We have all had times when we say yes to someone but really want to say no. It’s often difficult to say no because of the desire to be loved: we want to be helpful, we want to show we care, but we may have little to give, are tired, over worked, or need alone time. Do you feel that if you aren’t there for someone they may reject you? Or, that you’re somehow obliged to help as it makes you a ‘good’ person, parent or friend? Do you ever feel validated by being needed?

It’s easy to believe that any time you take to relax or meditate is time that could be used elsewhere. But taking time out doesn’t mean it is selfish or even wasted time. Think about what happens when your day is spent constantly caring for others. Do you get resentful, irritated, or even angry? Do you find stress building up? Does the quality of care that you offer become affected by that inner tension? Or are you so used to being this way that it seems impossible to imagine being any other way? You may even think you’re not the relaxing type, or that if you do relax you won’t be able to cope with all the things you have to do.

However, by taking time for yourself, by lowering your blood pressure and releasing stress, you are immediately creating a more harmonious environment that can only benefit all those around you. When you take time out to be quiet it means you don’t get so angry, resentful, or frustrated; instead you connect with who you really are. Then what you share with others is coming from that peaceful space. When you are energized and feeling good you will be able to do far more than if you are dragging yourself through your day with little energy or in a bad mood.

So, rather than being selfish, such activity is actually the least selfish thing you could do! This is when saying no to others means you are affirming yourself. The power of saying no is that you are empowered!

Our yoga master, Sri Swami Satchidananda, said, “Never compromise your peace, whether it be to your children, parents, husband, wife or friends.” Unless you are at peace, what you give to others is your stress or anxiety. Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh has a telephone meditation where he teaches that, when the telephone rings, just wait, breathe in and out and slowly walk to the phone, so you are at ease when you answer. Then the person at the other end will feel your peace.

No one can make time. No one can change our habits or routine. For meditation to have any effect in our lives, we need to make an agreement to honor ourselves by doing it. This is actually a commitment to our own sanity and freedom. It is not to anyone else—not to a teacher or even to our family—but to living. That choice has to be made by each one of us. We can change the way we look, where we live, even who we live with, but unless we connect with who we are inside then none of those external changes will make much difference. Remember, happiness is an inside job!

Entering into the Quiet

Taking time to meditate is not the same as going for a walk or quietly listening to music. These are wonderfully relaxing activities, but they do not have the same effect as simply being still. Even just ten minutes a day will help you and all those around you. Others will find it easier to communicate with you, will enjoy being with you, and will even be motivated to help themselves more. As peace is contagious, let’s start an epidemic!

There is a great beauty and joy that is our birthright, and we find this when we let go of resistance and stress and reconnect with that quiet space within; when we discover our essence rather than focusing on the content. A stressed mind sees life as a burden or constraint, while a relaxed mind meets life with dignity and fearlessness.

Sitting Quietly

Sit comfortably with your back straight. Take a deep breath and let it go. Eyes are closed; breathe normally. Begin to silently count at the end of each out breath: Inhale… exhale… count one; inhale… exhale… two; inhale… exhale… three. Count to five, then start at one again. Just five breaths, and back to one. Simply following each breath in and silently counting. So simple.

We will always blame and condemn those we feel are responsible for wars and social injustice, without recognizing the degree of violence in ourselves. We must work on ourselves as well as with those we condemn if we wish to move towards peace. — Thich Nhat Hanh, nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by Martin Luther King Jr.

There is lots of fear mongering going on at the moment. Fingers are being pointed. Rage is being tossed around. This makes us quake in our boots, be fearful of the “enemy” or the “opposition,” or anything else outside our known world.

Fear mongering is easy. Fox News political analyst Juan Williams said in 2010 how he gets nervous if he is on a plane with Muslims. Immediately, all his listeners felt a sense of empathy with him, it kindled their own fear, and showed how, when a seed of fear is planted in our mind, it generates instability to the point of paranoia, which can spread like wildfire.

A single match can burn down an entire forest. In the same way, anger can spread and affect all it meets, like a 15-minute video, itself the result of anger and irrational fear, that has ignited anti-US clashes from Morocco to Malaysia to Sydney, Australia. At the time of writing seven people have been killed, thousands injured and innumerable buildings destroyed.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself – President Franklin D Roosevelt in his first inaugural address

Fear has many faces, many disguises. There is fear that is a natural response to physical danger; and there is fear that is self-created, such as a fear of failure, of the dark, of being out of control, being different, lonely, or of unfamiliar “other people.” Just as people fear communism, now they also fear Muslims. And such fear easily becomes racism. As Juan Williams also said in 1986: “Common sense becomes racism when skin color becomes a formula for figuring out who is a danger to me.”

Ultimately, fear is about survival of the ego, the me-centered self, especially when the structures we have created to keep us feeling safe are, in our limited view, being threatened. The ego-mind casts a shadow of fear of potential loss and destruction. Many of us live our whole lives this way, with shadows haunting us like ghosts wherever we go.

When fear is in control we become irrational, resistant to change and spontaneity; we get angry, defensive, hidden behind self-constructed walls of protection, which reinforces separateness, isolation and enmity. Fear makes us cling to the known and reject anything that is unknown. Violence invariably arises out of such fear. Unacknowledged, it can wreck havoc in our own lives and in the world around us, as seen in terrorist attacks, gang fighting, rape, or forceful and abusive behavior.

This is the real enemy within: the part in us (whether it is bitter, angry, fearful, ignorant) that refuses to recognise we are all interconnected to each other.

We become fearless only when we can turn fear around and face it, get to know it, release resistance to it, and open our hearts. When we acknowledge and take responsibility for our own fearful and aggressive tendencies, when we see that the enemy within is actually more harmful than the enemy without, then we have the ability to change not only our own lives but the world as well.

We can make tolerance, acceptance, forgiveness and love our priorities. Which doesn’t mean we are always in spaced out bliss while ignoring the conflicts around us, but it does mean we have shifted our focus. Those people we have a difficult time with are really our teachers, as without an adversary—or those who trigger a strong reaction such as anger—we would not be motivated to develop loving kindness. So we should be grateful to them for enabling us to be more compassionate, and, as the Dalai Lama says, for teaching us greater patience. We can actually thank our exasperating partners, reckless teenagers, competitive colleagues, or misguided fanatics for the chance to be kind. What a gift!

All this is possible through meditation that not only invites us to witness anger, but also to get to know and make friends with ourselves, to dissolve the “me versus you”, the power struggles and one-upmanship. It gives us a midpoint between expressing anger and repressing it, a place where we can hear our feelings with awareness and acceptance.

Meditation may not be a cure-all; it is not going to make all our difficulties go away or suddenly transform our weaknesses into strengths, but it does enable us to rest in an inclusive acceptance of who we are. This does not make us perfect, simply more fully human.

Who said life would be like walking the yellow brick road, or that the human condition would be easy? And why is it so important to be here? What’s the big deal? It appears that the reason we’re not happy is because we long for things to be other than they are. We’re not satisfied being here. Not satisfied being with what is. We want things to be different, because we believe that if they were we would be happier. Therefore, we’re not truly present with our reality.

Certainly many of us face challenging situations, but resistance only makes this harder. It can turn pain into suffering. Taking each moment at a time enables us to be with whatever is happening. When we were in England, Ed was chatting with a nun named Avis. He said to her, “Some day we will all die and meet up in heaven.” And she replied, “Yeah, and we’ll look at each other and say, ‘What was that all about!’”

Normally, we spend our time either living in what-could-have-been or what-might-have-been or if-only, or in the expectation of what-could-be or what-might-be. But constantly living in either the past or the future is like being in a dream, as it limits our capacity to be in the present, with what is happening now. No matter how much we try, plan, plot, arrange, have things to do, we still have no idea what will happen next.

We used to live next to a river and walked beside it each day. But as much as it looked like the same river, even the same water, it was constantly different. Just as we may look the same, the cells in our body are forever being formed, growing and dying; we are continually changing as we renew ourselves in every minute.

We can stay open to these moments of change by simply being aware of them. Right now, just stop and take a deep breath. As you breath out, just notice how your body feels, the chair you are sitting on, and the room you are in. That’s all. It only takes an instant to be present.

Contrary to common belief, it can be immensely liberating to have nothing going on, to discover that the whole universe is contained in this moment. To realize that nothing more is required of us than to just be aware and present. What a relief! Finally, we can experience this reality just as it is, without expectation, prejudice, longing, or without the desire for something to be different. This invites a deep sense of completion, that there really is nowhere else we need to be or go. It’s impossible to think of somewhere else as being better for the grass is vividly green exactly where we are.

Someone once asked Ed if he had ever experienced another dimension. He replied, “Have you experienced this one?” There is no greater joy in this whole world than our own true self.

Practice: Being and Breathing Meditation

When we meditate by simply watching the flow of the breath it naturally brings us into the present. The breath is just breathing, and yet it is never the same, each breath is completely different to the last one.

 Sit comfortably with your back straight, hands in your lap, eyes closed. Spend a few minutes settling your body.

            Now bring your focus to your breathing, just watch the natural movement as you breathe in and out. Silently repeat, “Breathing in, Breathing out.”

            Stay with watching your breath. If your mind starts to drift just see your thoughts as birds in the sky and watch them fly away. Then come back to the breath.

            Anytime you get distracted, bored, or stressed, just come back to the breath, to this moment now. Silently repeat, “I am here, I am now, I am present. I am here, I am now, I am present.”

You can do this for a few minutes or as long as you like. When you are ready, take a deep breath and let it go, open your eyes, and move gently.

Anger can be an effective expression of passion for justice and fairness, for basic rightness, for what is appropriate and humane. But anger can also be like a single match that can burn an entire forest, causing tremendous damage and hurt, wars, greed and self-deception. The fallout can be huge and, invariably, we have no control over the repercussions.

Few of us want to admit that we get bitchy, shout, or lose our temper—we much prefer to see ourselves as being wonderfully tolerant and serene. Yet we all get angry at some time or another and in its passion anger pushes away, condemns, and makes everything wrong except itself. Our heart goes out of reach and we lose touch with our feelings. There is no compromise, no chance for dialogue—I am right and you are wrong.

Trying to eradicate anger is like trying to box with our own shadow: it doesn’t work. Getting rid of it implies either expressing it, and possibly causing emotional carnage; denying and avoiding it, which is a way of lying to ourselves and can cause depression or bitterness; or repressing it, which just holds it inside until it erupts at a later time when it can cause even more harm.

“Ducks don’t do anger,” says Deepesh Faucheux in our book, Be The Change. “Ducks fight over a piece of bread and then they just swim away. But people keep processing everything that happens to them. That processing of the story—what so and so did to me, she wronged me, why doesn’t he respect me—keeps the energy identified as anger and resentment, instead of seeing it as simply energy.”

There are often layers of conflicting feelings hidden beneath anger, such as hurt, insecurity, sadness or fear. The power of rage is such that it can overshadow these other emotions, causing us to lose touch with ourselves and struggle to articulate what we are really feeling. Having lost our connectedness with each other, anger can really be a cry for attention or for contact; it may be expressing grief, loneliness, or a longing to love and be loved. We are saying, “I love you,” or “I need you,” while hurling abuse at each other.

“We get to see that underneath anger,” says Rabbi Zalman Schachter in Be The Change, “there is fear, pain, and sorrow, and we cannot deal with anger unless we also deal with what sustains the anger. We forget how we are hardwired. The reptilian system within us makes sure we are secure and safe. If we do not feel secure, then the dinosaur will rear its head and roar. So under anger is always the question of how safe does the reptilian feel.”

We need to go beneath the anger to see what hurt, longing or fear is trying to make itself heard. There may be feelings of rejection, grief or loneliness, so if we repress anger or pretend it isn’t there then all these other feelings get repressed and ignored as well. Only by recognizing what the real emotion is behind the expression can there be more honest communication.

By naming and recognizing the many faces of anger, we can stay present with it as it arises, keeping the heart open, breathing, watching emotions come up and pass through. We can watch as anger fills the mind and makes such a song and dance, and we can just keep breathing and watching as it goes on it’s merry way.

 Meditation not only invites us to witness anger, but also to get to know and make friends with ourselves. It gives us a midpoint between expressing anger and repressing it, a place where we can be aware of our feelings and not be swept away by them. Meditation is not going to make all our challenges go away but it does enable us to rest in an inclusive acceptance of who we are.

The Guest House

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

~ Rumi ~

To anyone first coming to meditation they can be met with a plethora of advice and techniques that is enough to baffle and confuse. Where to go? What to do? Which is best? How to start? How to chose between mindfulness, TM, mantra recitation, kundalini, vipassana, insight, witness, breath awareness, shamata, visualization, MBSR, metta, and more?

Part of the difficulty is that the word meditation means both the experience and the technique. This is important because the experience is spontaneous, natural, arising from within, while the technique is simply the learnt method that helps you have the experience. And it makes little difference which technique you use. When you drive to Rome you need a car but once you get there you don’t. The techniques are designed to help you calm the mind, to bring your attention inward, focused in just this present moment, so that the experience of meditation arises naturally.

We clarify this difference in our book, Be The Change, How Meditation Can Transform You and The World, as it is so easy to get caught up in the technique – mine is better than yours – and forget that it is only a way to something, it is not the something itself. We talked with over 100 meditation teachers and practitioners who all stressed that the experience is far more important than the technique used because what you are really doing is opening yourself to an inner stillness that grows each time you come to sit quietly with yourself. In other words, just shut up, sit still, and see what happens!

The experience of meditation is one of being completely and utterly present. That may sound so simple but it is rare – notice how your normal state of mind is distracted by issues from the past or dealing with issues in the future – anywhere but just right here! When we are fully present all those demanding thoughts begin to drop away, are seen as being far less important, even the anger, resentment, hurt and other negative emotions lose their power. Being fully present we experience the totality of our being and the richness found in stillness and silence.

So, when looking for a meditation technique, it may be worth trying them all. Each one will offer a slightly different take on the same thing, and we each need to find that one that suits us best. As one of Deb’s teachers said, there are as many forms of meditation as there are people who practice it.

Just watching the flow of the breath as it enters and leaves very naturally internalizes our attention and is more than enough for many people (mindfulness, breath awareness, shamata –see below). Others have the same affinity to repeating a mantra or sound as the repetition induces greater peace (TM, mantra meditation). We can also purposefully foster positive states of being, such as cultivating greater peace, kindness, and forgiveness, through the repetition of simple phrases or visualization.

However, meditation can appear very boring, especially to beginners. Just sitting and watching our mind can seem so absurd, especially when we are invariably confronted with an endlessly chattering mind: the dramas, fears and neurosis seem to have a picnic, pushing anything meaningful out of the way. It’s not that this chatter is new, just that we are now more aware of it, like an endless parade of senseless scenarios. When we were teaching meditation in England Ed was explaining how the mind can create havoc, and how some of the most inane thoughts can arise like: “I want to kill my mother!” The woman he was talking with blurted out, “How did you know?”

Practice

All you have to do is sit comfortably and watch your breathing. Just breathe naturally, in and out, no forced, short or long breathing. Simply watch each movement of breath. If this is hard, then you can also silently repeat, “breathing in, breathing out” with each breath.

Thoughts will come and go. You will probably find yourself getting distracted. The mind is very good at finding reasons not to be still, like a monkey bitten by a scorpion leaping from branch to branch it leaps from or drama to drama. When it does, just come back to watching your breath. The monkey will eventually get quiet and be still.

Make friends with meditation by not pushing yourself. Start with sitting for just 10 minutes a day until you naturally find yourself wanting and doing longer. That way you won’t resent it. Sit upright – a bent or slouchy back will bring your energy down.

And as the saying goes, practice makes perfect. Which means that meditation is accumulative – you may not experience anything the first time you do it, but keep at it and you will. And though it may appear as if nothing is happening, in the midst of it all you may have a breakthrough, a moment of insight, and that one moment can change your life.

Ed was raised in the Jewish faith (as he says, on his parents side!), Deb was raised a Quaker. We both began spiritually seeking at the same time in the late 1960′s. Ed was in his twenties living in New York City, hanging out Studio 54 and other discos; meanwhile Deb was an art student living in London. And when Ed was in India being ordained as a Swami — a monk in the Yoga tradition — Deb was being ordained as a Buddhist. We both became teachers in our respective traditions, but by the time we met in the 1980s we had each left being part of a traditional order and were on our own, having decided to explore what it is to live a spiritual life in the midst of a materialistic world. We were like foreigners, finding our way in a world that was not so inclined or sympathetic towards spiritual life.

Essentially, religion is designed to be our spiritual source of comfort and advice, a structure to provide moral guidelines, a caring community, and help for those in need. And in many ways it is. But religion is also the cause of violence, wars, discrimination, bigotry, pain and suffering, all of which are a long way from kindness, compassion, comfort and spiritual reassurance.

Religious morality is also used to justify political reasoning and supremacy. In the U.S., the 1^st amendment draws a clear separation between church and state, between religion and politics. Yet every presidential candidate is judged by his or her religious beliefs, as seen in the attempt to prove that President Obama is a Muslim, more so because his name is Barack Hussein Obama, which generates fear.

Prospective Republican candidates use their Christian beliefs as a form of qualification and go to great lengths to show that a good Christian is a Republican, thereby implying that Democrats are not. We remember watching Bill Moyer (during George W. Bush’s era) interviewing a Kansas couple being evicted from their home due to spiraling mortgage costs. As the movers were carrying out their furniture around them, Moyer looked puzzled and asked why they had voted Republican. They replied: “Because we are Christians!”

We often hear somewhat extreme candidates constantly pushing their religious beliefs into the political arena with outrageous statements like: the hurricane and earthquake happened as God is punishing us, whether it’s because of gay marriage, abortion, or any number of reasons that support their ideology.

This is taking religion into realms that are not religious. When religion is used to validate killing because there is a difference of opinion, then it has gone beyond having a moral compass to imposing belief and power over another. We see this with the killing of abortion clinic staff, all in the name of saving a fetus, despite the pregnancy being caused by rape or incest, or threatening the mother’s life. Yet how many who are trying to stop abortion are also willing to adopt an unwanted baby?

At the same time, spirituality is a loaded word, often misunderstood, as its practices include meditation, contemplation, and direct communication with universal consciousness. The Pope has condemned meditation and yoga as immoral, deluding, and even sinful. Yet spirituality is simply the discovery of our authentic self without any trimmings or labels, which gives us a rich source of values and a deeper meaning to life, whatever our religion.

In the seeking of such meaning, religion and spirituality come together. Spirituality highlights qualities such as caring, kindness, compassion, tolerance, service, and community, and, in its truest sense, so does religion. But where religion is defined by its tradition and teachings, spirituality is defied by what is real in our own experience, arising from an inner search within ourselves, the finding of our own truth.

Where religion tends to breed separation: my religion verses your religion; my god is the only real god; my ethics are better than yours, etc., spirituality sees all people as equal: we are not an “ism” or a label, we are spiritual beings whose purpose is to awaken to our true nature.

Buddha wasn’t a Buddhist, Jesus wasn’t a Christian; the great ones did not create a religion, they just said to look within. They realized the truth that is always here, always present, but so easily forgotten. We are not able to see because of a mind that is veiled by ignorance, hate and greed: the ‘me-centeredness’ that rules and deludes.

When we were with the Dalai Lama at his residence in India we asked him what we could do to help humankind to awaken to caring and kindness. He said how people of different religions should come together in peace and respect and talk openly, honoring each other’s differences and similarities. This is a great example of religion and spirituality coming together.

While we were living in England we had our own TV series and interviewed the British minister Jonathan Aitken, who had just been released from prison. He was an arrogant, egotistical man who, like many politicians in America, think they can get away with most everything. But Aitken became a changed man in prison — it softened him. He shared how he was in a men’s group where he had learned how to cry.

All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him. — The Buddha

We spend the whole of our lives with ourselves; we can never hide. We can lock ourselves in a room and throw away the key, or live in a cave on a far off island, but wherever we go there we are. Aitken had to realize this, albeit the hard way.

What we put out, we reap. For Aitken it was trying to get away with someone else paying his expenses. For Gov. Perry it may be because he did not pardon a father of three who, despite a lack of evidence, was accused of arson in the death of his children. The man was executed under Perry’s watch, causing numerous doubts and questions.

Perhaps U.S. politicians can gain some humility from Jonathan Aitken, politicians like Rick Perry who make outlandish statements and promises in their attempt to brainwash and convince the people they represent their needs. Say anything enough times and people start to believe it.

Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth. — The Buddha

Amidst the digression of the Republican presidential candidates there is one issue that seems paramount to all: Do away with “socialism.” In America, this word is unfortunately misunderstood and represents fear; it has become synonymous with most things that appear wrong, such as the health care system, social security and even education. Coming from 11 years living in England, we are acutely aware of the benefits of such so-called socialism, particularly the National Health Service. Regardless of who you are, health care is available for all and prescriptions are cheap. Yes, there may be a wait to see a doctor; yes, there often isn’t much time allowed for a visit; but, if this is socialism, then long may it live!

The right wingers, such a Rick Perry and others who pervert what socialism means, use it as a fear weapon, a power tool to deflect from its benefits. Gov. Perry has called our social security system a “Ponzi scheme” and is bent on doing away with both it and Medicare. Perry recently reversed his claims about Social Security, but other Republicans have said that it is a “scheme to take money from the American people,” to frighten the young that they will be paying for the aged and will wind up empty handed themselves.

Such conviction begs the question: Does the Texas Governor have any idea what it means to live without an income, savings or any other means of personal survival? Can he honestly justify putting millions of people into a position of not being able to pay their way? Is his allegiance to the rich corporations and nothing else? Does it have to be so obvious they don’t care?

Do not think lightly of evil that not the least consequence will come of it. A whole water pot will fill up from dripping drops of water. A fool fills himself with evil, just a little at a time. — The Buddha

Which leaves us asking, why does Rick Perry want to be president? What are his motives? Power is dangerous in the wrong hands and easily guided by ignorance. First he wants Texas to secede and leave the US, then he wants to be president of the whole country, which means representing all people, not just those who agree with him. Can he really be trusted?

But all is not lost for Perry nor the other Republican contenders. They have time to clear their thinking, open their hearts, and see the reality of someone’s life who does not have the wealth that they all seem to have. And we have time to recognize ignorance for what it is and not let it to penetrate into our minds.

“The question becomes not how we fight a war against those who seek to harm us because of differences in ideology, but how to fight a war against the fear that motivates us to welcome hate, anger and evil into our hearts,” writes Alysson Fergison, in “The Dangers of Evil.” “While it may be easy to react in anger and rush to destroy those who would harm us, we must understand that to do so breeds more hate, anger, misery and destruction … We will never remove evil from the world but we can remove it from ourselves and hopefully inspire others to do the same.”

Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth, so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk safely through the maze of human life, one needs the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue. — The Buddha

Through many years of being involved with meditation we have seen how easily people miss the point, mainly because they take the practice and themselves too seriously. Many ‘try’ to meditate but their minds are so busy they get frustrated and quickly believe they are no good at it. Others turn into die-hard advocates of a particular method or technique and become like a salesperson trying to sell their produce.

Just like Yoga, people want to own meditation and to believe that their technique is the best one. They give it a name: TM or Vipassana or Mindfulness and sometimes make outrageous claims of what can be achieved, but that is not the point. Meditation is not a technique – being quiet happens by itself, not because of following the breath in and out, reciting a specific mantra or creating a visualization.

Teachers, through their compassion, created the many methods and techniques in order to help their students to concentrate and focus their minds, to be one-pointed. No one technique is better than another; they equally give our monkey minds something to do other than drive us bananas. Many of the practices known as meditation are actually concentration; they bring the mental energy together so the mind is less fragmented. But this is not meditation.

Meditation invites us to stop, just stop, breathe and be. Just as with a musician playing or an artist painting, when we stop trying to make it happen something occurs, like the radiant sun that suddenly emerges in a cloudy sky. But because we try so hard, we identify more with the technique instead of allowing the meditation to reveal itself.

The practice of meditation easily gets put in a box: “I will practice now, at this time, at this place and in this posture, and I will do this particular method.” But a method is simply an aide; it is not the experience itself. A hammer can help build a house but it is not the house. There is no doubt that through practice we can release stress and feel wonderfully peaceful, but genuine meditation is about waking up, where the mind is clear and free of obscuration.

This is not a mental process but an experiential one as meditation is an opening, a release of ego identity when all attempts to meditate, all striving, all doing stops, when there is no past or future, just radiant emptiness. It is being present – fully aware and present in every moment — and we can do that whatever we are doing and wherever we are. It is the freedom to be fully oneself without limitations or ideologies – there is just this.

Deb’s father, Richard, was on a Zen retreat where he was taught to temper his sensuality, not to give in to his senses or think of sensual things but to stay focused and single minded. While walking in the garden he then came across a pond laden with happily fornicating frogs. We think meditation has to be something special but true meditation is opening and expanding our perception, as if seeing with new eyes.

The technique becomes redundant when meditation becomes our natural state. It doesn’t matter what the technique is — when we drive to Rome the car is necessary but when we get there it is immaterial – what matters is the attitude and awareness that we bring to practice. The teacher is also more important than the technique. They must be skillful, peaceful and clear, regardless of the method or tradition they are teaching.

The moon trusts that the world will continue to go round on its axis, birds trust there will be berries and seeds to eat, trees trust the seasons will follow in the right order. Until we trust that things will unfold naturally then we are slaves to our doubts, fears and neurosis, to the constant chatter in our heads that says we are useless and don’t know anything. But we don’t make the sun to rise or set. The planet is in orbit and neither we nor Jesus or Buddha or any of the wise ones run the show. Our job is simply to surrender to the moment.

As actress Jane Fonda writes in our book, Be The Change: “There are practical reasons for dividing everything up. It makes things easier to manage and to solve, especially technical matters: the us and them, the either-or, the man versus nature, mine and yours. Life is simpler to deal with. But we have applied this fragmenting mindset to all of life so that it’s become our reality, which has led to further fragmentation and chaos and planetary destruction. The challenge is to figure out how to deal with our day-to-day life, while at the same time changing our mindset so that we see reality as the unbroken wholeness of the totality of existence, an undivided, flowing movement without borders.”

In the Buddhist teachings there is a description of a huge net reaching in all directions with a multifaceted mirror-like jewel at each of the many knots, every jewel reflecting all the other jewels. It is called the Jeweled Net of Indra and represents our interconnectedness: see one and you see all within it. Not one can be separated from or is independent of any other; take one away and the net becomes unusable. In other words, we are interrelated, interdependent, inseparable, and interconnected all at the same time, part of an integrated whole, not separate from the trees, elephants, owls, our neighbors, the people in South Africa or a river in India.

Zen teacher Bernie Glassman writes in Be The Change: “Imagine that each of my two hands has the notion that it is an individual object and not connected to anything else. Left hand calls itself Sally, and right hand calls itself Harry. Then Sally gets cut. Harry has read many things about the oneness of life, but he believes that Sally is separate and thinks, I can’t do anything about Sally being cut, I’m not a doctor, and I don’t have a first-aid kit. And anyway, I don’t want to get my new clothes stained. Harry walks away and Sally bleeds to death. But that means Harry also bleeds to death, as Harry and Sally happen to be very attached to each other. This is what happens when the experience of oneness is not there.

“Now imagine Sally and Harry both meditate and, while recognizing the separateness of Sally and Harry, they also recognize their oneness with Bernie. When Sally gets cut, Harry does the best thing possible to help her because he knows that to help her is also helping both him and Bernie. This is not a thinking process; it is the direct experience of the oneness of life. The appreciation of this is huge.”

On a relative level, of course, we have our own thoughts and feelings, but they cannot be separated from what we were taught by our parents or from experiences of pain and joy in our relationships—just as it is impossible to separate our body from the food we eat or the farmer who grew the food or the earth and the rain. There is actually no part of our being that is a separate or independent entity from everyone we have met and everything we have done or from every part of the world around us.

Author Tim Freke writes: “We think that we are separate from each other, and we are not. We think we are separate from the whole of life, and we are not. Tim is an integral part of the whole, and everyone and everything are also an integral part of the whole and, therefore, one with Tim. Separateness is the conceptual story we tell to make sense of life, the story of who we are, and when we get sucked into it we are not conscious of our deeper being. This is when we cause suffering to each other and our world. Waking up is the recognition that there is no other, that every person or situation is not separate from our essential nature.”

Where separation divides and causes conflict, awareness of our interconnectedness means we see all others as ourselves. The jewels in Indra’s net are independent jewels and each reflects a different aspect of the whole, while also reflecting each other. Each is so interrelated to all that they cannot exist without each other or without the entire net.

This can take us to the point where we most certainly don’t want to wish them well. But does harboring dislike, revenge, even hate, do us any favors? Does it really make us feel better in the long run or does it just get us more stressed?

It’s important that we acknowledge what we are feeling—all the anger, unfairness, and aversion—and really honor how hurt we are. Repressing our feelings means they’ll just come up again at some point, most likely when another situation triggers a similar response.

But negative emotions can sap our energy, especially when we hold on to them. And they spread like wildfire, soon affecting our behavior and attitudes towards other people, like a single match that can burn down an entire forest.

And they create an emotional bond with the abuser that keeps our feelings alive, so that we keep replaying the drama and conflict over in our heads, justifying our own behavior and disregarding theirs. In the process we become a not-very-nice person.

Anger, aggression and bitterness are like thieves in the night who steal our ability to love and care. Is it possible to turn that negativity around and chill out so we can wish our abuser well, without necessarily needing to know them as a friend again? This may sound challenging and absurd but it can make life’s difficulties far more tolerable. How can we do this?

1. Recognize no one harms another unless they are in pain themselves. Ever noticed how, when you’re in a good mood, it’s hard for you to harm or hurt anything? You may even take the time to get an insect out of the sink. But if you’re in a bad mood or are feeling very stressed, then how easy it is to wash it down the drain.

2. No one can hurt you unless you let them. Hard to believe, as no one actually wants to be hurt but it’s true. When someone hurts us, we are inadvertently letting them have an emotional hold over us. Instead, as spiritual teacher Byron Katie often says: If someone yells at you, let them yell, it makes them happy!

3. Respect yourself enough that you want to feel good. Deb did this with her father, an abusive and angry man. Deb made the decision that she wouldn’t respond to him with negativity, so she turned it around within herself and continued to wish him well. He died recently and Deb was able to feel total closure.

4. Consider how you may have contributed to the situation. It’s all too easy to point fingers and blame the perpetrator but no difficulty is entirely one-sided. So contemplate your piece in the dialogue or what you may have done to add fuel to the fire. Even when he feels he is 100% right, Ed always looks at a difficulty to see what was his part in it.

5. Extend kindness. That doesn’t mean you’re like a doormat that lets others trample all over you while you just lie there and take it. But it does mean letting go of negativity sooner than you might have done before, so that you can replace it with compassion. Like an oyster that may not like that irritating grain of sand in its shell but manages to transform the irritation into a beautiful and precious pearl.

6. Meditate. Meditation takes the heat out of things and helps you cool off, so you don’t over react. A daily practice we use is where we focus on a person we may be having difficulty with or is having a difficulty with us. We hold them in our hearts and say: “May you be well!  May you be happy!  May all things go well for you!”