Oakville Zen Meditation
Stressors are everywhere, permanent, intermittent, subtle, violent, sudden, slow, chronic, acute.
They come from our past via memory, from the present, and even from the unknown future.
They are mostly hidden in our subconscious or fully exposed consciously.
Stressors are defined as events, situations, or people that are perceived as out of our control or that we cannot solve. Can we avoid them? No. Can we prevent them? No. Can we eliminate them? No.
Can we deal with them to avoid being trapped by them and becoming their victims? Yes
The Zen approach, as always, is not to resist or fight stress and stressors but rather to be aware of their presence, then recognize and accept their consequences on ourselves and others as a mandatory part of our daily lives. How to proceed?
The recognition has 2 steps:
1. Mindfully reading your body under stress:
Our body reactions are a great proxy for our emotional yo-yo mind. Even more, our physical responses often precede our emotional ones when they are still at the subconscious level, which is the most frequent one.
a: During acute stress generating fear, anger, hostility, and anxiety, the release of stress hormones will affect your body-mind immediately, such as physical restlessness, fast breathing, tachycardia, sweating, tremor, gastrointestinal issues, headache, muscle pain, stiff neck, cognitive/ focusing impairment, etc.. They are called psychosomatic disorders.
b: During chronic stress producing ongoing subtle emotional negativities such as anxiety, doubt, regret, guilt, and worry, the body's responses are more subtle but still present.
Learning body scanning is a very effective tool to read your body. By doing so, you will be able to watch what is going on in your mind. Persistent physical issues will require medical attention.
2. Mindfully watching your mind under stress:
Stressors are affecting our minds mostly subconsciously, especially when they are subtle and chronic.
When the body is sending a signal, it is time to watch and dig into the mind, especially the restless one.
A primary mind-training tool is mindfulness practice, during which you learn to watch your mind, allowing you to tame its wildness. This is what we do during meditation.
Bring your non-judgmental, non-decisional attention to anchor your restless mind, such as using breathing during meditation.
Then, when you are becoming aware of negative thoughts/feelings, such as stress-generated anxiety, accept it w/o resisting. “ I have anxiety”.
With practice, you will enhance your tolerance to your negativities and achieve better control of them. This is called “taming the monkey mind” in Zen literature.
3 Practicing Metta or Loving kindness:
Under stress, and along with mindfulness comes the tool of training your “heart “ to be more open and compassionate to others, including to ourselves.
Practicing compassion, and loving-kindness called Metta to self, and mostly to others, draws you out of yourself as being a victim, and reminds you to better control your stress-related societal behavior.
When you feel the powerful force of stress squeezing you down and drawing you into yourself,
The practice of self-compassion and compassion to others can be of great help.
Remember that compassion is a fundamental tool carrying acceptance rather than resistance to stressors. You will then look around you and get a larger and more rational perspective of what events, people, and life are all about.
It is unrealistic to expect a stress-free life, but there is a real possibility that you could transform the way you are dealing with it using this triple approach. “ I have stress, and it is Okay.” Thanks
