I listened to Deepak Chopra about 15 years ago on his audio The Higher Self and he convinced me to get going on regular 10-minute meditation. As time went by, Lynn and I both developed a strong interest in giving 10 minutes to sitting still and quietly each day. Sometimes, we miss because of our schedule but mostly we do the activity. We found more and more benefits from it, despite the fact that the period is so brief. Some people meditate for longer periods, even several days or more, but we have found ourselves benefiting and changing for the better from just 10 minutes. That is a short enough time that we are very reluctant to say we are too busy or can't manage to spare 10 minutes.
That strand of activity led me to more books on meditation, Buddhism and Zen, such as
The Mindful Brain by Daniel Siegel (this was available on Kindle. I have it on mine but it isn't now! Must be part of the fight between Amazon and publishers over price.)
Lately, two books have really been helping me:
When I find myself silently cheering the author as I read or being struck by one "Aha!" after another, I know the book is a good one. That has been happening lately with the Germer book. My mother was seriously firm in her living, it seemed to me. She was a good example of the typical English/Scottish style of standing firm with no nonsense. That approach has been quite valuable for lots of groups for centuries but it can probably be improved on. Germer is a psychiatrist who, like more and more medical people, is deeply familiar with both Western and Eastern practices. Many of his comments apply to my way of living and what I saw from my mother and her parents. I have many friends who also fit the pattern of having trouble handling negative emotions and experiences and who do so mostly be denying them, dissociating from them and hiding them.
Germer makes clear that the flight, fight or freeze response built into us all works well for physical dangers such as a saber-toothed tiger. But emotional pain is not well handled in that way so developing the observational ability to see what our emotions are leads to greater sympathy with ourselves and others. He says that world travel has shown him that Americans are extra-likely to be embarrassed by feeling bad or down and are hopeful that a smile or a stiff upper lip will overcome internal negatives. He says people have a tendency to avoid accepting themselves and instead, rigorously demand of themselves attending to others.
The key seems to be clear observation, leading to really knowing what is going on inside. Balanced acceptance of oneself leads to balanced acceptance of others, too.
