Forming A New Relationship With Our Thoughts During Covid

A few days ago,

I read an excellent paper by an academic who has spent her life working in crisis situations,

Including war zones.

She described the general response to the coronavirus crisis amongst her peer group as a valiant fight for normality and productivity,

A sort of buckle down until things get back to normal.

She noted that underneath this very understandable reaction is a perilous assumption wrapped up in the question,

When will this all be over?

And that it will dawn on us at some point that the answer is in one sense,

Never.

Global events like this change the world permanently and often for good.

New patterns of living and working,

A new normal,

Will emerge on the other side of this crisis,

Even if we don't know precisely when that will be and what this will look like.

But right now,

The emotional and spiritual response most likely to support our wellbeing might well be to embrace the uncertainty,

The loss of the illusion of control,

And allow ourselves to grow through this time.

And the author helpfully outlined three stages which she has observed can help shape how people adapt to conditions of crisis in a healthy way.

The first stage is security.

During the first few weeks of a crisis,

It's important to make ample room for mental adjustment.

It's perfectly normal to feel bad,

Low,

Disorientated,

Tired during this initial transition.

The second stage is the mental shift.

Once people feel more secure,

They begin to welcome new challenges.

Given time,

Our brains reset to the new conditions and our ability to do high level work resumes.

But at this point,

More than ever,

She stresses how important it is to look beyond the merely performative and to embrace the authentic,

Which requires humility and patience.

And the third stage is embracing the new normal.

On the other side of this change and disruption,

Our creative and resilient brains will be waiting.

New ideas and ways of working will emerge as we start to embrace this new normal.

There will be a time when the crisis is over.

And when that time comes,

We will hug the loved ones we haven't seen for a while,

Return to our places of work,

And meet friends for that drink or coffee.

Economies will recover,

And we will go on that holiday.

All this is a rather elaborate precursor to help frame some questions I've been asked this week about how meditation can help us live more happily and peacefully during this time.

Difficulties people were facing included waking in the night with anxious thoughts,

The challenges of suddenly having to spend a great deal of time with those we live with,

And how to cope with feelings of loneliness and sadness.

So I'd like to offer some brief reflections on how we might face difficult feelings and thoughts that arise in response to external circumstances and then lead us into a short period of meditation.

Thinking about the adaptive stages of security,

Mental shift,

And embracing the new normal,

I think it's worth saying that we need to have compassion for ourselves.

We need to accept where we are and what we're feeling,

Regardless of where anyone else appears to be on their journey.

Much of modern Western culture encourages us to think that if we want to be happier,

We can achieve this by changing something in our external environment.

But the great wisdom traditions of the world teach that changing our internal environment is of far greater importance,

That when it comes to living with greater happiness and peace,

Our states of consciousness are far more important than external circumstances.

The famous Serenity Prayer,

Written by theologian Reinhold Niebuhr and adopted by Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12-step programs,

Asks that we be granted the serenity to accept the things we cannot change,

Courage to change the things we can change,

And wisdom to know the difference.

We may have little influence at the moment over a large part of our external environment,

But what we can change with a little determination and courage is our internal environment.

Our experience of life is largely determined by the states of mind with which we meet it.

Our lives are shaped by our thoughts.

And when we're not aware of how our inner environment is formed,

We tend to feel controlled by our external environment and at its mercy.

Meditation,

Practiced regularly,

Helps us become more aware of this internal environment,

How various thoughts arise in reaction to life's events.

We learn to notice our own mental states without getting caught up in them and becoming aware of how our thoughts arise.

Their triggers,

Their patterns,

Puts us in the best position to change what we can,

How we relate to what life offers us or throws at us.

Through meditation,

We can cultivate the best internal environment to meet whatever external environment happens to be there.

Let me share some advice given to me many years ago when I was living at a Benedictine monastery.

I'd had a conversation with a novice master about how to deal with anxious thoughts that were throwing me off balance.

He asked me to read a book that he rightly considered to be a masterpiece on meditation,

A collection of informal talks by the Japanese teacher,

Shunru Suzuki.

Suzuki's advice on how to manage thoughts is wise,

Simple,

And deeply practical.

To give your sheep or cow a large spacious meadow is the best way to control him.

To ignore them is not good.

That is the worst policy.

The second worst policy is trying to control them.

The best one is to watch them,

Just to watch them without trying to control them.

When it comes to anxious thoughts,

The anxious films that play in our heads,

Or any thoughts that are causing us a problem,

The best thing to do is just to notice them and turn our attention back to our practice.

It's a very simple teaching,

But not easy.

It requires effort.

It's very tempting to think that we can deal with an anxious thought by battling directly with it,

Perhaps by immediately trying to replace the anxious thought with a more appealing one.

This might give us some very short-term relief,

But most often it just means our head quickly becomes very crowded with thoughts,

Even more noisy,

Even less peaceful.

The best practice is to note the unwelcome thought and turn back to our practice.

To turn our attention away from the unwelcome thought and back to following our breath.

Whatever thoughts and feelings might arise in our mind,

We just let them pass through without getting entangled in them.

Because if we do this,

Then sooner or later unwelcome thoughts lose their force and dissolve.

Learning to meet our thoughts and feelings without getting caught up in them can give us a powerful sense of peace and possibility for radical change in our lives.

Some of you may have heard me mention a wonderful lawyer I used to work with.

He was regularly afflicted by severe bouts of painful anxiety.

I'll call him David.

David's clients loved him.

He was technically brilliant and always gave excellent,

Detailed advice.

But despite being a very good lawyer,

He regularly suffered waves of anxiety and was endlessly worried about making a mistake and some calamity ensuing.

After many years of suffering,

David had come to think this was who he was and how his life would always be,

That he was just an anxious person.

David began his meditation journey simply focusing his attention on following the in-breath and out-breath during the time of practice,

Rather than letting his attention grip onto an anxious thought or feeling.

Before long,

Through this simple practice,

He was able to calm the waves of anxiety that had been regular unwelcome guests for so much of his life.

Instead of greeting a difficult thought or feeling with reactive commentary,

Mostly in the form of imagining something awful was going to happen,

And telling himself he was useless,

He practised a skill which the earliest teachers in the Christian tradition called watchfulness.

He learned to greet thoughts and feelings with silence,

And to refocus his attention onto following his in-breath and out-breath.

Following the breath became a refuge,

A beacon point in the storm,

Collecting and returning his attention from troubling thoughts about the past or future back to the present moment.

And steadily,

Quietly,

The practice of meditation introduced David to an inner peace he had no idea was already there,

Waiting for him.

Crucially,

As David learned to still his mind,

Look at an anxious thought without chatting to himself about it and return to his practice,

He discovered something as simple as it is liberating.

That if he could observe the anxious thought,

He couldn't be the anxious thought.

He was certainly suffering the impact of these anxious thoughts,

But he wasn't the thought.

To grasp this is to start to see how you can create some distance between yourself and an anxious thought.

That it might be possible to step into a different,

More spacious relationship with it.

A more spacious meadow for your sheep and cows,

As Suzuki would say.

This is where David began his meditation,

And as he learned to spend more time looking out at the world from this spacious foothold,

He started to experience the world and his relationships with those around him in a completely new light.

And others started to experience him in a completely new light.

There comes a point when it dawns on us that we don't so much create peace within us as we step into it.

That it's waiting beneath and behind our thoughts.

Which is why it's often said that in meditation we discover what is already here.

We practice to see clearly,

To create a space of opportunity.

To see what is always the case,

Become better acquainted with it,

And let it permeate our life.

I said in the last podcast that if we can find some time each day to cultivate a healthy disposition of the mind,

To generate peaceful thoughts,

Compassionate thoughts within us,

We don't just take valuable care of ourselves.

We quite naturally bring peace to those around us.

That the work we do to establish peace in ourselves quietly opens out to touch and hold those around us.

So again,

I'll introduce two simple meditations.

The first is to quieten our mind and bring our attention back to the peace of the present moment.

The second is to generate peaceful thoughts within us and compassion for those around us.

And we'll practice each of these meditations for five minutes.

Take a few moments to make sure you're sitting comfortably.

With your back as straight as you're able.

With your body still and relaxed,

But alert.

Take a few slow,

Deep breaths.

Notice the softness of your body.

And if you're aware of any tensions within you,

Gently release these as you breathe out.

Now take your tension to your breath.

And breathing slowly and deeply from your diaphragm,

Follow your breath,

Flowing in and flowing out through your nose.

This will help you bring body and mind together and lead your mind to greater stillness.

Whenever you notice your attention has been stolen by a thought or feeling,

Simply take your attention back to following your breath.

To return to the practice is the practice.

As the teacher Shunru Suzuki taught,

Allow your thoughts to come and go.

Just don't serve them tea.

It's that simple,

That subtle.

And try not to place any demands or expectations on yourself.

Just to return to the practice is to say yes to being here.

Present for the gift of our life.

Present with each other.

And this is enough.

Now,

Our second practice.

To generate peaceful thoughts within us and compassion for those around us.

Take a few moments to make sure you're sitting comfortably.

And now draw your attention to your breath.

Breathe slowly and deeply from your diaphragm.

And follow your breath flowing in and flowing out through your nose.

And now imagine a warm light in your chest.

Imagine this light getting stronger and brighter as you breathe in.

And as you breathe out,

Imagine this light flowing out of you.

If people you love come to mind,

People you know are suffering,

Who may be fearful or lonely,

Surround them with this warm light.

With each in-breath,

Watch this light grow and fill you.

With each out-breath,

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.

Let this warm light of compassion flow into the world.