Stillness in motion

When we think of meditation, we normally think of sitting motionless in a quiet place away from the distractions of daily living. This is actually sitting meditation. By limiting sensory input during sitting meditation, we are able to calm our minds and reach the meditative state more easily. But meditation is not just limited to sitting in one place doing nothing. We can meditate by simply doing the ordinary things we do everyday with mindfulness. What we want to achieve in meditation is stillness. Stillness does not necessarily mean physical inactivity or even mental inactivity. In anything we do, be it eating, walking, driving, washing dishes, and so on, we have a capacity for stillness.

While the mind is fully engaged in physical activity, it is less likely to wander away from the present moment. While washing dishes, for instance, we attune our awareness to the moment-to-moment bodily movements and sensations involved in the chore. While the mind is preoccupied with the physical actions and sensations, it is less likely to be thinking, “Oh, this is such mindless drudgery; I have better things to do with my time!” Thoughts and feelings will continue to come and go, but as long as we can manage to hold our attention on the small details involved in getting the dishes cleaned, our minds will be attuned to the present moment. Dishwashing then becomes our object of meditation.

By uniting our minds with our body movements, we reach a special state of expanded awareness in which we hardly notice that we’re moving at all. The physical activity becomes a free-flowing experience that is perceived as a state of Being rather than an act of doing. This is how we achieve stillness in action.

When we wash dishes mindfully, the dishes practically wash themselves. Doing by non-doing. Non-doing does not mean doing nothing– it means non-judging, non-complaining, non-resisting. When the mind and body are able to merge and flow together in unison, without resistance from either component, we reach the state of awareness of being one with the activity itself. Embedded with our Presence, our actions become so refined and graceful that all we notice is Presence itself. This is a state of Being, not an act of doing.

We may think that by washing dishes mindfully, we get so absorbed in the chore that we become oblivious to other life responsibilities. But this is not true at all. Mindfulness is not about “spacing out” or becoming detached from reality. We do not deliberately resist or suppress our thoughts and emotions in any way as doing so would lead to stress. Thoughts and feelings will occur whether or not we are mindful. We simply let them come and go. While in the mindful state, we will continue to think, plan, imagine, daydream, and so on, but we do them in a nonattached manner. Mindfulness adds a new layer of awareness to our experience. Washing dishes mindfully, for instance, does not make us forget to take out the trash later.

Mindfulness is more easily achieved in repetitive tasks, such as walking and washing dishes. Cognitively demanding activities that involve constant planning, recalling, and problem-solving do not lend themselves as readily to mindfulness. Holding a conversation, working on a math problem, and performing brain surgery would fall into the latter category. However, with practice any activity– no matter how complex or intellectually demanding– may be done with some degree of mindfulness. The cultivation of mindfulness in these more challenging situations will be dealt with later. For now, suffice it to say that the key to mindfulness in any activity is to maintain a Presence in the body, a Presence in the activity, and a Presence in the present moment.