Exploration: What Keeps Me From Being Present?
Take a day or a few days, and keep a notebook handy. Every time you happen to notice that you’re not completely present with what is happening in this moment (for most of us, this is 99% of the time), make a brief note of the circumstances. You might only make one or two notes a day, but that’s okay, they will still accumulate.
When you look back over the notes, you might see a pattern. For example, I did this exercise when I was on away from home. Looking through what I’d written down, it seemed clear that the notes grouped themselves into a small number of patterns. At that particular time, I decided to use those patterns for further noticing in my meditation practice.
This is just one example of a way of looking at what we see, something I did for a week or two. When I’ve done the exercise other times, things came out differently – yours will likely be quite different too. But here is one snapshot as an example. I explained it at the time in an email to a friend:
Been working with my mind in a deeper way since I got here. Noticed there are particular kinds of thought streams that take me out of the open spaciousness of the present moment...actually numbered them, 1 to 5, and when I notice I'm not here I've been saying to myself, "oh, yeah, got caught on a 4" and come back into the moment. There is something helpful about doing that, that makes me see the thoughts more generically and helps me from getting all caught up in the content of them.
Feel like telling you what they are even though it might be a bit dopey...
1--self-conscious thought streams about how I look, how others see me, being right or wrong about something, etc--basically about what I project into the world and how it’s perceived
2--thought that is aimed at reconciling conflicting feelings, in a kind of genuine way (which still isn't that helpful; I think open space actually clarifies conflicting feelings more than picking at things with thought does; but, the thoughts still come up!); it has a different energy than number 1, kind of a curiosity and the discomfort of holding two incompatible feelings/views at the same time
3--idle thought--irrelevant little thought streams about nothing important--'wonder what it would be like to drive a cab?' 'one of those pots is raised and the other isn't, wonder how the water drains?'
4--charged emotional thought related to ongoing/repeat storylines about a small number of very challenging issues or people in my life
5--logistical thought, which divides into two categories
a--pure logistical thought, e.g. just before I have to give out the binders ‘how many binders are there, and where are they?’
b--logistical or planning thoughts aimed at getting something I want, which has a bit more 'grab' to it even if only slightly, 'I wonder if I try to call Bob first then look for the binders, will I have more of a chance of catching him at home?'
somehow this felt like a breakthrough in seeing thought more abstractly, as types of patterns, and not getting caught up in the content so much...
I think there is some uneasiness about the insults to the ego that this whole thing seems to bring up--which can be good if you work with it the right way--but also wearing, and jarring, and sad....
it seems so clear to me that all thinking (1 thru 5a and b, and whatever numbers might yet be added :-) is just an effort to get solid ground to stand on mentally, so that we don't have to feel the existential fear of how it really is--that there is no way to know what will happen, that we can't control how other people feel or even how we feel, that it's a big unpredictable crap shoot and much larger than we can ever understand or describe; I see myself, as everyone does, struggling to constantly rework the storyline of who I am and what my life is about, so that it's comfortable and makes sense;
yet also developing, micron by micron, more confidence that I could just rest in the open space that is actual truth and reality, which actually has no storyline....”
