A Flood of Insight

Some of our most interesting insights show up immediately after we give up trying to manage and manufacture them. They often appear when we ourselves become present and experience full ease.

Many of us are conditioned to "do", to "know", and to "be productive" - to the point of utter exhaustion, illness and disease. Ask yourself a few honest questions: If you were told you had one week of vibrant life left in your body, what would you do? If you had one week to live, how would you choose to live?

Have you ever used the excuse that "there isn't enough time to practice, to meditate, to show appreciation to others, to clean the house, to create ease, to...(you get the picture)? When I catch myself falling into this trap, I'm quickly reminded of this adage:

If you don't have 10 minutes to meditate, you should probably stop and meditate for 20. 

If you think that you're too busy, or you've been committing your attention to what matters least, here's your wake up call: You have even less time that you think, so use it wisely.

So, be open to the realization that you can create ease...all of the time...everywhere... even where you're sitting right now. Considering the self-deluge of anxiety and expectation we often pile on, our bodies and minds are ripe for the tool/experience I'd like to share. Here it is...

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On the I was scheduled to lead a group of teenage yogis at a YES Prep school, Houston was inundated with heavy rain, flash floods, and skies so dreary it looked like they were ready to collapse inward. My morning began with text messages of a flooded kitchen in my new apartment, but that's not the type of flood I'm interested in here.

After arriving to the campus I learned that most of the students were absent because the school's water system had been shut off. My class consisted of six students, which presented a beautiful opportunity to lead a supine meditation for 30 delicious minutes.

I joined the group in quiet, ease-filled silence for the final 15 minutes. Then...a fresh, beautiful insight flickered and burst into my consciousness:

Everything in our external environment is a gift that serves our internal self.

 

I'm always amazed by my students' responses when I share my insights. Honestly, I used to expect their initial responses to resemble that of Hindu cows (mostly blank, mostly empty, mostly confused), but they get it. They started sharing that "yeah, we can either complain about the rain, or we can play in the puddles and feel the drops on our face."

How's that for a flood of insight?

Other related insights we created that day: Traffic is here to help you meditate; parents are here to help you be a parent one day; children are here to remind adults that they too were children once; your enemies and friends are there to teach you compassion.

I invite you to live a life in praise of slow. A life that honors time, especially what little we have with others. That way, when you take your final breaths, you can smile and be happy because you'll know that you lived fully. You'll be at ease because you'll have seize every opportunity to feel rain beat against you face and squish between your toes. And, guess what, you won't even remember that your apartment flooded.

Much love,
Dan