Insight and meditation - a continuous learning experience

This morning while tidying up a room after a massive (more than 300 books) donation to the Free Library Project in Camden, NJ, I came across several of Pema Chodrin's books. Pema Chodrin is abbot of Gumpo Abbey in Nova Scotia and a practitioner/teacher of Buddhist meditation practice). I credit Pema Chodrin with saving my sanity at one or two of the most difficult/painful periods of my life and what I have disovered over the years is that the seeds planted by the teachings from her books and cd's in the early years grow perrennial crops. I read all of Ch9drin's books as of the period of my discovery of her work which was around the time of the millennium, 2000.

My daughter had quit college in her freshman year and flown to California to become an acress. I was paralyzed by anxiety. I couldn't sleep, and I couldn't control the "invasive thoughts" based on fear - serial killers, pornographers, all the rabid predaors who prey on the naive young girls who think they are grown-up and know the world.

My first attempt at seeking psychological counseling was a disaster, and I had no one to turn to, but somewhere, maybe Shambala Magazine, I had come across the writing of Pema Codrin, so I bouht a 5 cd player and her cd's and all of her books - at that time about a dozen with titles like WHEN THINGS FALL APART, IN TIMES OF UNCERTAINTY, and others, all of which seemed to speak to my condition.

Every night I loaded the cd player and listened for the hours when I couldn't sleep and what that did was it displaced the intrusive fear thoughts with soothing medictation prompts and Buddhist teachings.

Over the years, I picked up more books and cd's of Pema Chodrin's works and they were like refreshers. My experience with her and her works changed my life, saved my life.

This morning, I was thinking of the suggestion "look at your thoughts passing by; don't try to get rid of them, or scold yourself for thinking, look at them like clouds passing in the sky, see them, know that they are only thoughts." That may be one of the mosst powerful recuring lessons I have learned from Chodrin. I meditate throughout the day, on the porch after walking the dog, while walking the dog, or at times of idleness, and that practice has helped to tame and soothe an anxiety tortured emotional creature.

My latest addition to this world of wisdom was a book recommended to me by Friends from Providence Friends Meeting, by author Rex Ambler, a pamphlet book from Pendle Hill Publishers and I think the title is the MYSTICAL ORIGINS OF THE EARLY QUAKERS. In the book, the author describes how Quaker silent meditation is paralell, or related to insight meditation as well as various psychological approaches to exploring our thoughts and becoming more adept at recognizing patterns and allowing us to not be controled by emotions generated by thoughts that are unproductive or unhealthy (monkey mind).

When I donated the 30 or more cartons of my library, I kept out a few books here and there, incuding some of Pema Chodrin's and perhaps in a later post, I will list the title of the few I kept. I hope the ones that left bring some comfort to other tortured souls being ravaged by their own uncontrolled thoughts and fears and the unhealthy emotional fallout from them.

Happy Trails wrightj45@yahoo.com