2021-06-17, 11:40 AM
(2021-06-17, 10:31 AM)Stan Woolley Wrote: [ -> ]Am I right in thinking that you’ve answered my (open) question...
...and have concluded that this may be the best approach? (Acceptance) There is surely great benefits to being able to accept certain things (perhaps all things), but the thought of always doing so leaves me unsettled.
Yes, you understood my intention, my train of thought. My only additional comment is that acceptance during meditation does not necessarily mean doing nothing afterwards. It is more a way of handling things before or after taking some action. While we're in this world I don't personally think we should all sit on a mountaintop in meditation the whole time. (Though it may be the way for some, a few).
Quote:I think you may have read my book (Choices) ? In it I describe how I meditated almost around an hour every day for over three years starting a few months after my medical event. I had no previous interest in meditating and really hadn’t given the subject any thought previous to my stroke. I really don’t know how, but I just started to do it, it was literally a no-brainier. It was like I was under the control of someone/something that knew it would benefit me, and no part of me wanted an argument.
That auto-phase came to an end over a period of a couple of months. Thereafter, I stopped and didn’t give it much thought or wish I could have kept it going. What you have written in the bit I quoted, is true for me now. I have considered starting meditating again in the past two years, but am finding it very difficult to find drive to do so, whereas it came so effortlessly previously.
I would love to know what/who the difference in motivating me lies, between the me ten years ago and the current me.
Yes, I have indeed read your book. Though unfortunately these days my memory doesn't hold onto things the way it used to, and I'd forgotten the part you describe here, about your own meditation. No disrespect to you, I simply forget a lot of things.
What you say here, "I have considered starting meditating again in the past two years, but am finding it very difficult to find drive to do so, whereas it came so effortlessly previously." is interesting. It may be that you don't need to do so now. I was for some reason this morning reflecting (and feeling somewhat embarrassed) on a letter I received - it must have been nearly forty years ago, not sure why it came to me today. The letter was from some major college in London where they had declined to accept me onto a course, and I had sent a pleading letter asking them to reconsider. The reply was very polite and considered, rather than just a one-liner. But the question it raised in me is, "Why was I so motivated?"
It was a strange thing, I was absolutely fired-up, filled with a drive to do something, so determined that I sent off a rather silly letter which got me nowhere. But the stranger part was a very short time later, a very different college course just fell into my lap, I had no difficulty getting accepted, it was so easy.
That isn't the only time in my life when I seem to have sensed something coming in my future, tried desperately hard to make it happen, with no result. Followed by some opportunity or events just unfolding so naturally and easily that it seemed orchestrated.
Sorry I got way off topic and this didn't really relate to your question. Except to say sometimes maybe we don't need to try to force things to happen, not even meditation.