Meditating

I walked along the lake, enjoying the weather, nature and the water. Everything was present to make me feel happy. I felt at one with the landscape until suddenly a deer jumped up, at a distance of two or three meters, and fled. While recovering from the scare I thought: be careful do not let yourself be carried away by any sudden (alarming) thoughts triggered by the fright, let your mind stay engaged in the peacefulness of the landscape.

I did my best to stay in the present, tried to enjoy the supple movements of the deer. I did my best to engage with the landscape once again but the more I tried the more difficult it became. My thoughts were stronger than the willpower to push them away.

I continued walking and found a wooden bench inviting me to sit. While resting I thought about

Buddha, who after a period of ascetic efforts to find an answer to the question ‘how can we free

ourselves from suffering’, sat down exhausted beneath the Bodhi tree to calm down, only to

continue with the question: ‘who is it sitting beneath that tree?’ Rather than trying even harder to find the answers to his questions he simply sat down and looked at himself, looked at his mind, his thoughts, learned who he was and noticed how suffering evolves from our mind.

I too understood that I needed to stop doing my best, stop fighting against myself. I should just sit down calmly, look at my thoughts without becoming involved or trying to push them away. Thoughts will come and go, floating past as clouds in the skies.

I sat there, looking at my thoughts and noticed how they glided by. I quieted down and my senses

opened to the landscape, even the thoughts about all the chores still to be done did not bother me.