Learning to Allow the Mind Stillness

Catspace stududio Hi, it's Dora here and welcome to Radio Headspace Now, when I tell people that I'm a mindfulness teacher at headadspace, one of the first responses I hear is something like Oh, meditation isn't for me. And before I even ask why, they usually followed up with a confession My mind is too restless. I can never make it still I tried it once and I'm just such a bad meditator And the funny thing is these confessions are almost always made completely unprovoked They're incredibly common So common in fact that I remember having the exact same thought when I first started meditating. When I first began practicing, I remember sitting down, closing my eyes and almost immediately thinking I am terrible at this My mind was everywhere planlanning what I was gonna to eat later re're playing conversations from the day before Thinking about what I should be doing instead of sitting here. And I thought meditation was supposed to make me calm But what I didn't realize at the time was how revealing the practice would be. Because meditation didn't immediately make my mind calmer t firstirst, it showed me how restless my mind already was And that was a bit of a surprise. In Buddhist teachings, there's a phrase used to describe the nature of the mind. which is the monkey mind. It's the restless, unsettled state of mind that jumps from thought to thought just like a monkey swinging from vine to vine And when we first sit down to meditate That monkey mind suddenly becomes very obvious. So many people believe they're failing meditation because their mind wanders. They can't focus the whole time. Or there's simply too many thoughts But here's something important to remember Mind wandering is not a mistake It's actually a shared human experience Our minds were designed to wander So when the mind starts wandering during meditation, It's not that we're doing something wrong The mind is doing exactly what minds are supposed to do And this is what I often remind my students The moment that you notice that your mind has wandered That moment is the practice There's a story I love that illustrates this beautifully There once was a young traveler who came to a quiet monastery seeking wisdom he told an old monk My thoughts never stop. I can't understand my own heart. The monk led him to a small pond and stirred the water with a stick Look, he said The traveler leaned over the pond but only saw ripples in broken reflections I see nothing clearly, he replied The monk then set the stick aside and waited Slowly The water began to settle The ripples faded. The sky reflected clearly And the pebbles at the bottom became visible Your mind is the same, the monk said gently When it's disturbed by fear, desire, and worry It cannot reflect clearly But when you allow stillness Clarity appears on its own. And the traveler understood something important in that moment. Chace wasn't something he needed to chase It was something that would arise when he stopped disturbing the water And meditation works in a very similar way It's not about trying really hard to get rid of all of our thoughts or forcing our mind to be still. Because the harder we try, the more ripples we create Instead, meditation is about learning to allow the mind to be as it is. Thoughts may come and go That monkey mind may swing around for a while, and that's okay The practice is to simply notice Notice when the mind has wandered When you've been lost in thought and gently returning your focus again So the next time you sit down to meditate and your mind starts to wander Instead of thinking, I'm so bad at this You might try saying to yourself There's the mind and simply allow it to be there without judgment and full of a childlike curiosity. That moment of noticing the mind wandering is what meditation is. So just something to keep in mind the next time you sit. Thanks for listening And I'll see you back here next time