Competitive Meditation

If you're like me you spend too much time in your own head. Perhaps you too create implausible outcomes to ordinary situations that you swear will happen, but have never once come true. Or maybe you see a television show that you like and become strangely envious of fictional characters and think how much better your life would be with superpowers. Or maybe you simply enjoy sitting in the dark skecthing unicorn death matches...that might just be me.

I spend a great deal of my time escaping my own insanity. I ride bikes, play tennis, write this thing, talk to people who are there, talk to people who aren't there, but the point is that I am continually engaged in one activity or another that helps me get out of my own batshit brain. So with this snazzy intro I will share that I recently tried yet another tactic in the pursuit of calming the fuck down.

Meditation

Seems wonderful, right? Clear your mind, think of nothing, just breathe. 

Impossible. Perhaps it is my extreme resistance to instruction, but I tend to let as many thoughts race through my head as humanly possible. I think of literally everything at once (its actually the color brown, because that is what happens when you mix everything together), and I also set the world breath-holding record. 

Despite these unfortunate impediments to a clear mind, I ventured on. I also discovered that my competitive nature and unproductive thinking prevents me from just doing what I'm told. Here's an example from a class I tried:

Soothing lady voice:

"Try and relax and clear your mind."

Me:

"Ok, clearing my mind. Gonna think about nothing...thinking SO HARD about nothing. Picture a blank, white space, ok that's nothing, right? Wait, technically that is the color white...should I be thinking about something transparent, but what if there is something on the other side, does that count...Do I get credit for seeing something through the nothingness? What the fuck is happening?!?!?"

Soothing lady voice:

"Focus on your breathing...how the breath moves in and out of your body...Breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth"

Me:

"Holy Shit. I've been holding my breath this whole time. breathe...stop gasping, just breathe....ok that's better. I'm breathing.  Wait, am I breathing in through my mouth and out through my nose, or is it the other wat around? I was on the verge of passing out and I don't remember what she said."

Soothing lady voice:

"Focus on your body. Slowly move down from the head to the toes, relaxing every part of as you progress"

Me:

"Ok eyes closed, trying desperately to unclench my jaw. Alright, moving down my body feeling the air go in and out of my lungs. I feel my chest rise and fall, I feel the air draw into my belly. I feel...like I have to fart...I am so relaxed its just gonna happen, no one's gonna notice...oh no, I just ate a burrito, who eats a burrito before a fucking meditation class? I super regret that decision. What if my relaxed gas expulsion kills everyone in the room? Who can relax at a time like this? I am on the verge of mass recticide...and all these people are just laying there, breathing deeply..,They'll never know what hit them. I have to get out of here. How can I discretely, without fart-murdering anyone, get the fuck out of here?"

Soothing lady voice:

"And now its time to slowly come out of the meditation. When you are ready open your eyes and stretch"

Me:

"Wait, what the fuck?! Its over!?

Then when anyone asks me how it went...

"I am totally relaxed. I relaxed way fucking harder than anyone else there. I am the most relaxed person who ever lived."

Meditation, fuck yeah.