This Is Why I Meditate

To once in a while embrace the spirit of free creation. Not confined by any rules. Not bringing it down to the concept of work. Not writing for any reason other than pleasing myself — whatever and wherever this Self is.

My hand may become shaky and my eyes wet in those moments. That’s great. That tells me that I still work in order to live — and not live in order to work.

It becomes more and more difficult for me to do things without the notion of usefulness in mind. Even when I write freely, like now, there is still the idea of “I am doing this to keep my creativity rolling and honing the skill that will help me be a more popular writer on Medium”. Even when I read a book for pleasure, the idea of what it does to my brain and how it shapes my personality is always present in the back of my head.

It is important for me to notice this happening, as I see it as a reflection of a much bigger trend in our culture. We are losing the capacity to live just for the sake of living. Our looking for purpose behind everything is turning into a disease which clutters our minds and stands in the way to experience the simple joy of being alive.

And I think that this simple joy of being alive is an essential ingredient. That’s why it bothers me so much that I seem to be losing it.

Not losing it. I believe that the ability to experience Joy is always in me. But it seems that the culture I am immersed in is training me against that Joy. My mind is being trained for something else entirely, almost the polar opposite.

I am being trained to be conditional. I can only be joyful provided that A and B happens.

I am trained to feel unworthy by default. To create my own sense of worth, I need to do/buy/achieve the A and B.

Hence, I am trained to always strive for something I don’t have. If I am not upgrading my life — materially or mentally — that means that I am stuck.

I don’t want myself to be trained like that. This kind of training doesn’t help me to live in peace and wisdom. Recognising that, I need to organise a productive counter-training for myself. No matter what it takes.

This is why I meditate. This is why I spend time with myself. This is why I get inspired by my teenage self, who knew exactly what true inspiration feels like and what it means to do something for the pure pleasure of doing it.

The only thing that makes life worth living is trying to see things as they already are. Trying to experience all the misery and anger and excitement as mental constructs — not as the objective reality. Trying to grasp the difference between what life really is, and what we make of it.

I am trying — and even if or when I don’t succeed, I know it was worth it.