Sunday, January 10, 2016

Practicing Presence

Presence is simple.  Presence is keeping the mind engaged with what is happening here, and now.  Presence is not easy.  Our minds naturally leap from past to future, mulling things over, thinking about contingencies and options - what to do next - what might go wrong.

Presence is loving.  That is, it is accepting and nonjudgmental.  Sometimes that's the hardest part. The mind will stay present, or at least in the immediate vicinity, but court remains in session.  The part of us that wants to say "this is good," or "this is bad;" "I like this," or "I don't like this," is hard to quiet down.  Perhaps it even seems that our judgments - what we like and don't like - define who we are and how we relate to the world.

Being present, accepting what is happening without judging, allows us to experience the world as it is, not through the filter of our own preferences and prejudices.   But sending the judge home requires a lot of practice.  One way to start is to pay attention to something that is relatively easy to be neutral and nonjudgmental about.  Perhaps colors.  "Color naming" is a practice that I like to do, especially in a busy place like an airport or busy street.  Simply watching and naming the colors I see - red, green, light blue, gray, black, etc - and watching for any hint of judgment or preference.  There's no "puke green," just green or perhaps shades of it.

Eventually, your sense of nonjudgmental awareness will be firm enough that you can move to more difficult subjects.  Like people.  I found it powerful to spend time watching people and labeling each one, simply "person."  Regardless of shape, size, color, age, attire - all the stuff that might trigger assumptions and prejudices, likes and dislikes - I see another person and tell myself - "person."  After a while, my mind stops immediately pulling up the assumptions and prejudices, and I have room to take in the experience with more objectivity, more acceptance of the world as it is.

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