Accepting something doesn’t mean you like it. Acceptance is the act of acknowledging. This exists. That is happening. If I break my leg, I have to accept its brokenness in order to proceed skillfully. “Good vibes only” power of positive thinking isn’t going to unbreak it. Denial and avoidance will only make it worse. Feeling the pain, seeing the injury for what it is, is the first crucial step to making it better.
There’s a lot to hide from these days. The sense of hopelessness in witnessing climate catastrophe, helplessness in the face of war, injustice, and the erosion of multiple rights and freedoms can be overwhelming. The urge to turtle into the comfort of our own safe harbours of distraction or like-minded ideological bubbles is completely understandable.
But to address these giant crises and their systemic roots, we’re going to have to come out of our hidey holes eventually. Truth is we need each other, and not just those in our comfortable circles. Our existence as a species, our survival and safety, is absolutely tied to one another. We live in relationship, to everyone and everything.
Practicing meditation with other people has a distinct flavour to it. Something in the accountability to other people makes me sit a little straighter, makes the time fly faster. For such a seemingly solitary pursuit, meditating in community makes me feel less alone. Hearing others guide and talk about practices has created endless inspiration and fodder for my own practice. Even in silence, being amongst people who are also doing the hard work of trying to know themselves better and greet the world with curiosity and compassion can be incredibly poignant.
Like many meditators, I’m drawn to practices that transcend this body. It’s enticing for me to take refuge in the sounds around me, observe the colour and form of the natural world, spread my awareness out into the vast reaches of space. It was a revelation that meditation could chart a path away from the stuck places, but now that it has, I need a way back in so that I can heal them. It turns out the long-avoided embodiment practices are the ones I need most right now.
I learned it wasn’t actually possible or desirable to fix another’s life, that it was in fact at odds with true empowerment and liberation. Both theirs and mine. ‘Cause of course they’re connected. So my perspective shifted from trying to fix everyone’s everything to trying to create the conditions for empowerment.