This is Mindful Reflection number 3.
I'm Stephen Scattini.
We all seem to have a natural resistance to meditation.
We have to make a special effort to sit down,
Be still and resist restlessness.
So make that effort now.
Take a breath,
Let it go.
And as you're watching,
You may note a restlessness at the periphery of your awareness.
It's like a bug which you can't completely ignore.
And you shouldn't.
You have to keep your eye on it.
Restlessness will steal your attention and scatter it.
And of course,
The first thing you do in meditation is to focus because that's what keeps your attention together.
So stay with the breath.
Maintaining this sense of presence in your body,
Looking out and looking in.
Watching the breath.
Using the breath as your anchor.
And just be.
And as you breathe now,
Let's take a look at this restlessness.
It's like a nervous friend who keeps trying to pull you back,
Afraid of exploring.
Come back to the noisy place.
It's easier.
It is easier in the sense that there are fewer decisions when you're on automatic.
The decisions are already made.
Staying here in the center,
Maintaining your focus,
Resisting your restlessness.
It takes effort.
Each act requires a decision.
But when you have a conscious choice,
You naturally choose consciousness.
And when restlessness gets its way and you're led off into the normal current of rapid moving thoughts and feelings,
It's easy to let go into that.
But the ride isn't comfortable.
It's restless.
Restlessness is never satisfied.
And satisfaction clearly requires effort.
Watch the breath.
Be still until you need to act.
You place your focus consciously on what needs to be done.
This is the way to live with clarity and focus.
It doesn't mean you're unable to act.
While you act,
You stay with the breath.
As you walk,
You stay with the breath.
As you talk,
You stay with the breath.
This is easier to practice in a quiet conversation than in a raging argument.
But the time will come where even in a raging argument you can be mindful too.
You can be at least aware of what is going on.
And you may say,
But if I'm mindful,
I would never get in a raging argument.
And I would say,
You don't know that.
Restlessness is a reaction to uncertainty.
When you don't know what's going on and making a decision is risky,
The mind goes into a restless mode,
Which is the contrary of the meditative mind,
Which is unclear,
Unfocused and reactive.
To reverse this,
Meditation relies on effort.
It takes a special effort to resist the restlessness and to make the decision to meditate.
It brings immediate clarity.
When you're focused,
You can see the waters are still and there are a few distractions.
Allow restlessness in and your mind is fragmented into smaller bites of information or awareness or reactivity,
Which are not bound together by effort,
But fall apart through reactivity.
This is the basic choice you have in meditation,
To pay attention or not.
It's not a moral dilemma in the sense that you should feel guilty when it doesn't work.
It takes time to see and understand your mind,
How it resists,
Why it resists,
And how you can bring effort to bear to make yourself quite simply more conscious,
More awake to your life,
To what's going on and to the decisions that have to be made.
Take three more breaths and stay with your breath,
Now and always,
As you get up and go on with whatever you're doing next.
That's all for now.
Mindful reflections are thoughts for a mindful mood.
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