I recently watched a season of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with my son. One episode begins with the Ninja Turtles’ adoptive father, mutant rat Sensei Splinter, in a meditation pose. He takes a deep breath and prepares to begin his practice when the turtles start crawling all over him. “Looks like meditation is over now,” he says.
This scene reminded me of the misconception many people have that meditation can only happen in special circumstances—in a quiet environment, in a specific posture. It’s a common belief that meditation starts with a timer you set, and if you can make it, it’s a success.
If it happens and you don’t, it’s a failure. Meditation can even be put on a to-do list, and many people complain that they simply don’t have time to meditate. This reinforces the idea that life and practice are separate.
However, if we look closely at the Buddhist tradition, we see that many practices are skillful means designed to be integrated into our lives. Practices such as mindfulness and heart awareness can be integrated into everything we do, whether or not we set a timer or assume a specific posture.
When we are able to expand our perspective to include more and more of what is happening in our lives in the present moment, we realize that meditation seems to just start and stop.
Without an obsession with what meditation should look like, every moment becomes a possibility for a more present, loving, and aware life. Of course, this is easier said than done, so it helps to keep the following points in mind.
You may be stuck in a split between your life and your practice, and it’s not your fault. Sometimes, this gap can feel huge. In fact, the entire Buddhist tradition began with this split. This can lead to a feeling of powerlessness in our practice.
This split can be obvious, such as “If only I could go to a meditation retreat,” or subtle, such as “I don’t have time to practice because the kids keep me busy.” Both statements separate meditation and dharma practice into a realm that “doesn’t exist yet.”
This leads us to think that we have to wait until life conditions are more conducive to practice. This sense of disconnection can be painful, but as my spiritual mentor Trudy Goodman reminds us, “The content of this moment is the content of awakening.”
When we commit to bringing awareness to our moment-to-moment experience, what’s happening in any given moment can become an opportunity for us to be mindful. If the mind is busy, then we can simply notice: “A busy mind is just that.”
If we can reframe our perspective to encompass the entirety of our experience, we are free to live in the present moment. We don’t have to wait for some future moment.
Some things in life aren’t always pleasant. Maybe not always. Yet, we have to do them. Clothes to wash, teeth to brush, dishes to wash. The list can be long and overwhelming. These things can also seem to take us away from practice. But what if we make them a routine?
The word “ritual” comes from the Latin word “ritus,” which means “to become one.” These daily actions can bring us together. I invite you to imagine all the people you know. Now, imagine them all washing dishes.
Or perhaps all the people in your community. Many of them will be washing dishes today. Simple, ordinary actions can connect us to one another and bring us together for practice.
Many people do these things, and in some way, these simple aspects of life bring us together.
There is a saying in the tradition: “Dharma is good at beginning, middle, and end.” Every task has a beginning, middle, and end. Mindfulness practice guides us to focus part of our attention on the body while expanding our attention to more and more experiences. When I wash dishes, I may also be aware of the coming and going of thoughts and feelings. As the water flows over my hands, I experience many moments of sadness and joy as the washing motions.
The cycle may begin with resistance and fear, but many times it ends with joy, relaxation, and presence. My goal is to allow the moment of completion to come and realize that the cycle will begin again. Life is full of opportunities to be fully present and feel the rhythm of things.
Theravada teacher Dipa Ma once said: “Whether I move, shop, or do anything, I am always mindful. I know these are things I have to do, but they are not problems. On the other hand, I don’t spend time chatting, visiting, or doing anything I don’t think is necessary in life.”
Perhaps this is the challenge: to look at our lives with our heart and see everything in it as a deliberate act.
One of the most challenging aspects of practice is the fourth foundation of mindfulness, our relationship to what is happening, especially when we are reactive and feeling tense.
It may simply be about what is happening within us, however, as the classic teaching of mindfulness practice, the Satipatthana Sutta, leads us to realize, in order to truly practice, we need to experience the inner, the outer, and both together.
Dr. Dan Siegel is deeply involved in mindfulness research and has pioneered the field of interpersonal neurobiology. He has worked to verify that “the self experienced as ‘mind’ is actually both embodied and relational. These brain scans provide strong empirical evidence that the mind actually stems from the physical and social environment in which we live.”
So let us remember to consider all our relationships with ourselves and others as part of practice. When someone walks into the room in a bad mood and you react to that, it is not your fault. We live in this world together. In those moments, if we can be mindful and apply mindfulness, we can break the trance and affect the situation at hand.
Learning to cultivate a state of happiness, joy, and peace of mind can do a lot for the world. We can use our power to influence others, and it can be as simple as noticing our reactivity and being willing to care. I do this over and over with my children.
So the next time you’re in a crowded room, alone in your car, doing the dishes, or, like me, have an electric toothbrush that buzzes every thirty minutes, remember that this is it.
Your entire life is about being mindful of the present moment with awareness and love. This is your practice, if you will.
