[MMi]

Being with loss


How can we be in a wise relationship with pain, fear and loss?  There is no simple answer.  What I can share with you is an attempt to sit with "what is".  Don't try to change it, to wish it away or "fast forward".  This is perhaps the most fundamental mindfulness practice, and yet the most challenging for a "quick-fix" society.

 Sit comfortably.  Feel your feet firmly grounded  on the floor, your back aligned with your neck and  your hands resting in your lap.  

 Focus on your breathing.  Allow each in-breath to enter your body and expand for its full duration - don't force anything, just allow your body to breathe itself.  Then, after a natural break, breathe out the out - breath for its full duration, until it comes to a natural end.  Do this for a while, as long as it takes to feel settled enough.

Then focus on the "loss" - it may be health, a friendship or partnership, or the death of somebody close.  Gently say: " Whatever it is (here, you fill in the "loss" verbally or as an image) let me feel it".  Start with a very simple phrase or image and just hold this in your awareness. Be with it, feeling, seeing the loss, facing it, even if it is painful, but don't pretend it is not there.  You may only be able to do this for a minute or two.  Let go of the thought or image, and return to the simple breath of life.

Peace

There is only silence

On the mountain tops

Among the tips of the trees

You perceive barely a breath 

Even the birds in the forest

Keep still and are silent

Wait then

Just a little while longer

And you  too

will find peace at last 

(10 Minutes a Day to Less Stress, More Peace)

 Make peace with each breath you take .