Years ago, I remember first beginning my mindfulness practice. I’d been sitting for what felt to be an eternity, shifting uncomfortably under the weight of my own story.

I’d had a ‘bad day’ – one of many in a long string. I was unsettled, discouraged, and – desperately in ‘need of a change.’ My body ached as I sat in a forced meditative pose; the normally soothing ambiance of the room disrupted by the incessant droning of a portable air conditioning unit.

“I can’t get comfortable,” I complained to my teacher.

“That’s because you’re focusing on all the wrong things,” he winked.

I felt immediately dismissed; angry at the brevity of his response given what I felt to be the complexity of my issue. I wanted answers, not roundabout riddles. I wanted someone to take my hand and guide me effortlessly through.

It took me many years before I finally began to understand the fullness of his statement. He was right, you know – I was focusing outward, when I should have been looking within. My unsettledness wasn’t owing to the droning of fans, rather – it was related to the noise within.

“I go among trees and sit still.” writes Wendell Berry. “All my stirring becomes quiet around me like circles on water. ”

For the first time in my life, I was able release those aspects of self which were pulling me down. I realized stillness as its own entity, a ‘visitor’ to that which I knew as ‘home.’

“Then what is afraid of me comes
and lives a while in my sight.
What it fears in me leaves me,
and the fear of me leaves it.
It sings, and I hear its song.”

And, in that room – I found, I no longer shifted.

Instead, I found my peace within the song of shared breath.

Spoiler alert – it was in there all along.

Namaste ❤️