My intention today is to do what I'm gonna call an insight meditation.
I want to just be here and hold space,
Invite us into presence,
And in the process of doing that,
I might say some insightful things.
And what's on my heart right now as we sort of lead into this,
While also completely embracing the mess of my humanity,
Is I see that meditation is such a beautiful invitation to not run from our humanity.
Now,
Naturally,
As with everything,
We can use it as an excuse to try and escape our humanity,
And meditation can certainly be used to do that.
But what I notice in my life,
Let's just say ways that we self-sabotage ourselves,
The way that we notice unhelpful patterns,
The ways that we effectively don't show up in the ways that we would prefer to show up,
There's this flavor of running that shows itself.
And what I see that is being run away from is almost like a truth of discomfort.
Like there's something going on inside of us that we don't want to experience,
That we don't want to meet,
And in the running away we hide behind,
Let's say,
Ways of being that are ultimately problematic,
That are ultimately not reflective of the sincerity of our hearts,
And furthermore,
So often just make things worse.
And so meditation is almost like a container that says,
Hey,
Let's just be for a little bit and see that actually we're okay,
And see that actually we don't need to run away.
And I was doing a bit of a writing exercise earlier,
Kind of investigating what is being run away from?
What is that discomfort?
And in making a list of things,
It's all just the same thing.
Maybe we have different stories to tell about it,
But my goodness,
It's always some intrinsic fear of inadequacy.
Whether that's being uncomfortably uncertain about the future,
Whether that's feeling like we are deeply not enough,
Whether that's a fear of what somebody else thinks,
Even if it's the collapse of a hopeful expectation,
Or you didn't get what you wanted,
It all boils down to this fear of inadequacy.
And my goodness,
There's so many ways to run away from that.
There's so many ways to distract ourselves,
To numb ourselves,
To cover it up.
And yet,
In my own spiritual journey,
I'm always brought back to the realization,
Maybe the classic phrase that says,
Hey buddy,
Do you remember?
It's the truth that sets you free.
And of course,
To meet the truth,
We must meet the reality of this thing that we are wanting to avoid.
Because you see,
If you run from what is,
We are running away from the truth that supposedly is supposed to set us free.
And so this is the invitation,
At least for me,
Of meditation.
To bring the totality of your humanness,
Not as an effort to get away from it,
But as an opportunity to look and see what's really there.
So let's do that.
And we don't need to be super spiritual about it.
We can just be here.
We can invite the totality of our human into this moment.
And what does that look like?
Well,
In contrast,
We can just notice all the ways that we reject our human,
You can look at the city noise,
Right?
And be like,
Oh,
It's just so loud.
There's so much commotion.
I can't relax.
And it's the same with the things that go on inside of us.
There can be so much noise,
So much commotion.
I can't relax.
I must distract myself from this chaos.
I must run away from it.
I must hide.
And yet,
If we just be,
There's this space of allowing.
And you see that you're okay.
And then all of that noise,
Whether it's on the inside or the outside,
It will pass.
And then it might start up again.
But you see,
In the great coming and going of all the noise,
It's almost like the stillness that heals is always there regardless of the noise.
The stillness is holding space for the coming and the going.
And you know what's super interesting?
The more I am not at peace with myself,
The more impossible it becomes to be at peace with the world,
To be at peace with the noise.
The more I am not at peace with the content in my mind,
It's impossible to be at peace with the content in other people's mind.
So maybe you can see in some way,
Regardless of what's going on,
The invitation is to come home to the real issue.
And to whatever degree you can,
Find peace with the truth of what you are.
In the same way that we can find peace for all the noise outside.
Just let it be and see that you're okay.
And you know what might happen?
As you just let things be,
You might come to see that you're really,
Really,
Really not okay.
And then of course the invitation is to let that be.
At least we're getting more honest.
You see this?
Do you see that it's okay to not be okay?
Do you see that that too comes and goes?
What a beautiful thing to genuinely hold space for yourself when you're truly feeling not okay.
And what a curious thing it is to run away from not feeling okay.
It carries this message that kind of says,
I don't love you.
It kind of says,
I reject you.
It kind of says,
It's not okay to be human.
But what's the truth?
Because when you become still,
Is it okay?
Or let me ask it this way.
Is there anything in life that says you're not allowed to be as you are?
Isn't life holding you?
In the same way that life holds space for all in the noise,
Is life not also holding space for you?
Which is to say,
Is it not true that life also loves you?
Do you see the great diversity in our experiences?
In the same way we see the great diversity of weather patterns.
Sometimes it's raining,
Sometimes it's not.
Sometimes it's snowing,
Sometimes it's super hot.
And all of it comes and goes.
And just like the weather,
The more we want it to not be what it is,
The more we are bothered by what it is.
Yet to be still,
To let life be life,
You see that really,
What you really are,
Is okay.
What healing is greater than this?
Than remembering the truth of what you are.
Because this truth of okayness,
Just as is the truth of stillness,
It's always there and will be there for the rest of your life.
And yes,
In the same way that the weather shifts about,
You will forget and remember again.
But even in the changing of the seasons,
Life is still life.
Life is still whole and complete,
As is the same for you.
Isn't that wild?
In one way you can see how that's so true for life.
Like the totality,
The wholeness of life.
No matter what happens in life,
Life remains whole and complete.
Perfectly balanced in many ways.
Do you see how this is also true for everything in life?
Are you not also that?
And you know,
We just innocently forget.
We get lost in the noise,
In the chaos of our stories.
And that's okay.
Because even if we get lost,
We're still found.
It's like saying it's okay you fall asleep at night and have crazy dreams.
Because really,
You're there safely,
Held in bed,
Untouched by the dream.
The great comedy in this for me is that this is to touch upon the real spirituality.
Where the real spirituality isn't inviting you to get somewhere.
It's not trying to help you become someone.
It's inviting you to remember what is true.
The truth sets you free.
You know what doesn't set you free?
That more spiritual version of yourself in the future.
That photoshopped image of yourself that you're desperately trying to get to.
That is wrapped around a judgment that rejects your humanity.
The truth sets you free.
Let's just breathe into that.
Breathe into a wellness that is here.
A stillness that is here,
Regardless of the noise that might be circling around you or within you.
And maybe we can find a gentle humor that can smile at our human insanity that gets lost in the noise.
And of course that humor,
Inspired by a compassion,
Extends a tremendous amount of forgiveness.
Not because you did something wrong,
But you see how innocent it all is.
How easy it is to forget and that's okay.
Because the truth is still the truth.
Let's just breathe into that.
Do you see that you're okay?
And look,
I'm right there with you.
I understand that it seems like this life thing can get pretty hard sometimes.
But for myself,
What I keep coming back to is that the real difficulty is how I am in relationship with myself.
The more I hate on myself,
The more I hate the world.
And the more I see the beauty of what is,
Which is to embrace my humanity,
To forgive my humanity.
The more I look through those eyes and I see a peaceful and forgiven world.
So regardless of what the struggle is,
I'm invited to be as honest with myself as possible about what is the real issue here.
And in many ways it's always just,
I'm having a hard time embracing my humanity.
But in the stillness,
At least I hope you see that it's okay to be human.
And I know there's a lot of people online or in the world that maybe do a really good job pretending that they're not human.
Pretending to have reached that Photoshop version.
But I'll tell you,
In what seems like the thousands of people that I've talked to,
We're all just human.
We all have the same struggle.
We're terrified of not being enough.
We're terrified of losing those illusions we hold on to.
And we all have our forms and flavors of running away and hiding.
But at least for that short time,
Hopefully you can see that you don't need to run away.
You're okay.
And life has got you.
Thanks for meditating with me.
