The other morning, I was out walking my two dogs. It was a typical late spring day. June gloom hung over the valley like a cool wet blanket as my eyes scanned the distant hills and mountains. The hum of Interstate 5 unpinned the chirping of birds and the sounds of leaf blowers emanating from a nearby neighborhood. I spent a few minutes meditating on these stimuli.
There were the green rolling hills, and the brown serrated mountains beyond that. There were the scents of effervescent sage and towering black mustard intermingled with eucalyptus and fresh bark mulch. The sounds of sparrows, terns, ravens, and the occasional cry of a red tailed hawk combined with the hum of the freeway, the crunching of dirt beneath my feet, and the panting of my dogs to provide the soundtrack for my journey. I relished the cool air entering my lungs, teasing my shirt, and lazily blowing across my face.
Meditating on these things, the long straight edge of a roofline suddenly caught my attention. Then another, and another. The red tiled roofs ran in succession across the entire ridgeline. As they receded into the distance, they interrupted the natural flow of the hills. Below me, a grid of streets stretched its eager tentacles off in every direction creating an endless sea of ninety degree angles.
The hard edges of civilization stood in stark contrast to the gentle curvature of nature, embodying the duality I so often discuss in my meditation sessions.
Meditating on Duality
It wasn’t all that long ago the suburban hills I found myself exploring were a sheep ranch. I’ve seen the old photos. It was quite serene. Yet, there was nothing unappealing about what I was looking at this day. It was simply the current state of things, not permanent mind you, just the way it happens to be at this present moment.
Sheep have been replaced by subdivisions and SUVs, soccer moms, and Starbucks. Just as the sheep replaced whatever occupied this land prior to their arrival, something else will someday replace this. Still, as a roadrunner and a family of valley quail scurry across the trail, I’m reminded that some of the more permanent residents make their presence known from time to time – adapting to whatever fate throws their way.
Meditating on the duality of hard and soft, permanent and transient, we come to understand that we cannot have one without the other. But there is something odd about those straight lines, those forced edges that make them uniquely stand out against the flowing backdrop of nature.
Forcing vs. Flowing
Look at a tree, a flower, any animal, or natural landscape and the one thing you’ll be hard-pressed to find is a straight line. Even if you’re able to find one, it’s unlikely to stand up to closer scrutiny. The natural landscape is shaped by many things – plate tectonics, the flowing water, and the whistling wind. The organisms that inhabit the land emerge from it and are molded by it.
When mountains are thrust up out of the earth, it’s water and wind that break them down and round them off. And while both water and wind can be forceful at times, for the most part, they just flow. As they do, they slowly chip away at the softer parts of things. The results are curvature, holes, and arches. Roundness.
If you had stood at the edge of the Grand Canyon millions of years ago, it would have been quite unimpressive. You would have been confronted by a rather ordinary stream. Yet time and flow, aided by the wind, have created what is now undoubtedly one of this world’s greatest wonders! And there’s not a straight line in the whole place.
The Grand Canyon was not forced, the flow took care of it all.
Meditating every day is a lot like this.
The Benefits of Meditating Daily
There are numerous benefits when you practice daily meditation. I’m not going to cover them all here since those are the subject of too many blogs and articles to count. Instead we’ll be focusing on how the flow created by the act of meditating wears away the hard edges of our minds over time.
The hard edges of subdivisions, street grids, and skylines seemingly exist ‘out there’. And yet, these same structures impress themselves on our impressionable minds. If not literally, than figuratively.
What I mean to say is that the same society responsible for constructing the hard edges of our cities and towns, compels us to live in much the same manner. Deeply entrenched ideologies are hard edges. Habits that do not serve us are too. The financial system is the hardest edge of all, especially for those who buckle under its weight. Yet, all are perceptions and inventions of society and ourselves.
Meditating chips away at perception. It creates space between impressions, thoughts, and actions. It teaches us that what may appear at first to be ‘good’ may in fact ‘bad’. And vice versa. Subsequently, it teaches that good and bad are simply perceptions. They are two sides of the same coin. What’s bad for you might be good for me. We jam pack the world with winners and losers.
When we are meditating, we seek to quiet the mind. The quiet itself smooths the edges of our rapid fire thoughts. It soothes fiery emotions. And it calms us down. In other words, it ‘takes the edge off’.
Some folks choose to take the edge off forcefully by self medicating or working themselves to the bone. But I would argue that intoxication and exhaustion conspire against psychological fitness. Meditating is far more effective and longer lasting.
Rounding It Out
Meditating allows us to round things out. As empathy takes hold, we stop being so ‘hard’ on ourselves and others. We cease judgement. Instead of ‘making things happen’, we allow them to happen. We don’t ‘make up our mind’, but are mindful.
With enough practice, we meditate away our brittleness and become like the sapling that bends in the wind as opposed to the old oak that snaps. With the pollution of negativity removed, the flowing of our thoughts pulls us in the direction of our desires. There is no need to persist in our incessant pushing on everything and everyone. Our internal compass is finally pointing to our true north. And we are drawn there.
We are in control because we have given up on the idea of controlling. The hard edges are an illusion of control. We do not control anything – “there but for the grace of God go I”. It’s humbling when we come to terms with the fact the everything we have (materially or otherwise) is on loan from the angel of death, and that loan can be called in at anytime. So why all the stress and anxiety to control everything? Beats me…
Just as the Grand Canyon formed over time, so it will take time to round out your mind. Do not force it. Just flow it a little everyday. Consistency not persistency. Practice meditating without expectation. But do so everyday if possible.
Before long, you’ll experience a great shift in your outlook, happiness, and relationships. You’ll flow.
And so will everything else.
