Settling Down
In preparation for the week-long vipassana retreat I've signed up for in April, I've been reading this book on Mindfulness. It's terrific. Very direct. Very practical. And very little jargon.
From the first chapter, Meditation: Why Bother?:
"...Why waste all that time and energy when you could be out enjoying yourself? Why? Simple. Because you are human. Just because of the simple fact that you are human, you find yourself heir to an inherent unsatisfactoriness in life that simply will not go away.
"You can suppress it from your awareness for a time; you can distract yourself for hours on end, but it always comes back, and ususally when you least expet it. All of a sudden, seemingly out of the blue, you sit up, take stock, and realize your actual situation in life.
"There you are, and you suddenly realize that you are spending your whole life just barely getting by.....But you hide it beautifully. Meanwhile, way down under all of that, you just know that there has to be some other way to live, a better way to look at the world, a way to touch life more fully..."
"Meditation changes your character by a process of sensitization, by making you deeply aware of your own thoughts, words and deeds. Your arrogance evaporates, and your antagonism dries up.
"Your mind becomes still and calm. And your life smoothes out. Thus meditation, properly performed, perpares you to meet the ups and downs of existence. It reduces your tension, fear, and worry. Restlessness recedes and passion moderates.
"Things begin to fall into place, and your life becomes a glide instead of a struggle. All of this happens through understanding."
10:39:10 AM 
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