We live obsessed with time. Everything needs to be fast, efficient, almost every day is a tight agenda, from the morning wake-up til evening rest. Training, meditation, relaxation, massage, nourishment...., if we decide to give ourselves some, are also scheduled. So meditations has to be efficient and do not last more than....how much? Check with yourself for a moment please :) Zen masters use to say : "You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes a day, unless you are too busy. Then you should sit for one hour." And of course it is very easy to give a false interpretation to the wise advice, because our minds are masters of misinterpreting. Don't be fooled. Sitting in meditation is not the same as sitting and letting our mind do exactly the same they've already done during the whole day... thinking, planning, organizing and so on...for another 20 minutes....that's why is said..."then you should sit for one hour". So my question to you is: How long, during one hour sitting, have you truly been in meditation? How long, during a 20 minutes sitting, have you truly been meditating? Reality is, some of the things we do can't be planned. Can you really know, after how long a walk, will your body start relaxing? Is it every day the same? You can not decide if meditation will happen or not. Basically, your expectation for it to happen, in 20 minutes, is what will basically sabotage the whole process. It's like sitting next to the sea repeating to your self relax, relax, relax.....the last thing that will be experienced is relaxation! So the point is again not in the time that we dedicate, but in the attitude we have towards it, and the real question is: are we willing to commit to the practice without expectation? Are we ready to give ourselves unconditional space and freedom, for things just to happen, without our control?
Can we really sit and stay open to whatever is there for us, even if it's nothing?
Love, Sati Shama
