Ease and dis-ease

There are conditions of ease and of dis-ease and both have their mental and physical sides. By taking thought the balance can be shifted.

I rarely notice my physical states but, by following guided, body-scan meditations, I am getting better at it. 

When working the computer there is often tenseness in the neck and shoulders - and the back is often scrunched up. 

When reading I flop in the comfy chair with my legs and feet resting on the office chair. 

When meditating I usually sit upright on the comfy chair although my lower back is usually touching the back of the seat. This support goes against the rules of sitting and it makes it too easy to lean back and dose. I could change this.

The bed has cotton sheets and an electric blanket. I enjoy slipping between the warm bed clothes and noticing the breathing. I usually drop off to sleep within minutes of being horizontal. I often get up in the middle of the night for a pee or a poop. But this is not a problem - it allows another slip into the warm bed. The regular and robust poops are an ongoing source of appreciation and joy.

There is a mild overall body soreness when I get up but this drops quickly from attention as the day progresses. The Parkinson’s Disease has caused a loss of fine motor control of my fingers. This results in a drop in the quality of guitar playing, handwriting and typing. I have given up the guitar and the handwriting but the many typing mistakes can be corrected at the computer. There are also problems with softness of speech and with stuttering. But I do not interact with many people so it is not too troublesome.  There can also be a shortness of breath when I am active – especially when the air is very cold but, on the whole, I am fortunate and grateful for the lack of bodily dis-ease.

Mentally, these days, I am equanimous most of the time. There are several ‘easy’ states of consciousness associated with this. 

There is the peace and bliss that comes more often than not when sitting in mindfulness with a focus on the breath. Sometimes I try the Zen ‘just sit’ technique and ‘drop off body and mind’. There is the saying ‘no self, no problem’. I now have experience of that. As Tolle says, ‘Silence speaks’.

A no-self state is also realized when reading and writing. There is no awareness of self or of time and space. But ‘work’ gets done. When I was younger I could stay in this state of what Csikszentmihalyi calls ‘flow’ for three or four hours at a time. These days it is more like one or two hours. This flow state can also kick in when shopping, cooking, eating and washing the dishes. It is what the Chinese call wu-wei – effortless action.

These days I reckon that the no-self flow states are due to the unconscious finding enough silence and clarity to take command of the conscious mind/brain. But these states can be seductive and addictive. It is easy to get hooked on the peace that comes with the experience of no-self. But that is like falling in love with the foothills of the mystic’s mountain. There is more.

Numinosity is linked to these states of mind. There is awe and stupefaction. A snowdrop in springtime. A full moon in a cloudless sky. The death of an aged relative. These humble incomers at your sense doors somehow speak of the infinite and the eternal. There is an appreciation of interbeing and of the essential Oneness behind the ten thousand things. Form is emptiness and emptiness is form.

And then there is the sports car mind. Most people never switch it on, very few get it out of first gear, and only a tiny minority get it racing along in the top gear of the everyday Zen of applied Buddhism. 

I spend a fair bit of time with the motor switched off when I am absent mindedly day-dreaming, cruising the internet, or watching telly. This is pointless in terms of reprogramming consciousness but at least it is usually peaceful and easy.

BUT – there are times when the mind will not go into selfless gear. It re-runs stories from the past with a negative spin and it looks to the future with pessimistic scenarios. The body reacts with cold sweats and hot flushes, with a dry mouth and a pounding heart, and with a restless sleeplessness. Self confidence and esteem are at low levels and the moods are negative – anxiety, despair, doubt, greed, anger, fear, impatience, laziness, hopelessness etc

Mindfulness helps to neutralize dis-ease. I become awake to and aware of what the mind is doing. Thoughts, feelings, moods and emotions become part of the mental show which ‘I’ witness from a distance rather than being caught up as an active participant. Mental stuff arrives, hangs around for a while then leaves. Much of it is linked to past experiences, especially from childhood.  It has no abiding reality; there is the impermanence of all created things. Let them go.

SO – 

• I should sit more often. 
• The cure is up to me. 
• The solution is hard wired into my brain. 
• Brush the dust off the mirror. What mirror?