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Why I Meditate: Karen

When & where did you begin to meditate?

I remember a summer evening in my living room, the double windows wide open, I played one of my favourite songs, Time by Hans Zimmer and I felt compelled to do nothing else but to listen, eyes closed, laid on the cold floor. When the song finished, it felt short-lived. I closed my laptop playing the song, sat down on the floor and stayed in silence and stillness for about 20 minutes. I enjoyed it a lot; I was 20 then and it seemed quite unconventional. I had this inner whisper reminding me that I usually would be watching TV or going out with friends at this time. 

After such a beautiful encounter with meditation, one might think that was it. Love struck by mindfulness, I ever since bathed in the present moment. In reality, it seemed to require a lot of effort to do it back then. In hindsight I now know it was space I was lacking, not time or effort. Sporadically, I lived these delightful moments of solo-presence only a few times a year, for many years. 

It is beautiful to reflect, 10+ years later, that the "solo-presence", or “only a few times a year” I describe is what Advaita Vedanta calls "glimpsing." The philosophy teaches that "oneness" is always there, but we habitually see ourselves as separate. Meditation is the tool that turns those rare delightful moments into a natural state.

Why did you take up a regular practice? What was the spark?

The spark was optimisation. My friends and peers know me to be a time-maximiser. It was before starting a new employment, I had a couple of weeks free and used the opportunity to assess where I was at, in terms of habits. 

From this, I decided to try some new, so-called “healthy habits”. Running and seated meditation were on my rough paper self-made habit tracker for 10 days. I didn’t put a time constraint on them, even if I would sit for a 5-min meditation session or put my shoes on for a 10-min jog, I’d tick away the box. Running didn’t stick, I enjoyed it but not as a daily activity. Meditation, on the other hand, made a lot of sense to me. Before I knew it, I was two weeks in my new role and still meditating a few minutes everyday.

The year of my 30th, I tracked my habits at a granular level. Meditation was one of the habits I was monitoring. I didn’t meditate everyday that year, but I did meditate more than 37 hours across 194 days, which is about 11 minutes every other day. I don’t know what’s more impressive, my dedication to the practice or to carry on such a rigorous tracking for 365 days (let me reassure you, it wasn’t paper and pen based anymore!).

At the end of the day, I believe it doesn’t matter why we start to meditate, what brings us back to it years later after a break, what matters is starting. What matters is remembering. What matters is coming back to it. And that’s often the hardest part of it all. That’s why having space and surrounding ourselves with mindful ecosystems is crucial. 

What were your early experiences?

In a nutshell, lonely and challenging, yet I remained curious and fascinated by it, even though I kept on forgetting it existed.

It was a lonely interest. It seemed as if, as soon as the word “meditation” would go for a walk out of my lips, it would curse the person in front of me to instantly have remorse, a sort of disinterested guilt. They would sing the praises of meditation, and how they should do it too, and proceed to engage nowhere further. They didn’t want to try it or look into it more deeply. I didn’t know anyone who meditated, for years, for almost the first ten years actually.

Remembering was another struggle. Like any habit, I found it hard to maintain it. Unlike a sport-habit, where it felt easy for me to join a boxing club and being reminded to go to the club by my digital calendar, the friends I had met there, and my monthly direct debit, there was no such thing for meditation.
It solely relied on my self discipline. It’s such a flexible practice, free of literally everything, that it is very tempting to cancel it every time something social comes up or when the mood isn’t here for it.

Again, years later it’s fascinating to see how I used to see it, because there is no mood required to meditate, yet I really understand what I meant then. It’s a real challenge. 

What has been your experience as a member of SoM?

At first, I thought I was investing time and money to add a new skill to my belt. You know, time-optimiser type of thinking. My rational mind deliberated; this will help me sustain a habit I knew made me a sharper, wiser, calmer. But the real value to joining the School of Meditation was having access to an ever growing community of people who meditate. People older than me I could meet for a one-to-one 30min online chat, anytime I had a blocker in my practice, a “silly question” that actually they made me realise was never silly. People from different horizons and backgrounds than me, facing different blockers, parents with tight schedules that would really broaden my perspective on time, energy and space management. People in appearance completely different from me, whom we would have probably never met if it weren’t for this yellow door, with whom I could talk about the human mind, how it is to be with oneself, feeling one with the world around us. 

My membership with SoM has taken many shapes throughout the past three years. I came to the Wednesday 11am free sessions before becoming a member. Then joined a weekly-group meeting them for six months every Tuesday or so, that was a fantastic way to anchor my weeks. Then I moved to South London and joined the 7am or 12pm online zoom sessions sometimes, and then I paused for a while. I would attend only the day-retreats, or the end of year party. Last year I also attended a weekend-away retreat to Worth (in Sussex) which was very refreshing and insightful. 

Now I’ve joined a weekly group again and come to the school every Thursday evening. I’m on term two. Now let me say if you’re not familiar with how it works, that this is a fabulous structure. Once the meditation course is completed, it isn’t the end goal, it isn’t the certification of “I know how to meditate now”. It is the beginning of applying the technique learnt during the course. Meditation is actually a tool to understand and apply the Advaita Vedanta philosophy, which has been passed on here for some 60+ years ago and we get to keep it alive by learning it ourselves. There are terms, and weeks, and the longer we study the teachings, the further we go in our understanding of oneself and the world. I’m so pleased to have re-joined a group with a fresh perspective on the school and its community.

Getting to discuss “being a human” and practice being present with people from all walks once a week is something invaluable. 

There is no strong commitment which makes it very adaptable and at least I know every Thursday evening my dinner is sorted as I eat with the group at the School’s kitchen. 

In summary, my experience as a SoM member has been very diverse and I’m excited to see how it evolves in the years to come.

How does meditation affect your everyday life?

Here's an analogy: every time I enter the kitchen, the sink is empty and a couple of clean dishes are resting on the rack next to it.

When I don’t meditate, clean dishes are on the rack too, but the sink’s got items in it left to soak, items on the left side that I just used and items on the right side which have now dried up and will need extra work to clean. The sponges are damp and I’m unable to clean what is inside the sink before emptying the rack. Shall I put the older dishes to soak first? I don’t know where to start, even the thought of breaking it down in a to-do list isn’t providing any relief.

The dishes are my thoughts, the kitchen my mind, and I’d rather have a clean and clear space to operate from.

Meditation brings me clarity, creativity, patience, emotional intelligence, and self awareness. 

It aligns perfectly with the mindset I cultivate through boxing. The intersection between the boxing ring and the meditation cushion (or chair!) is real. In both spaces, we’re essentially training to remain "unshaken" while the world (or an opponent) is moving at high speed. My boxing coach at West London Boxing Academy, Gus, always told me to cultivate the three Cs. Because being a good boxer is to have stamina, footwork, etc, being a great boxer and overall human being is to be Cool, Calm, and Collected. 

In the context of the School of Meditation, these three Cs are kind of the results of what Advaita calls Sthitaprajna, a Sanskrit term for someone who is "steady in wisdom" and remains the same in victory or defeat.

I’ve seen professional boxers at my gym meditate as part of their training, so for me that bridge isn’t far-fetched. Meditation is for the person in the ring, sweating, facing their fears, and needing "sharper awareness." If it works well for boxers, chances are quite high it works for everyday stressful situations, in my experience a few things are more demanding than a 3-minute round.