It’s a common experience: being unable to locate an item
that is hiding in plain sight. In fact,
there’s an old adage that aptly characterizes the occurrence: “If it had been a
snake it would have bit me.”
My legendarily forgetful Granny Garrett, who lived her whole
life in South Georgia, often applied the old saw of the snake. And it was her voice that brought the words
flying back to me recently, as I contemplated mindfulness on a training walk –
only to find that mindfulness itself was hiding in plain sight and I wasn’t
seeing it at all.
**************
In preparing for a one-day rim-to-rim hike of the Grand
Canyon this fall, I’ve taken to walking (multiple iterations, with a tad of
running) the 650 feet up and down the path to The Cross of the Martyrs in Santa
Fe. Recently, I started this workout
within an hour of reading a chapter from Sharon Salzberg’s book on meditation, Real Happiness: The Power of
Meditation. Having taken to reading
Salzberg’s book as a way to reconnect with my own meditation practice, I was
full of the notion of making my workout mindful by being fully present in the
experience.
Traipsing up and down my training route, I was (mindfully, I
thought) noticing sensations: the comfort of my new trail shoes, the burn in my
gluts, my increased respiratory rate. I
was (again, I thought) fully present
to the sensations and scenery of the trail.
What a meditation maven I was!
And that’s when it happened.
A rattlesnake busy making its way down a stonewall bordering the path
startled me from my thoughts and brought me to full presence. Before
I saw the snake, I heard the rattle.
Looking to my right (roughly at shoulder level), I was close enough to
note the triangular head and elliptical pupil of my impromptu mindfulness
instructor.
Said snake had done its job. I was present -- fully, mindfully aware. Nothing could have been more enlightening in
the practice of mindfulness than this mindless encounter. It was a snake. It didn’t bite me. You get the picture, I’m sure.
For those of you – like me – who at times struggle with
meditation and the practice of mindfulness (and it is such a human experience –
the struggle), the “If it were a snake . . . “ moment may be quite
familiar. It’s less what we don’t see,
than what simply doesn’t register. The
present experience is unable to get a figurative word in edgewise through the
busy chatter in our minds.
What mindfulness really does for us is allow us to
experience our thoughts without succumbing to the chatter. Whether we’re sitting crossed legged in a
meditation room, training our physical bodies with the intent of moving
meditation or trying to remember the name of the guy at the grocery store,
distracting (obscuring) thoughts come up for all of us.
Salzberg says that what we hope to learn from meditation is,
“the difference between thinking and being lost in our thoughts.” That is, the difference of being present on
the path and surrendering to all the distracting thoughts along the way.
Occasionally I get a coaching client who thinks meditation
is about suspending one’s thoughts (as if one could). The trick is not to cease thoughts – rather
to acknowledge one’s distracting thoughts, and then let them go. In this way, mindfulness trains our
attention. It’s a reason meditation is
being used more and more as a tool of performance enhancement for
athletes. One of basketball’s greatest
coaches, Phil Jackson, is known for using meditation training with his players with
the result of improving focus and teamwork (11 NBA titles can’t be wrong).
So when along my path, the snake was there, suddenly within
striking distance and politely warning me of my impending trespass, I did not
stop thinking – rather I let go of all thoughts not of the snake. That focused thinking (snakes have a way of
creating focus) allowed me quickly, though surprisingly calmly, to move away
from the wall. For the rest of the walk,
when there arose distracting thoughts that threatened to blind me to my
surroundings, the venerable snake reminded me to acknowledge them, and let them
go.
There’s a lot one can learn from a snake . . . no bite
required.
