Meditation and Aging

I was in a department store a while back, flipping through the winter coats and getting bored and overheated when I caught my reflection in the mirror at the end of the aisle. It stopped me for a moment, and as I stood there staring at myself, turning my head from side to side and recognizing the... Read More

Becoming a Better Listener

One afternoon, years ago, I was on the back porch of a friend's house, listening to him discuss his awful day at work, when I suddenly realized that I wasn't actually listening to him. I was just waiting for my chance to speak. I had advice to give him, and if he'd have shut up long enough, he'd ... Read More

How Long and How Often?

The first time I tried to meditate I'd been assigned fifteen minutes of walking meditation and fifteen minutes of sitting meditation by the monk who was leading a retreat I'd joined at a Buddhist monastery in northern Thailand. Fifteen minutes. I managed about two before I exploded. It was imposs... Read More

Why Meditate?

Renowned meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg once said, "We don't meditate to get better at meditating. We meditate to get better at life." To be honest, I couldn't say it better. I didn't understand this early on. My first experience with meditation was a silent retreat in Thailand I decided to a... Read More

So, Just What Are We Doing?

We've heard about it, right? It's in the lexicon. Over the past few decades, it's gained momentum in the cultural ether in which we all swim. We've maybe read a few articles or watched a few videos about it. Maybe we've even tried it. But what, really, is meditation? Put simply, it us, sitting wi... Read More