Mediate, Alleviate, Don’t Suffocate on Your Own Hate
I took my first Meditation class last night. I know, I know…meditate and mediate are completely different words. But it still got me humming the old INXS song..hence today’s title.
Anyway, I really needed the meditation after the hellish afternoon I had. As I blogged about earlier, I’m heading to Provincetown this weekend. I made reservations at the Commons Guesthouse for Saturday and Sunday nights. I got an email confirmation and they charged me for the room.
Then a little after 3PM yesterday (less than 48 hours before check-in) the manager called me to say that he accidentally double-booked the room and that I couldn’t stay there on Saturday night!!!!
Now those of you familiar with Provincetown in the summer can understand my predicament: Ptown is full of tiny guesthouses and inn’s and very few actual hotels. Most require 3, 5 or even 7 day minimum stays in the summer. And this is supposed to be the perefect beach weekend. Frustrated, I immediately began searching the Ptown “Last Minute Availability” website and there were a whopping 3 places available. One room was more than double what the Commons room would have cost and the other two were $20 more and didn’t even have a private bathroom. UGH.
Desparate, I called the shared-bath places and one said the available room had just been taken minutes before I called. The other said they wouldn’t give it to me unless I stayed for 4 nights. ugh.
Then I went to the Provincetown Business Guild website and Chamber of Commerce website and just started calling every guesthouse listed. Nothing was available.
Finally, I called the Chamber of Commerce and explained my situation. She gave me a slew of numbers to call. She didn’t give me any business names – she just gave me 4 numbers and said to ask if they knew of any rooms available.
The first two numbers resulted in nothing. With the third number, I struck gold. Well, I hope I did (I’ll find out tomorrow). It put me in contact with the Gallery Inn which just had a last minute cancelation. I was able to get a room for two nights with air-conditioning, a private bathroom, and a water view for only $6 more than the Commons. PHEW!
My two-hour room hunt ended just in time for me to go to my first meditation class. It took place in a “resource room” on campus. There were probably 15-20 students waiting (only one guy besides me) when the instructor walked in. She’s a Harvard grad (class of 1973) who has been doing meditation since she was a junior in college.
I must admit – going into the class I had no idea what to expect. Based on the instructor’s first name, Begabati (as listed in the course catalog), I was expecting a man or woman from India. What appeared was an earthy-crunchy white lady in flowing green clothes. She was carrying a bouquet of flowers and a bag. Before saying a word, she opened the bag, took out a fancy scarf and laid it on a table. Then she pulled out a vase and put the flowers in it, then (and this is my favorite) she pulled out a fake plastic candle. She explained that fire codes prohibit real flames so she found this fake candle that actually turns off if you blow against the light bulb (excuse me, the flame).
Apparently, Begabati is her adopted meditation name. She was very passionate about meditation and gave us a brief history of her use of it and brief descriptions of the various meditative techniques we’d be learning. Yesterday’s class was about concentration (hence the candle and flowers) and next week’s is on breathing techniques.
The whole reason I signed up for this class is because my mind is always racing, I can’t concentrate, and I’m always feeling tense and edgy. Well, we did our first two meditations and, as expected, my mind raced throughout them and I was unable to focus on the candle, the flowers, or the other stuff she was guiding us to focus on (placid water, lights in our heart, etc…)
At the end of the class, and before I could say anything, she said that it is VERY common for people to have trouble with focusing because our minds are used to being in control. In fact, she said our brain will try to fight it by saying “it’ll never work, you can’t do it, you might as well stop trying.”…and those are exactly the things I was thinking the entire time!
She suspected that if we try if for 5-15 minutes every day, it’ll find break through. I hope so. I really want the benefits of this. Plus, since my lack of an ability to concentrate is what brought me to class in the first place, I think that the breathing techniques will work much better for me than the concentration techniques. Wish me luck.
OOOOOHHMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!
OOOOOHHMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!
OOOOOHHMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!
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It’s “Ohmmmmmm” not “ooooooohmmmmmm”, which is a sex sound.
Well, the instructor did imply that it could assist with sleeping and sex lives…..
Maybe you can focus all that hate you have toward the world into a nice healthy rage.
When are we going to P’town again (if ever?)?
I hope you have a great time in P’town – maybe I’ll see you out there. I’m going out tomorrow morning with Moe, my Mom and my Brother for a day down on the Cape since my Mom and Brother have never been there.
Happy for you on the last minute save. Enjoy the weekend, Karl!
ohhmmmm to you…. from one racing-thoughts brother to another, best of luck with your meditation. it’s so hard to go from hyperrationality to relaxation; you’re doing all the right things. xo
and could Begabati and fake candles be ANY more appropriate??
Kripala Yoga.
I found it much easier to focus my mind on my body rather than an abstract – a thought, a sound, or a non-abstract thing like a flower or candle (fake or real).
If my body is going to contort and do all manner of strangeness and hold it and breathe a certain way, subject you can bet your sweet ass I am going to have to focus a tremendous amount on it.
It’s a tremendous benefit; I took it for 2 years but I’ve used it – even if just a little breathing exercise, or stretching – every day for … what… eight years now.
And when I left class? I felt springy and refreshed and rubber-bandy. Read: Flexible.
Good things.