Dear Friends,
A new year tradition for many people is to set some resolutions… lose weight, meditate every day, run a marathon! And before the month is through, many people will have given up on keeping those resolutions.
In previous years, I have written about the usefulness of setting an intention – for the year, month, day, or the next meditation session. We set our intention, and we can course-correct as we veer off-course.
In an article for Mindful, Elaine Smookler wrote:
Intentions help you stay oriented toward your goal when strong emotions, exhaustion, boredom, or hunger threaten to throw you off course. Intentions connect deeply to your true heart’s desire, to what really matters to you, and use that rudder to set your course forward.
An intention isn’t a wish or a fantasy. It isn’t a proclamation of who or how you think you should be. It comes from truly listening to what’s important for you to feel most alive and, well, yourself.
Not an intention: I want to lose 25 pounds and fit into my old jeans.
Intention: I am listening deeply to my body’s desire to be healthy and active, and my heart’s desire to feel vibrant and whole.
Smookler, Elaine. “How to Manifest Your Deepest Desires.” Mindful, Mindful Communications & Such, PBC, 17 Dec. 2019
https://www.mindful.org/how-to-manifest-your-deepest-desires/
The article mentions connecting to “your heart’s desire.” In a TED Talk by Simon Sinek, which is more business oriented, he presents the “Golden Circle.”
His thesis is that effective leaders and companies start with WHY and move out to the HOW and WHAT. I think this also can apply to our meditation and mindfulness practice.
Over the course of this month, we’ll delve into various aspects of the “what” and “how” of meditation and mindfulness practices, but the “why” is what you need to determine for yourself. If you have a strong sense of your “why,” I think you’ll find it easier to stay with the practices – this month and going forward.
I’ll give you my first draft “why/how/what” statement, which is still a work in progress…
I believe we can live in the world with wisdom and kindness. The practices of mindfulness and meditation can help us better understand what supports wisdom and kindness, and what gets in the way. Through this month of reflections together, we can establish and strengthen foundational skills as part of a community, to live lives aligned with our highest values.
When I touch into this deep belief, then it’s easier for me to get my butt on the cushion for a bit of meditation, even if I’m tired or there are a hundred messages to answer, or I’m struggling with sadness and everything seems bleak.
Elaine Smookler reflects this in her article too:
You may want to lose weight, get your real estate license, or be a better listener—but if you don’t know why you want this, you will quickly lose motivation and fall back into your old habits. However, discomfort and resistance are no longer insurmountable obstacles when we know what we really want and recommit to it again and again.
What’s your why? Maybe you don’t know, and that’s okay too. You can see what emerges over the next while.
If you would like some reflections to consider, I recommend reading a recent post by Rick Hanson, Ph.D., “Find Your North Star.” He offers some practices you can try to find out what’s your “North Star” or most important thing, and he suggests some ways to keep what you identify central and embodied.
Another thing that can support us with our intentions and whys is having friends to encourage us. So I invite you to share your “why” with a buddy, or perhaps post a comment to the blog to inspire others, or send me an email.
I look forward to hearing your reflections and having your encouragement too.
With warmest wishes,
Andrea
Happy New Year, Andrea, and thanks for the lovely beginning to your January e-mails. What’s my why? I want to be kind. I want understanding and wisdom and love, but I can’t be kind and give love if I don’t love me and I can’t love me if I don’t know what’s going on with me. Meditation is a way from day to day, minute to minute to find out what I’m feeling,(how my body is) what I’m thinking, my emotional climate. Meditation tunes me in and just observing all this I can laugh with me, or be kind with me or have compassion for me if life is tough and this year it has been tough for me. But can I be kind in the midst of the way things are? Can I wake up without enough sleep and be kind instead of grumpy? Well, that’s what the practice of meditation is for … that and a lot of other things, too. The Dalai Lama said that his religion was kindness. That’s mine too.
Carol Kavanagh
Beautiful reflections, Carol.
Why do I practice mediation? I practice mediation to overcome mental illness. I still have a long way to go until I’m free. I have put so much time into my mediation practice. Enough time that I would be a black belt in Karate. I think we need a black belt of mediation. If you have put four or more years of hard work into your mediation practice you should be able to call yourself a black belt.
Now I have an attachment to a black belt. May I be free from attachment.
Thank you Darren for this reflection. Meditation practice is a useful tool in mental health. May you find ease and well-being!
Why? For the benefit of myself and all beings. Thanks for the emails Andrea!
Thanks Lisa. May the benefit of our practice ripple out to all.
Happy New Year Andrea!
What a wonderful way to begin the New Year.
I appreciate having to stop and listen to the video about finding your “Why” and why it’s so important to know your why. And Hanson’s article asking “What’s the most important thing?” “By what should I set my life’s course?.”
For me it’s clear: My purpose is to help facilitate problem-solving on important issues in the world. The one word that that came to mind is HELPFUL. To be helpful using my mind, my skills, and clear communication. I am forever working on clear communication as I find it challenging and very important to communicate clearly what is important and why. This need for clarity is also part of respecting my quiet introverted nature which comes coupled with feeling deeply. The wisdom from the heart equally with the knowledge in the mind.
My How is about exuding Light in the world. Secondly it means going about my ‘work’ lightly. A quotation that spoke to me at Winter Solstice is this: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly.” (Aldous Huxley) Meditation is the means to access the Light within me. It also provides guidance to living lightly. This by cultivating those qualities that create harmony within myself and ultimately greater equanimity in relation to the world.
I’m looking forward to following your daily meditations through January.
Warm wishes,
Geralyne
Thank you for your reflections Geralyne. I appreciate your words on clear communication — that’s something I work on too. And a beautiful quote too!
Thank you for joining again this month,
Andrea
Thank you so much for doing this beautiful process Andrea.
Why?
My main difficulty in life is trying to slow down. I have been in the white water of existence for the last half century at least. I am intoxicated by experience. I can never have enough. I want more and more and more.
Time is my wild black stallion. I have learned how to hang on for dear life. At the fastest moment of all the charger leaps a glassy stream and arrives of an instant at a fullstop. I come to myself finally and at once in a silent summer meadow high above the tree line. There is not even a breeze. The horse has his dark head down grazing in the butter cups. I slip off and for the first time forever I take a slow deep cleansing breath and let my eyelids slide down.
That’s why I meditate.
Robbie, I appreciate the artistry of words that you bring to your reflections. Thank you.