Do not be anxious if you didn’t meditate today.
Do not be anxious.
Some meditators are anxious if they skip a day of meditation.
You are supposed to meditate, but do not beat yourself up if you, for some reason, are not able to do it.
Likewise with some other habits.
Let’s take an example.
There’s this fellow, Neu, who meditates sometimes. On the day he doesn’t, there’s an inner voice that criticizes him “you are not worthy, you are behind your peers, you are not a good student.”
Underneath this inner voice lies insecurity and fear. Which are normal human emotions — things to gradually overcome.
The fear is that if you don’t meditate, you are not a good person.
Meditation has become almost like a… the person is taking refuge in meditation to have a good self image.
The above sentence may slightly be difficult to understand, let’s simplify.
For some reason, the person thinks they are not a good person. They then consider meditation as a good habit. Maybe someone told them meditation is good habit. Maybe they saw meditation is considered good and holy by the public. As a way of seeking social acceptance, validation from outside perhaps.
So they meditate.
In their mind, because they are doing meditation, they are a good person.
Their self-esteem is tied to a habit of doing meditation — and whenever they skip a day, week, or a few weeks, their mind criticizes them that they are not a good person.
This is the problem we are discussing here.
The student is meditating without sufficient self esteem. The student hasn’t done the inner work required to feel secure.
If you see this student, he or she is constantly looking to meditate hoping it will fulfill them. They may say they meditate to become a good person but even after months or some years of meditation, if you ask them “are you a good person now?” they may not have an answer.
If you are meditating to become a good person, you should be able to recognize some signs. You should be able to give yourself some credit.
Instead, this inner security says, “I may be a good person after I meditate for 12 weeks.” After 12 weeks they may say “Not yet, I need to meditate more.” And more and more.
Who knows what the solution for this thing is. Here’s one analysis.
Start the meditation with inner security. Be internally secure you are already a good person, and your past meditations have worked.
Give yourself credit for how far you’ve come.
The important thing is to soothe your anxious mind that says “I’ve never arrived” and gently, lovingly reassure it that you have arrived, you have made progress, and you are good enough.
That statement just written might just be the “click!”
Soothe your system. Gently. Reassure yourself. With “tenderness, warmness,” as He says.
Do inner work on feeling secure first. Start the meditation with inner security — confident as a good student. Do not pray as a poor person who’s asking for things. Pray as a rich, abundant, self-reliant person.
Dat’s it. God bless.
This same inner insecurity may also be in areas of work: over working because you never feel you’ve done enough.
Maybe money: over spending, investing, calcualting because you don’t feel reassured.
Maybe relationships: holding on tightly to wrong relationship because you fear you may not get another one — another one like her/him.
Maybe your goal is to do a lot of service and get a special seat in God’s eye. That’s why you’re constantly anxious if you’re doing enough. If you want to serve god by serving other people then aren’t you too, the overworked and stressed student, a child of god who deserves rest? Don’t you think the being in the universe wants you to rest and heal? Don’t you think he will take care of it? Whatever you are stressing about? That he sees you? or maybe god is a She.
The Lord Jesus said:
“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
“Look at the birds of the air: They do not sow or reap or gather into barns — and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”
Lao Tzu said:
“Stop trying to control. Let go of fixed plans and concepts, and the world will govern itself.”
“Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.”
—
This has been a therapeutic write up for me myself. Neu was anxious the past few days. Gotta work on it.
Thanks to my meditation today after which I write this — I feel serene and the words out my fingers are much softer and gentler.
Last week I wrote a rant which thank god I didn’t publish.
11:56 PM, August 27, 2024, by Siddhartha
