Stillness in
Motion
When we think of
meditation, we normally think of sitting motionless in a
quiet place away from the distractions of daily living. This
is actually sitting meditation. By limiting sensory input
during sitting meditation, we are able to calm our minds and
reach the meditative state more easily. But meditation is
not just limited to sitting in one place doing nothing. We
can meditate by simply doing the ordinary things we do
everyday with mindfulness. What we want to achieve in
meditation is stillness. Stillness does not necessarily mean
physical inactivity or even mental inactivity. In anything
we do, be it eating, walking, driving, washing dishes, and
so on, we have a capacity for stillness.
While the mind is fully engaged in physical activity, it is
less likely to wander away from the present moment. While
washing dishes, for instance, we attune our awareness to the
moment-to-moment bodily movements and sensations involved in
the chore. While the mind is preoccupied with the physical
actions and sensations, it is less likely to be thinking,
"Oh, this is such mindless drudgery; I have better things to
do with my time!" Thoughts and feelings will continue to
come and go, but as long as we can manage to hold our
attention on the small details involved in getting the
dishes cleaned, our minds will be attuned to the present
moment. Dishwashing then becomes our object of meditation.
By uniting our minds with our body movements, we reach a
special state of expanded awareness in which we hardly
notice that we're moving at all. The physical activity
becomes a free-flowing experience that is perceived as a
state of Being rather than an act of doing. This is how we
achieve stillness in action.
When we wash dishes mindfully, the dishes practically wash
themselves. Doing by non-doing. Non-doing does not mean doing
nothing-- it means non-judging, non-complaining, non-resisting.
When the mind and body are able to merge and flow together
in unison, without resistance from either component, we
reach the state of awareness of being one with the activity
itself. Embedded with our Presence, our actions become so
refined and graceful that all we notice is Presence itself.
This is a state of Being, not an act of doing.
We may think that by washing dishes mindfully, we get so
absorbed in the chore that we become oblivious to other life
responsibilities. But this is not true at all. Mindfulness
is not about "spacing out" or becoming detached from
reality. We do not deliberately resist or suppress our
thoughts and emotions in any way as doing so would lead to
stress. Thoughts and feelings will occur whether or not we
are mindful. We simply let them come and go. While in the
mindful state, we will continue to think, plan, imagine,
daydream, and so on, but we do them in a nonattached manner.
Mindfulness adds a new layer of awareness to our experience.
Washing dishes mindfully, for instance, does not make us
forget to take out the trash later.
Mindfulness is more easily achieved in repetitive tasks,
such as walking and washing dishes. Cognitively demanding
activities that involve constant planning, recalling, and
problem-solving do not lend themselves as readily to
mindfulness. Holding a conversation, working on a math
problem, and performing brain surgery would fall into the
latter category. However, with practice any activity-- no
matter how complex or intellectually demanding-- may be done
with some degree of mindfulness. The cultivation of
mindfulness in these more challenging situations will be
dealt with later. For now, suffice it to say that the key to
mindfulness in any activity is to maintain a Presence in the
body, a Presence in the activity, and a Presence in the
present moment.
