Birthday Blog: The Gift of Mindfulness in a Corona World
Something extraordinarily significant happened in my life, today, forty seven years ago. Although I don't remember the actual event, I was told that it happened, and like other things I know happened but have no memory of, I can find proof enough to believe it.
I guess being born is pretty much up there in meaningful moments.
I wasn't sure how exactly I was going to celebrate, or even if I was going to be able to celebrate my birthday this year, in a world-in-quarantine, a world of people suffering and dying. I thought about fasting for my birthday this year.
This morning, I went out for my regular morning jog, to walk the dogs, pray and meditate. This daily outing which began almost seven years ago, changed my life significantly. This week I am particularly grateful that I have dogs and that I can still go outside to walk them...We can't take anything for granted right now.
What happened on today's walk was actually very birth-like. Writing is an activity I haven't done in some time. I guess my birthday, and being off of work is a good time to end a bout of writers block.
I walked up the hill, the same hill that I climb almost every morning, to be alone and go inside myself, my own self imposed bidud, quarantine, or hitbodidut, meditation. (In Hebrew it is nearly the same word,...A hint perhaps, of what we should do in quarantine.)
I always begin my morning meditation by expressing gratitude for three specific things: the simple blessings and miracles of yesterday, today, and this moment. I also express my honest feelings and questions, my deepest desires. I sometimes cry out against the pain and the losses of life, for the suffering of others, and for myself, particularly, when I cannot see and I feel blocked and inadequate and numb.
Each morning, I visualize and create in my minds eye the kind of day I want to have, the kind of life I want to have, the kind of person I want to be today. I ask for strength and blessing for my husband and children, and for a list of friends who are struggling. This life, it seems, is about struggle.
If there is one thing I have learned in my life it is the power of my mind. My mind is how I survived a traumatic childhood, and my mind is how I have healed from it and moved beyond. When I let go, and drop inside, deeper still, I enter into a different space. Some days I am blessed to go deep enough that I exit the door of consciousness into a place outside myself, outside of consciousness. If I am lucky enough to get there I connect to myself and to the reality of the Oneness of life around me in a way that changes me and changes my beliefs about life, about God and meaning. It is a place of absolute pleasure and connection. It is an experience, that I wish on everyone at least once in this lifetime...not something that can be put into words easily. I believe it is the essence of Judaism and belief.
I'm getting back to today though, because besides for it being my birthday, today something was just a bit different.
I didn't notice anything unusual at first, then, as I ascended the hill It looked different. It was the same hill as yesterday, and last year, and the year before, but today it was as if I had never been there before. It was as if I had never been in this world before, and somehow I landed on a new planet in a particular moment and place in time. Memories of past and future became fuzzy and insignificant. I breathed in and I noticed how easy it was to breathe..so I took another breath, this one slower and deeper. One, two, three, four, five. A full five second breathe...And then I let it out. Five, four, three, two, one...
I noticed again, how easy it was to breathe...I had a vague sense that this was significant, that it wasn't a given, breathing easily. I felt so deeply grateful in that moment for that sweet breath that I did it again...One, two, three, four five...
Slow and aware, was the next breath, and the next one too, and it brought a whiff of something sweet growing on the hill, and the smell filled my nostrils with pleasure. I backed up to try to get another whiff but I couldn't find the heavenly smell again. I could, however, feel the warmth of the sun shining down on my head, so rare during these rainy winter Israeli days. The sunlight entered my mind and filled it with light and warmth.
A white wisp of cloud broke the glorious light into warm rays, a crown of light around the white wisps. Watching the crown of light I had a tug of memory...a crown...Corona, but like an amnesic visitor from another planet, the thought came and went and I was conscious only of right here, right now, this moment.
This breath.
I focused my curiosity on the newness of this place and this moment that I found myself in. I noticed that I had a physical body, fingers that were grasping colored rope and at the end of each walked with me a magnificent and beautiful creature...one large white and fluffy, the other small, wiry and tan. I noticed that I, unlike the creatures accompanying me, walked on two feet. Each step was cushioned my something soft and I looked down and noticed my shoes, without naming them, because words and names of things didn't matter or exist in the moment, but only the feeling of gratitude in the soft cushion of each step on the rocky uneven hill.
I looked, really looked, and actually saw where I was and what was around me with brand newborn eyes. I wondered how I became so lucky to land in such a wonderful place and time...I had a momentary vague sense of other times, other places that were dark, frightening and unpleasant, but the sense of darkness was very quickly lost in the present light and in the different textures and tones of green growth of all kinds, waving gently at me, in the clear air. My eyes feasted on a symphony of green dotted with splendid color. Red, purple, yellow, white and pink flowers, peaking out from between all the green and the jagged gray of the rocks and puddles of sparkling liquid.
Love filled my heart for Whomever, Whatever, put me here in this place in this moment. For the Creator of this place, of me, of life itself. I didn't want to ever have to leave. I was part of the life and beauty here, connected to it in every way. I wanted to stay forever. To stay connected, to stay aware, to stay present, and just breathe.
It occurred to me then, that I was having an experience of deep mindfulness, and that this state of consciousness, was perhaps a gift from God on my birthday. If I could just bring this mindfulness with me into my life, I could be calm and serene and even grateful and possibly even joyful in each moment in spite of the darkness and suffering. In spite of Corona.
I imagined walking into my home and noticing with my newborn eyes, the blessings of having a home, a roof, a refrigerator with food inside to eat. The blessings of a family. Alive and well.
And so, then I came home.
And I wrote this down.
It is my gift to you on my birthday, to remind you, me, and all of us, to slow down, to breathe, to connect, to let go of past and the future worries and to focus on the blessings of this present moment.
