Today I Cried During Meditation
As I followed my breath, body, and the sensations of the moment in meditation, I noticed a warmth filling and illuminating my heart. It called to mind the hurt, trauma, and despair of so many in this sometimes devastating human experience.
As I attempted to gently escort my mind back, anchor myself and release the thinking, I noticed an urgency to project those feelings outward. I realized they weren’t thoughts, requiring effort to be quieted, tamed, or changed, but they were feelings and energies reflecting a genuine presence, atunement, and compassion.
As I connected with them, a tear softly rolled down my cheek. There was light, peace, strength, safety, trust, and connectedness. I meditated on this. The tear wasn’t a cry of sadness or joy, but of wanting goodness and freedom from pain. Not for me, but for all.
My meditation room has an energy that is palpable. With an increasing mindful presence, the paper lanterns hanging in the window begin to dance. As I connect with the symbolism of the objects in the room, it comes alive.
Each item holds a personal meaning. I honor each and what it represents – the seashells from my visits to beaches around the world, the sand from my honeymoon, the heart shaped tray holding an homage to my late cat Tony, and finally the Guan Yin statue.
She is Bodhisattva, enlightened being of compassion. There is something grounding, uplifting, warming and centering about her in that room. Those moments of expanding mindfulness and meditation materialize a unique visceral energetic experience there.
Along with my three cats, the incense and candles, the flooding natural light and atmospheric music, a spacious calm fills the tiny room inside the endless chaotic frenzy of New York City. It makes me small, insignificant, and expansive all at the same time.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art houses the oldest Bodhisattva, Avalokiteshvara (Guan Yin) statue. She is magnificent. At about 20 feet tall, she is a symbol of an enlightened being offering hope, passion, purity, and good fortune to those around her. She was believed to hear the cries of the world in the time of Buddha in the 5th Century B.C.
I met her not so long ago, the miniature statue version at a Manhattan holistic wellness center, and brought her home. She sits with me compassionately, always ready for an inward journey.
The paradox is that an outward healing is released seemingly by natural consequence of meditation with her. Call it metaphysics, religion, or spirituality. Whatever it is, she soothes the cries and opens up a universe of possibilities.
