mindfulness

How a spiderweb helped me understand how meditation works for emotions

Today I want to share some realization after meditating for awhile and also learning more and more about meditation practices.

So, before I knew about mindfulness and meditation things, I assumed that all these meditation teachers, you know the gurus and stuff, they're like all Zen out, is blissed all the time, don't feel any anger they’re just like super Zen.

And that might not be the case, turns out!

One meditation teacher I started to listen to a bit more is Dr. Tara Brach. She's a Buddhist meditation teacher, and also a clinical psychologist.

She told a story where she was doing her morning walk. And she's all like, “Oh this river is so beautiful, and it’s so serene, the scene was so nice. The weather was perfect. The birds are chirping.” And she’s having this, you know, gorgeous time.

And, suddenly, she walks into a spiderweb. 🕸

You would think this Zen...she's very like this Zen, grandmotherly, motherly, super chill when you listen to her voice, it just makes everything feel nicer. So you think she'd be super calm.

But no!

Basically she walked into this spiderweb, and, I’m pretty sure she swore, but she was super pissed at a stupid web!

So there’s a huge contrast between how Zen she was and how she was explaining how pissed off she was at this spiderweb that kind of ruined her morning, her perfect morning.

A Super Powerful Type of Connection

Can you lose weight just by thinking about it?

Can you make better decisions by holding your pee?

The answer is, maybe!

Pylin, what are you talking about?

These statements are in the realm of possibility due to a super powerful type of connection.

The mind-body connection.

“I think, therefore I am./Je pense, donc je suis.”

This Descartes quote has always represented the long-held paradigm of separating the mind and the body. For example, psychiatrists would use to only prescribe pharmaceuticals to help treat depression “in the brain” of those who suffer from it.

But turns out, the new paradigm is that the mind and body are so connected they are pretty much ONE. What you do to your body can impact your mind, and what’s going on in your mind can impact your body. In fact, psychiatrists are now prescribing aerobic exercises to help treat depression, anxiety, ADHD, and even addiction.

As someone with a deep interest in psychology, I thought I’d share with you how intertwined our bodies and minds are by sharing some interesting studies as evidence of this connection.

Being productive isn’t the same as being alive

Something weird happened to me a few weeks ago.

For some background: I am a crazy Type A planner who feels the need to plan her entire day in 30-min increments in her calendar, uses this as a time tracker to see where I’m spending my time and how long things actually take (has that “only 1 hour” project ever only been 1 hour? No! I know about planning fallacy, topic for a future post, and I should know by now to multiply any new project timeline at least 2-3x its original optimistic estimate), and tries to cram as many things into her day as possible to feel super productive.

So what happened: A few weeks ago, it was one of those days that I nailed all the things on my to-do list starting from 6:15am to 10pm. Here is a screenshot of my actual Google calendar of that day. (Yes I put in “shower” time or else I forget I need to include “shower” time into my day and “showering” actually takes time! You think I joke…Also, any GTD folks will see I don’t use the GTD method well as, I list other things beyond the “hard landscapes” into my calendar…I’m working on it!)

Was I productive? Yes! I fucking nailed it that day in terms of self/home care, creating, being organized, networked, and even did coaching for a prospective client.

But did I feel human? No!