Meditation and Medication. Interesting that these two words are only but one letter off from one another.
I have been on 6 anti-depressants on and off since I was 15.
I have been determined since I was 22 to take actions into my own hands. I am now 29 and I know that I can be my own worst enemy or greatest heroine. There are so many elements involved in wellness for me to be able to stay above what has always been described to me as "the safety line". I have known for years now that when I eat properly and exercise it gives me the building blocks to avoid succumbing to the dark side. For some reason though, year after year even if I was eating properly and exercising, I would still stick a toe, or a leg of half my body into the pool of my own self loathing.
Obviously, something was still missing and two years ago I found myself drowning in the messiness that is my depression. Reluctantly, back to the doctor I went saying the same shit once again. Answering that damn questionnaire that I just wanted to carve "I just f*ucking hate myself" across.
I was back on my "meds" but my search was far from over. Although I was doing all I could do at the time to refrain from being a hazard to myself and my family, I was still determined to continue lifting up heavy rocks to see what gems could be hiding underneath that might help me finally live the life I knew I was meant to live. I knew if I could get out of my own damn way, that there was something special out there waiting for me.
Part of my determination to love and accept myself came years ago when I read a book called "The Highly Sensitive Person". It was really wonderful because it was the first time I felt like maybe all these heavy burdens I lugged around were actually gifts that I didn't know how to carry properly.
I started to shift my thinking (although I don't think I truly believed it until recently) this book gave me hope that some day I would wake up and not only feel comfortable in my own skin, but help others to as well. Obviously, you never just wake up to a new perspective on life it take years of determination and dedication. In my case it's taken over 7 years - from when I first set out to find the true Grace, hold her, and freakin' love the crap out of her.
In case you haven't noticed yoga has been doing wonders for my self-care. But for today I want to share my meditation experience. Please don't confuse meditation with prayer because they are two very wonderful, but very different things.
I have been trying to meditate for quite some time. Meditation has always been this elusive mysterious abyss to me. I have to also admit, that it scared me. A lot.
I really didn't know what was going to happen or what I was going to have to face if in fact I ever understood it enough to achieve this wondrous esoteric ability. It was something I felt was always just beyond my reach. I bought books, listened to audio books and googled the heck out of meditation. I wanted so badly for someone to just give me a concrete answer of what it was and how to friggen do it. I felt I was like Nancy Drew, and the answer just kept evading me, slinking into the shadows constantly - just beyond the next corner.
I didn't know what it would do for me or what I was suppose to expect. Expectations eh - they're a son of a B. Trip you up before you even get started.
I don't have an answer for what meditation is exactly but I do know what it has done for me.
Each time I set out on my meditation journey, and that's really a good description for it, I really have to surrender all expectations of how it's going to go and where it's going to take me. For me it's a stripping of layers, a quietness that has a level of trickery to it. I believe it's in the effort for quietness that the quietness really occurs.
Whoa that was deep.
Let me explain:
One of the guided meditations I did a year ago that was pivotal for me was an inner-child meditation. (Side note: this 28 day series changed me deeply).
The first thing he said was "Relax and go deep." I had no idea what that meant at the time but now it is crystal clear. At first you sort through and notice those initial surface thoughts and it's like peeling back the layers of an onion - only inside this onion is something delicious. It's not kicking thoughts out, it's kinda like "Oh Hello there, thank you, goodbye now."
At first there is a lot of "oh I'm itchy here" or "ow what's that tension in my earlobe" and then once you can get beyond that the ego will show up with all kinds of business and busyness. To do lists start to float through you brain like some kind of flip chart on steroids.
Peel back again - and there will be some things from your day - you might have an imaginary conversation with the asshole who cut you off in traffic or your hubby who didn't tell you that the house looked amazing, or thank you for not killing the kids.
Peel back again - seeing a trend here? So each time I go into meditation depending on the day I have had, it can be rather quick to start to get to my core or it can be a little longer and more grueling. No matter what it's beneficial and most rewarding because those little golden nuggets will start to shimmer and catch your eye. I think this is why I cry at the end of yoga most of the time. It's such a stripping of thoughts, emotions and even the old smoke in mirrors of physical strength - that all I am left with is rawness at the end. I am so use to a BUSY mind that the feeling is foreign yet simply astonishing.
Moving past the day to day busyness of the mind is the chocolate centre of a mint. You know you aren't sucking that mint chocolate mint for the mint flavour, it's for the moment when the mint disappears and you are left with the chocolate. It's always a little rush - there it is! I got to it! Yum.
Meditation is never what I expect it to be so I don't plan it. I just put my headphones on, or get on my mat and let whatever I need unfold inside of me. I can never predict what is going to show up but I am never shocked when it does. I picture it to be like surprise origami - all this folding but not knowing what the end result will be.
I don't expect to jump in with a calm mind because for me that is impossible. A calm mind can be as evasive as soap in a bathtub - the more you try to chase it around the water, the further away from you it gets, slipping out of your grasp the tighter you try to grab it. You have to just slowing search around the tub and hope that the soap finds you.
What meditation has created for me in my day to day life is a higher sense of presence. I am able to remember things more, like why I went into a room. I am able to release judgement of myself and others more. (Notice I am saying more, these are all works in progress). I smile more. I breath more - with more depth and awareness. We take breathing for granted because it's something our bodies just do we don't think about it. But boy of boy when we do - it's rich. Breathing life into your body on purpose changes everything. For me it can stop an anxiety attack in it's tracks. Breathing takes no prisoners.
This interruption brought to you by "Breathing":
Tonight I was purposefully breathing in the tub. With exaggerated inflation and deflation, my whole body rising and falling with each inhalation and exhalation. As I quieted my mind and focused on my breath, I closed my eyes but was aware of the water rising and falling around me as I filled my lungs and emptied them, I realized that breathing is not only sustenance for life but also a metaphor for the significance for life - Inflation cannot exists without deflation. Like a balloon we cannot keep inflating or we will burst. We need to be deflated once in a while in order to grow and it's not only normal to feel that way but necessary.
Continued "What meditation has given me":
I am able to be happy in the present moment because I am not carrying with me a hobo bag on a stick of yesterdays shit and last weeks, and last years and that time when I was 3. As I work through it and release it and see it (whatever belief or mistruth an old experience created for me) - which is truly just an illusion - I can watch it float away and disappear. All of my experiences still leave me wiser and stronger but the excess weight sheds itself like snake skin and I step out a newer me.
I don't think we are meant to wear all our old skin, or carry around our hurts like baggage. Would you keep wearing a sweater that didn't fit just because you remember the first time you bought it? I know that people who have faith are no strangers to putting their troubles in the hands of God/Source/Universe etc. meditation is the act of handing over your unneeded burdens - they were never meant to be yours to keep. I believe that meditation became a lost practice that was essential to human growth. At some point when you want to repaint, you have to do some scrapping of the old paint first otherwise the new paint just doesn't stick.
"Truth is singular, it's versions are mistruths" - Cloud Atlas
So I dropped the "c" and added a "t".
With infinite amounts of love and gratitude,
Grace
I have been on 6 anti-depressants on and off since I was 15.
I have been determined since I was 22 to take actions into my own hands. I am now 29 and I know that I can be my own worst enemy or greatest heroine. There are so many elements involved in wellness for me to be able to stay above what has always been described to me as "the safety line". I have known for years now that when I eat properly and exercise it gives me the building blocks to avoid succumbing to the dark side. For some reason though, year after year even if I was eating properly and exercising, I would still stick a toe, or a leg of half my body into the pool of my own self loathing.
Obviously, something was still missing and two years ago I found myself drowning in the messiness that is my depression. Reluctantly, back to the doctor I went saying the same shit once again. Answering that damn questionnaire that I just wanted to carve "I just f*ucking hate myself" across.
I was back on my "meds" but my search was far from over. Although I was doing all I could do at the time to refrain from being a hazard to myself and my family, I was still determined to continue lifting up heavy rocks to see what gems could be hiding underneath that might help me finally live the life I knew I was meant to live. I knew if I could get out of my own damn way, that there was something special out there waiting for me.
Part of my determination to love and accept myself came years ago when I read a book called "The Highly Sensitive Person". It was really wonderful because it was the first time I felt like maybe all these heavy burdens I lugged around were actually gifts that I didn't know how to carry properly.
I started to shift my thinking (although I don't think I truly believed it until recently) this book gave me hope that some day I would wake up and not only feel comfortable in my own skin, but help others to as well. Obviously, you never just wake up to a new perspective on life it take years of determination and dedication. In my case it's taken over 7 years - from when I first set out to find the true Grace, hold her, and freakin' love the crap out of her.
In case you haven't noticed yoga has been doing wonders for my self-care. But for today I want to share my meditation experience. Please don't confuse meditation with prayer because they are two very wonderful, but very different things.
I have been trying to meditate for quite some time. Meditation has always been this elusive mysterious abyss to me. I have to also admit, that it scared me. A lot.
I really didn't know what was going to happen or what I was going to have to face if in fact I ever understood it enough to achieve this wondrous esoteric ability. It was something I felt was always just beyond my reach. I bought books, listened to audio books and googled the heck out of meditation. I wanted so badly for someone to just give me a concrete answer of what it was and how to friggen do it. I felt I was like Nancy Drew, and the answer just kept evading me, slinking into the shadows constantly - just beyond the next corner.
I didn't know what it would do for me or what I was suppose to expect. Expectations eh - they're a son of a B. Trip you up before you even get started.
I don't have an answer for what meditation is exactly but I do know what it has done for me.
Each time I set out on my meditation journey, and that's really a good description for it, I really have to surrender all expectations of how it's going to go and where it's going to take me. For me it's a stripping of layers, a quietness that has a level of trickery to it. I believe it's in the effort for quietness that the quietness really occurs.
Whoa that was deep.
Let me explain:
One of the guided meditations I did a year ago that was pivotal for me was an inner-child meditation. (Side note: this 28 day series changed me deeply).
The first thing he said was "Relax and go deep." I had no idea what that meant at the time but now it is crystal clear. At first you sort through and notice those initial surface thoughts and it's like peeling back the layers of an onion - only inside this onion is something delicious. It's not kicking thoughts out, it's kinda like "Oh Hello there, thank you, goodbye now."
At first there is a lot of "oh I'm itchy here" or "ow what's that tension in my earlobe" and then once you can get beyond that the ego will show up with all kinds of business and busyness. To do lists start to float through you brain like some kind of flip chart on steroids.
Peel back again - and there will be some things from your day - you might have an imaginary conversation with the asshole who cut you off in traffic or your hubby who didn't tell you that the house looked amazing, or thank you for not killing the kids.
Peel back again - seeing a trend here? So each time I go into meditation depending on the day I have had, it can be rather quick to start to get to my core or it can be a little longer and more grueling. No matter what it's beneficial and most rewarding because those little golden nuggets will start to shimmer and catch your eye. I think this is why I cry at the end of yoga most of the time. It's such a stripping of thoughts, emotions and even the old smoke in mirrors of physical strength - that all I am left with is rawness at the end. I am so use to a BUSY mind that the feeling is foreign yet simply astonishing.
Moving past the day to day busyness of the mind is the chocolate centre of a mint. You know you aren't sucking that mint chocolate mint for the mint flavour, it's for the moment when the mint disappears and you are left with the chocolate. It's always a little rush - there it is! I got to it! Yum.
Meditation is never what I expect it to be so I don't plan it. I just put my headphones on, or get on my mat and let whatever I need unfold inside of me. I can never predict what is going to show up but I am never shocked when it does. I picture it to be like surprise origami - all this folding but not knowing what the end result will be.
I don't expect to jump in with a calm mind because for me that is impossible. A calm mind can be as evasive as soap in a bathtub - the more you try to chase it around the water, the further away from you it gets, slipping out of your grasp the tighter you try to grab it. You have to just slowing search around the tub and hope that the soap finds you.
What meditation has created for me in my day to day life is a higher sense of presence. I am able to remember things more, like why I went into a room. I am able to release judgement of myself and others more. (Notice I am saying more, these are all works in progress). I smile more. I breath more - with more depth and awareness. We take breathing for granted because it's something our bodies just do we don't think about it. But boy of boy when we do - it's rich. Breathing life into your body on purpose changes everything. For me it can stop an anxiety attack in it's tracks. Breathing takes no prisoners.
This interruption brought to you by "Breathing":
Tonight I was purposefully breathing in the tub. With exaggerated inflation and deflation, my whole body rising and falling with each inhalation and exhalation. As I quieted my mind and focused on my breath, I closed my eyes but was aware of the water rising and falling around me as I filled my lungs and emptied them, I realized that breathing is not only sustenance for life but also a metaphor for the significance for life - Inflation cannot exists without deflation. Like a balloon we cannot keep inflating or we will burst. We need to be deflated once in a while in order to grow and it's not only normal to feel that way but necessary.
Continued "What meditation has given me":
I am able to be happy in the present moment because I am not carrying with me a hobo bag on a stick of yesterdays shit and last weeks, and last years and that time when I was 3. As I work through it and release it and see it (whatever belief or mistruth an old experience created for me) - which is truly just an illusion - I can watch it float away and disappear. All of my experiences still leave me wiser and stronger but the excess weight sheds itself like snake skin and I step out a newer me.
I don't think we are meant to wear all our old skin, or carry around our hurts like baggage. Would you keep wearing a sweater that didn't fit just because you remember the first time you bought it? I know that people who have faith are no strangers to putting their troubles in the hands of God/Source/Universe etc. meditation is the act of handing over your unneeded burdens - they were never meant to be yours to keep. I believe that meditation became a lost practice that was essential to human growth. At some point when you want to repaint, you have to do some scrapping of the old paint first otherwise the new paint just doesn't stick.
"Truth is singular, it's versions are mistruths" - Cloud Atlas
So I dropped the "c" and added a "t".
With infinite amounts of love and gratitude,
Grace
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