Centering Meditation
- Bell
Breathing in,
I am present in the here and now.
Breathing out,
I am happy to be here
Breathing in, Presence
Breathing out, Happiness
- Bell.
(repeat if necessary)
Introduction
Well this is my last leading of the AES Sangha, and I don’t think I have to tell you that I will miss all of you a lot. I’ve prepared something that addresses my reticence to leave all of you.
Last Saturday I was able to spend seven hours at a meditation retreat led by Venerable Tenzin Chogkyi, and American nun, at the Tushita Center.
She presented several excellent brief outlines of guided meditations that each lasted about 10 to 15 minutes. One of the ones that she presented was a Guided Meditation on Impermanence.
I’ve chosen to go give my own version of this meditation today, because I personally have a problem with embracing change. As a child growing up in the Foreign Service, I never really got over leaving my friends and school every few years and it’s the main reason why I really didn’t go overseas again for about twenty years and certainly not for extended periods of time.
However, I also have a personal problem with the purportedly Buddhist concept that since all things are impermanent, detachment from the physical world is the path to personal peace and perhaps even enlightenment…
So for the second part of the reading I will read an excerpt from Mark Epstein’s “Open To Desire”, which I feel promises to flesh out the concept of Buddhist asceticism and serve as a balancing weight for the first meditation. I’ll only read the first ten pages of his introduction, but that is enough for you to get the thrust of his thesis, I think.
Meditation on Impermanence
[bell]
Breathing In
I consider that a static, unchanging reality is an illusion.
Breathing Out
I open myself to change.
[bell]
Breathing In
My mind is a kaleidoscope of cascading images
Breathing Out
Is my mind still? Or is it moving?
[bell]
Breathing In,
I suck oxygen into my lungs and ultimately into my blood.
Breathing Out,
I release my breath in a stream of carbon dioxide atoms that were in my body for a brief time.
[bell]
Breathing In
I am aware of my heart beating, pumping my blood-flow,
carrying oxygen to every cell in my body.
Breathing Out
My heart is still beating, but is it the same heart?
Is it the same blood? Are my cells the same?
[bell]
Breathing In
I consider the idea that there are 150 different types of cells in my body: skin cells, blood cells, nerve cells, bone cells, brain cells, muscle cells, hair cells, kidney cells, heart cells, liver cells, spleen cells, mucous cells, eye cells, and others.
Breathing Out
I consider that each of these cells has a different life-span, and they constantly die and replace themselves throughout my life span.
[bell]
Breathing In
I consider that my seven skin layers of dermis and epidermis shed like a snake and replace themselves every 21 to 28 days. I generate a whole new heart every 8 months. I synthesize a whole new liver every 5 months. The surface layer of the mucosal lining in the intestines quickly replaces itself every 3 to 5 days. Because skeletal bone cells are made up of a harder matrix of substances it can take up to 7-10 years for bone cells to die and replace.
Breathing Out
Consider the idea that everyone in this room right now gets a whole new body every 7-10 years. Even my brain will replace itself, entirely.
[bell]
Breathing In
I know that there is a tiny universe beyond the cellular level. Where atoms contain sub-atomic particles separated by relatively vast distances, whirling around each other at an incredible rate, never still and never the same from one-micro-second to the next.
Breathing Out
I know that at the sub-atomic level my body is mostly space, where transient energy passes.
[bell]
Breathing In
I am aware of the world outside my body and mind. I and the Earth and the other planets are whirling around the sun. The Sun is on its own interstellar trajectory, and the biosphere of the earth is totally dependent upon the sun and the rain to fuel the lives of every animal and plant.
Breathing Out
I see that the universe, and all things in it, are in motion and never still.
[bell]
Breathing In
I am aware of the illusion of a non-changing reality and that the attempt to cling to things that I don’t want to change is a major cause of suffering.
Breathing Out
I acknowledge change. I won’t necessarily embrace it, but I acknowledge change and will try to not let it be a cause of suffering.
———————-
-dennis landi © 2009
