Around some 30 years ago, when I was working for a company called 21st-Century Products, a distributor of salon and hair care products in the Bay Area, I was introduced, through a rather extensive library of audio cassettes the founder made available to us, to a broad range of motivational tapes and speakers. Zig Ziglar, Tony Robbins, Dennis Whately, Wayne Dyer and more. I fully entrenched myself in these cassettes, and I found them quite engaging. However, after about 6 to 12 months of listening to them relatively non-stop, daily, driving to and from work, and at home too…
I gradually noticed something. I noticed that I started to feel more and more anxious about what I was doing with my time. I started to feel guilt over not trying to make the most out of every single minute, not accomplishing something every single day that was a substantive step in the direction of whatever goal I may be working to achieve. I came to a recognition of this sense of angst, pressure, and concern, and I realizing that I had effectively programmed myself throughout that time, to be so focused on the ‘push push push’ mentality and so obsessed with achieving every goal, thinking and becoming rich, influencing people and being constantly consciously aware of anything and everything that should be in my control that I couldn’t just relax.
What I am realizing now, during this past month or so, is that one of the needs I’ve neglected for so long has been to simply be still, to be calm, and to be fully in the moment. Within 60 seconds of waking each day, I typically have two or three things already actively dancing manically in my mind for attention. Something I need to take care of at work, to follow through on for one of my children, a reminder I need to set about an appointment, a need I have to replenish a diminishing stock of food for kids lunches… It’s all there… at once… dancing, shouting and pushing for attention. And yet, by giving it the attention it yearns for, I’m reinforcing the negative behavior.
Taking the time to meditate every morning, just 10 - 15 minutes at most, is has been significantly grounding. If I do so within a few minutes of waking, before my head begins to quickly fill with numerous thoughts and actions, it’s quite effective. My carving out a slice of time each morning to just sit and go through a guided focus, letting go of all of the thoughts and recognizing that the important ones will return soon enough, I am able to slow my self down and focus specifically on being present, in the moment, and just building out some mental space.
I still get irritated, frustrated and even, embarrassingly, reach breaking points where my frustration boils over. But those do feel less and less likely, and I have absolutely been spending my days far more consciously aware of my actions, surroundings, and the things I do have control over. I feel like my parenting and modeling has improved, my presence at my job has significantly improved, and my confidence to step outside of my comfort zone, take more risks and be bolder have all improved as well.
I’ve no illusions that I have this fully down and perfected in the least, but I have had enough experience so far to gain insight into the positive things this modest effort can return to me. I like what it's done. And I like the idea that it might do more.