I’d like to share a little lesson I gained from meditating. Not an epiphany acquired from a quiet mind, just something unexpected that happened while sitting.
It was my first morning at home after being away in California with my wife for several days. Having just finished writing notes about the trip, it seemed the perfect time to get some Headspace before moving onto a different project.
I closed the door to my office. But before I could sit back down our sixteen year old tomcat began meowing from the hallway, reminding me not only that we had been away, but that he had recently been quite ill with a kidney infection.
Part of what attracts me to the meditation app Headspace is the emphasis Andy Puddicombe puts on the well being of others. So how could I clear my mind knowing that a skinny little tabby with chronic kidney disease was suffering on the other side of the door? All he wanted was to sit on my lap.
I figured that this once I could meditate with him on me. I might even find more clarity, knowing I was putting Kobe at ease. For, on top of our recent absence, and his recovery from illness, the cat was extra stressed out by the presence of strangers in the house right then.
A pair of contractors were upstairs fixing a section of our kitchen cabinets coming loose from the wall. I had answered all their questions. They were busy but not loud. I was only going to get busier and was scheduled to work later in the afternoon. If I was going to meditate that day, now was my only chance.
Kobe got settled in my lap, and I started to clear my mind. I checked in with the different parts of my body to get a sense of how I felt before turning my curiosity toward my breath. I let distractions come and go, just like Andy suggests. Then I heard footsteps down the stairs, followed by the cabinet guy calling my name. I couldn’t let that go, it conflicted with my focus on the well being of others.
Here’s where things got weird, or I made them weird. I came out of my office holding Kobe. The contractor stared at me, with what I interpreted as a slight sneer. My focus on the well being of others was so strong that I started putting all sorts of thoughts in his head. In fact, I had driven all thought from my mind and was only thinking his thoughts. What is this weirdo doing behind his closed door with his cat? I thought he thought. And I assumed he heard some part of Andy’s guiding voice in the meditation for the day.
Of course, because my thoughts were gone it didn’t occur to me that our cabinet guy may have thought nothing of the fact I had my door closed. Presumably I wanted to shut out the noise of their prying and hammering.
Instead I tried to explain away what I thought looked odd and in the process must have looked quite odd.
I started rambling about how I was meditating. I’m not sure, but I may have described all the benefits I get from it, and that I listen to an app on my phone. But, I know for sure that I explained that I didn’t usually do it with a cat on my lap, but this little guy had recently been ill and I wanted to comfort him. I sensed the repairman’s opinion of me shift in a negative direction. He just wanted to know where the breaker box was so he could cut power to some lights mounted beneath one of the cabinets and get back to work.
I showed him. He went back to work, but I did not go back to meditating right then. A little later he called me upstairs and showed me that the cabinets themselves were broken. He didn’t think he could repair them; they needed replacement. He didn’t think it safe to mount it back on the wall, either. He was done.
We’ve since hired someone else to remodel our kitchen. Our new contractor says the cabinet can be repaired. I can’t help but think that I made the original repairman feel so weird, so uncomfortable with my disclosure, that he looked for any reason possible to finish the job and get out of the house of the man who meditates with cats (sounds like a cool name for a modern Native American who spent time in India during a “Beatles phase”).
Emptying your head of thought, not by direct effort, but just letting go, is a great way to let in new perspectives, insights, or just peace. But I must avoid replacing those thoughts with what I presume to be the thinking of others. After some reflection, I really doubt I freaked this guy out too much. I think I just freaked myself out – I rarely discuss meditating with anyone and suddenly I’m telling a stranger that I was sitting with my cat? I’m just glad that our little tabby doesn’t understand English, or he would have been terribly embarrassed for me.
