Arriving Home :: What It Means To Begin
The Call To Begin
I’ll never forget the moment I really decided to begin. In some respects, I didn’t really have a choice as deep down, I knew my only real chance at healing was through meditation. For me, all of the signs were pointing towards becoming serious about meditation, though I had learned how to meditate 6 years prior. This time, the call for deepening and the genuine call to truly begin was something much different - this moment is what I now call “beautiful choicelessness”. I had no choice but to show up, arrive, learn, study and really begin. I knew it was time.
For each of us, the call to begin will be unique. We often begin due to our own “why” or reason for wanting to meditate, which is also a key ingredient in starting and sustaining a daily meditation practice. Whether you are showing up to meditation’s doorway because you heard meditation is good for you, or your doctor recently told you to look into it for help handling stress, or you’re in need of inner-support in growing self-awareness, self-love or self-healing; when you truly decide to begin, this is also the same day your life will without a doubt begin to change.
One of my teachers and mentors, Matthew Brensilver, always says, “the moment you sense even an ounce of genuine willingness in a student, that is when you know they are really ready for meditation and for all that it has to offer.”
When you have serious interest and genuine willingness to truly start a meditation practice, essentially you are saying yes to so much more than simply sitting down and focusing your attention on your breath for 5 minutes. Through learning to focus and sustain your attention in the present moment is a foundational aspect of meditation as you learn in our Begin Audio Meditation Series, soon you will discover this too is just the beginning.
Each time I have the honor of practicing with someone and it’s their first time ever meditating, I can’t help but become really ecstatic for them, almost to the point of having to curb my natural enthusiasm as I know they are just about to embark on understanding what they are really saying yes to.
What You Are Really Saying Yes To
Transformation: When beginning a meditation practice, you are essentially saying an inner-yes to transformation. Like it or not, your life is going to change, as transformation is an inherent bi-product of a consistent meditation practice.
Uncovering & Discovering: Meditation is not only a practice of learning how to show up fully in our lives by training ourselves to be present, a little more accepting, less judgmental and carried away by the narratives of our own reality. It is also a practice of uncovering and discovering, which are really two sides of the same coin. Through self-awareness, we begin the journey of self-discovery in meditation and uncovering happens when we actually get serious about our practice, what it is we want and the reason why we are pursuing this path. When we set the course towards moving our ideals, goals, desires and dreams into reality, this is where we begin to rub up against ourselves. We uncover deeper layers around what is blocking us. We uncover our resistances, our self-sabotaging tendencies and our loudest self-critical thoughts. This only happens when we become truly serious about our practice and are about to embark into action around making our intention a reality - this is actually a very good sign of really being ready to begin.
Healing: Meditation has the capacity to meet you exactly where you are at, and meet what your desire to heal exactly where it is at. As a scientific author, I take this statement seriously as I share this from the lens of known clinical outcomes from meditation. Since meditation points us towards a natural sense of wellbeing, that is always there just below the surface of everyday thoughts and activity, when we learn to rest in this inner-wellbeing we also begin to heal.
Being able to look back now, if someone had told me 15 years ago that my life would begin to change forever by learning this one simple practice of being present, I am unsure if I would have believed them. Now, I know this to be true with each passing breath and beat of my heart.
To further explore what it means to begin you may want to check out my foundational Audio Meditation Course, HOME. HOME is a 3 part course, guiding meditators from beginning to blooming their meditation practice. For more on how to begin a meditation practice, learn about Week 1 of HOME, ‘Begin’ here .
