all add up over time. And you'll be all the more well adjusted for it.
Recently I was watching season 1 of a Hard Knock Life from a subscription cable network. Hailing from 2001, I had found it on YouTube of course. Cause that's all I watch these days. Anyway, this is essentially the first ever televised documentary of an NFL team (American Football) going through training camp in August just prior to the season. The team in question was the Baltimore Ravens, having just come off of a Super Bowl win. Each team has some 50 players that make the season roster. However, 80+ players are invited to training camp. So over 30 people will be cut. In this documentary, there was one quarterback that was not signed to a team in the NFL ever. Didn't get drafted during the offseason. But, had a somewhat successful football career at a good Division-1 college, the NFL's breeding ground. I believe this player won a national championship with his university as the starting quarterback.
The documentary followed him. He kept on talking about how nervous he was and it showed. He was ham-fisted, had two left feet. Couldn't move. Couldn't throw. He looked stiff. He couldn't complete a simple pass. Didn't seem to have any on field awareness. Coaches and veterans alike brought him aside, told him to relax. They knew he could play. No need for the nerves. But their words were not sinking in.
The thing is, for every football player, this is the pinnacle. The best league in the world. This comes with a lot of high pressure situations. And high expectations.
After seeing this dude struggle so much, I thought to myself 'This guy's gotta relax, he should meditate...' Immediately after saying that is was like, 'Oh sh!t... I've heard this before...!' Shortly thereafter in the episode, he was cut from the team. The first one to go.
So yeah, quelle suprise, I've heard that jazz about meditation before. Trying to remember where it came from brought me back to my grad school days. Something readers of this blog have heard me reference before. The circumstances under which I heard this meditation suggestion were similar to this football players. His stiffness, fumbling, and inability to perform at his best I have experienced before as a former PhD student. In the episode he would tell people, 'This has never happened to me before,' alluding to his inability to play. This was eerily familiar to me. Why? Because I have mouthed those same words for the same reasons to those questioning why I could not perform, when they knew I was good for it.
For some jacked up reason in the US, PhD programs insist upon everyone taking qualifying examinations. Basically everything you've ever learned about the subject your studying in question boiled down to 6-8 hours of testing. Like the final exam of all final exams. But only for the opportunity to start your PhD dissertation (the work that will actually earn you the degree). This comes after roughly 45-60 credit hours of coursework. Contrastingly, in Europe, for the most part, PhD programs don't make you do additional coursework. You just immediately start on your dissertation from day one and learn what you need on the fly sans any formal classroom settings. Therefore no graded coursework acting as a speed bump of sorts. There is only a time limit for the entire degree. And if you don't finish when time is up, no PhD. For this reason and a few others, I wanted to study in Europe, but I have family I wanted to be near, so I dropped this plan.
In America, the qualifying exams honestly has everyone nervous. But for some reason I could not overcome mine. And my symptoms are silent, sneaking up me. As in, I studied well for the exams. And downright became bored due to my level of preparation. However, performance anxiety would always get the best for I would clam up in real time during exam time sans any pre-exam jitters.
When I was trying to overcome this phenomenon, that I've never had before or since, is when meditation was suggested to me. By a therapist at the universities infirmary. During which I was informed of a meditation group on campus that I should join. So I did. And in all honestly, it did nothing for me at the time. So I stopped practicing.
I found the mantra's and the traditional seated posture to be stupid and uncomfortable. Also, I sussed out that I essentially had been engaging in some form of meditation my whole life by way of the mind state I would enter whilst listening to music. Somewhere between being conscious and unconscious. This was indeed affirmed by some others in the group as well as the group leader. However, it was not enough. Soon after I bailed from my PhD attempt for going down this path seemed to be causing damage in other areas of my life.
More recently I've taken the initiative to really work on the psychology of my own life. During which, meditation has been suggested for me once again. This time for some similar, and some different reasons. The initial suggestion was some 16 years ago. Again, the thought was to improve the hiccups I was having during my qualifying exams. The more recent suggestion was to improve how I move in my own personal life. Less so about performance anxiety, more so about being present in anxiety filled moments. Allowing myself to take a bird’s eye view of a scenario to see not only my own perspective, but the perspective of the ladies in me life. AND, to see how it looks from an outsider’s reference frame.
After some initial apathy rooted on the past experience I had, my instinct and outside encouragement told me to give it another shot. One major difference from my initial introduction was the following. Do not worry about any sort of seated posture and mantra. Simply close your eyes and focus on your breath. Once meditation was described to me in this way I felt the need to proceed.
Based on 4-5 months of nearly daily meditation this is what I have found.
Overall, it seems as though other people may have noticed a change in me where as I haven't for myself. More specifically, I feel as though people notice a mild difference in the 'energy' I give off, or my general aura. Many times in the past I have experienced things, and have had people comment that I seem to be an empath of sorts and spiritually intuitive. I have noticed that more messages are seeming to crop up in my daily life in the form of things I notice that seem to be more pronounced to me than to others. Messages that have, let's say one degree separation from the source of some matter of the heart I am going through in my own life. Or, personal life problems I need to solve.
The person that suggested I give meditation a go for real this time mentioned to me that meditation will help me hone this spiritual intuition. I didn't believe her at the time. Being trained as a scientist I was and remain skeptical, but much less so than before. Why? Because I've had experiences that have proven my skepticism wrong, and her claims to be correct. So I classify myself as open to what meditation may bring to my intuition.
And then there is this little tidbit. Often when I meditate, I essentially have dreams. But I'm awake. They are of course abstract as most dreams are. But also detailed, complex, and intricate. Always with some underlying message that I need to take time to truly understand. I write them down and share them with this person who essentially is my mentor in this journey. She says that I am more so having hallucinations, and that is rather abnormal for meditation but fascinating at the same time. That it is similar to those who undergo therapy under the influence of psychedelic drugs administered by professionals in a safe environment. In other words, I'm getting the same benefits, without the drug use. To which I told her that I never liked drugs because when I was a teenager I sussed out that people take drugs to get their minds to a place my mind has been since birth. She emphatically agreed with me stating that I should indeed stay away from drugs for sure.
Aren't I so special.
So this has been my experience so far. I'm still in the early stages of what I plan to incorporate for the rest of my life. Learning and exploring new things is a treasure and exciting. As I stated up top, much of the benefit is in the journey itself.
Undoubtedly, when trying meditation you may see improvements to your overall state of existence, temperament, stress levels, blood pressure, etc. But, maybe it will enhance your spiritual existence and awareness. You'll never know unless you try it out...!
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