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I hit the “Start” button on my iPhone to begin my 15 minutes, twist my legs into a pretzel and slowly close my eyes. Deep breath in… then out. Again. Ahhhh… I made it. I made it to the floor today. I made it to the nirvana of an empty mind.

Then…

I should write a blog post about meditating. I can write about how helpful it is to clear your mind as you tap into the essence of your message. Oh shoot. I'm thinking. Maybe I should write about monkey mind and how it's such a frustrating experience. I think this would really help my community because they are such conscious people, many of them meditators themselves.

Ooh, I'll write about monkey mind and the will to write! How my mind could not let go of this concept of writing a blog post about the experience of monkey mind. It's kind of a funny irony that I will have written about something I was thinking while meditating since the idea behind meditation is not holding onto any thoughts.

Well, that's not right! Then they'll think I don't know how to let go of my own thoughts. This will show what a lousy meditator I am. Okay, then. I will let this thought go and if I still have it when I am done meditating, then I'll write about it. But it won't be because I thought about it the whole time. Now, let it go…. let the thoughts float by… ahh, that feels good. Nice.

[peaceful, open, quiet…]

Actually, I'm just going to do one thing before I stop thinking. I'm going to use some of those imagery memory tricks I learned from Jim Kwik of Kwik Learning. I'm going to picture Simone in her monkey jammies. Wait, I need to add the writing part. Actually, I will picture a writer in Simone's monkey jammies. Who should I picture? Hmmm…

Oh, come on! This is silly. Stop thinking and let this go! You're going to miss your whole meditation and you won't have time to do a whole new round. Now, breathe out… good. Nice…

[Quiet, peace, openness…]

Jeez, it seems like it's been more than 15 minutes. I wonder if I somehow never actually hit start on the timer… oh, I know I did. This is just that part where I get antsy when I've been quiet for a bit.

Well, I'm just going to check real quick… just real quick.

Oh, okay – 46 seconds left.

[Quick settle back into position]

[quiet, peaceful, open…]

Ahh, this is nice...

Ding, ding, chime. Ding, ding, chime.

I fling up to standing and leap to my computer. I remembered what I wanted to post about today!

 

Thank you, Starmist1, for the lovely incense meditation timer image. Perhaps if I had begun with such a soulful system, things would have gone differently.