Written by: selfdef
2/28/2009 1:33 PM

Patience as a Discipline

I meditate for an hour each day. I used to start a meditation with the intention of observing my thoughts. I would go into the observer and observe thoughts from that viewpoint. One day I decided to do it the opposite way around. I would start at the mind and back into the observer. . Once I came to the observer, I had to stop. I couldn’t go into the observer. So I asked the observer how I could get through him. The answer that came back was “wait”. So I waited. I waited for the remaining hour. During that hour I saw how difficult it was to just wait. My mind wondered. I tried to keep it occupied by observing thoughts but kept on getting lost in thought, just like I usually do in meditation. Only this time I was waiting for an opening to occur. An opening to a deeper level within. I also saw that I was short on patience. I was impatiently waiting to go within. That’s when I realized that I lacked patience and that patience would be a good discipline to cultivate.

So for the past month I’ve been doing the same meditation. I would go back to the observer and wait. While waiting I would watch thoughts, remember the past, and l get lost in thought often, just like I used to do when watching from the observer. Only this time it’s different. This time I’m also waiting. Waiting for an opening to occur.

This may seem like a mind game that I’m playing and it probably is. But somehow it seems different. Besides watching my thoughts, I’m also practicing patience. If nothing else, it showing me how often I lack patience; when driving in my car, waiting in line, or waiting on the phone. So each time I observe this impatience in me, I stop and remember to be patient. They say that patience is a virtue. I believe that patience may a tool for finding the Truth.

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