Meditating when I don’t know what to do
There come points in the day when I don’t know what to do.
I’m trying to choose meditation more often when I get to these points.
Rather than waiting only briefly for the first idea of what I can do to pop into my head, and then immediately starting to do that.
When I wake up early and have extra time before I need to head into the office.
During the workday, after I finish one task, and I don’t have another task on my list to start working on next.
After work and gym and shower, before bed.
On the weekends.
What I notice happens when I start to meditate is that first idea of what to do pops into my head, and I just watch it.
And then another idea pops in, and I watch it.
And some of the content that enters my mind isn’t ideas of what to do.
Sometimes there are emotions.
Feelings in my body.
The result is that what I decide to do after the meditation is usually different than what I would have done if I had just started or the first idea that popped into my head.
Sometimes, I’m like, oh, my back hurts, maybe I should stretch. Or, I’m thirsty and I haven’t had any water today. Maybe I would get some water. Or, I’ve been sitting at this desk inside all day, I should go for a walk outside.
In the past, I’ve sort of scheduled my meditation.
For a while, I would do a breathing awareness meditation in the morning and then a gratitude meditation at night.
Now, I’m trying to do this:
Whatever I’m doing, do it mindfully, being aware of what I’m doing, especially aware in my body.
When I don’t know what to do next, meditate.
It’s hard.
I achieve this rarely.
Part of me just wants to move on to the next thing.
I like to be in motion, doing stuff.
Getting dopamine hits.
Feeling like I’m getting something done or achieving something.
Especially when I’ve picked up momentum.
Especially at work.
I don’t want to sit down.
I don’t want to be still.
Can I meditate even when I am moving, doing things?
Until I don’t know what to do next.
And then I meditate, not necessarily to decide what to do next. But just to observe. It’s harder to observe when you’re doing something. You’re focused on the task at hand.
Observing can be what you’re doing.
And you notice things you wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.
And this noticing changes what you do next.
i like this mindset a lot