Another day in paradise

I have been very lazy today - catching up on all sorts of things that need doing... bank balance, lawn mowing, etc. and it feels rather nice to just hang for awhile.

I had an interesting "aaaaah... haaaa" today. I re-read what I wrote in the middle of the night over the weekend (prompted by a reply to that post) and realized that I am caught up in the very thing that I have been reading about. Wanting things to be different than the way they are and in doing so, I spin my wheels and make myself miserable in the process. I feel like a walking factory of misery sometimes when I get caught in this spin cycle of looking and then judging and then feeling depressed. It is a very common cycle for me... maybe for everyone at some level - who knows?

Anyway, it dawned on me that the point of meditation is to learn how to be here in the moment doing nothing, thinking nothing, going nowhere. I must have some kind of work ethic thing that says that if I am not "doing something" then I am wasting time. Even reading a book at times can be seen as a waste of time for me, unless I am learning something. Meditation is helping me see that conditioning - as well as any other conditioning that comes up. I love it. It is so clear to me that I am a product of my generation, culture, and family heritage after sitting. I have to be doing something to be worthwhile. That's why sitting is such a "waste of time" in some sense to me. But, if I can justify it by saying that I will accomplish something with it, then it's ok. So, I tell myself that I will better myself; become wiser, become calmer... blah, blah, blah. It is all part of the same old game. What a hoot!

It's a very slippery thing right now for me. Sitting with no agenda. What a concept. Gosh, it would never occur to me to do anything without some agenda of accomplishing something from it and here I find myself doing something and "trying" to do it without an agenda. Of course, that is even an agenda, but I feel like it is something different than before. What an interesting ride this is.

I'm thinking of going to Australia for a WorldWork conference in April of next year. Can I really do that? Can I really go half way around the world and do something like this? It is really at my edge to think that I can do this. It's far enough away that maybe I really can do this - financially, I mean. The conference is only about $650 and then there's accommodations and the flight and some site-seeing money... well, it's a thought.