Category: Experience

I’m no master meditator. How do I know this? I’m still trying to figure out “what I’m supposed to get out of it.” Experienced folks will likely tell you that mine is the wrong attitude. They are probably right. The quote below contrasts the mindful awareness approach against a less-known “centering prayer” method.

But there is one very significant difference. In classic awareness meditation, the watcher would stay keenly tuned to the passing parade overhead, watching each boat as it emerged into view, sent its wake rippling through the waters, and then passed out of sight. But in Centering Prayer the diver simply wakes up to discover that somehow he’s managed to sleepwalk into the hold of one of those boats; at which point he simply climbs off and swims back down to his rock. There is no requirement for sustained observing consciousness, merely for prompt action when one discovers oneself “caught out”.

Because in most schools mediation is seen as virtually synonymous with clarity of mind and a strong “I am here” presence, it is to the considerable horror of some practitioners on these more traditional paths that Centering Prayer seems to go sailing right past these core prerequisites for either single-pointed attention or a sustained witnessing presence. Christian Mediation’s founding father, John Main, echoes the traditional wisdom when he insists that it is absolutely essential to keep saying the mantra as a touchstone for attention. To fail to do so, he says, leads to a state that he calls “pernicious peace.” In attempting to describe this state, he, too, is drawn to the metaphor of boats on a river. As he sees it, meditation is something like rowing a boat across a river; the goal is to get to the other side. Partway across the river, the midday sun may feel warm and gentle, and the temptation is strong to pull in the oars and bask in the sun. While the consequent experience is pleasurable, the net result is that you simply float downstream. Getting to the other side requires that you keep pulling steadily on the oar, which for Main means the steady repetition of mantra.

Bourgeault, Cynthia. Centering prayer and Inner awakening, pp. 114-155. Cowley Publishing, 2004.

Frequently I catch myself concluding that a given personality trait is predictive of another.  For example, that people who are outgoing are also domineering or that people who are shy are also unkind– you get the idea.  Though I’m aware that these can only be proved through rigorous statistical investigation, unconsciously I use these poorly supported judgements to influence my valuations of people.  It seems to be a human tendency to detect such relationships from stories, usually comprised of only a few characters but each with a wide breadth of personality traits.  In his book Once upon a number, John Allen Paulos explains why we often make this mistake:

Stories and statistics offer us the complementary choices of knowing a lot about a few people or knowing a little about many people.  The first option leads to the common observation that novels illuminate great truths of the human condition.  Novels are multivalent and bursting with ironies, details, and metaphors, while social science and demographic statistics can seem simple-minded and repellingly earnest by comparison.  We can easily delude ourselves, however, into thinking that more of a general nature is being revealed to us by a memoir, personal reminiscence, novel or short story than is truly the case.  Biased and small samples are always major problems, of course, but my caveat arises from something more specific: the technical, uneuphonic statistical notion of an adjusted multiple correlation coefficient.

If the number of  traits considered is large compared to the number of people being surveyed, there will appear to  be more of a relationship among the traits than actually obtains.

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Whenever the number of characteristics is a significant fraction of the number of people, the so-called multiple correlation among the characteristics will suggest spurious associations.

To tell us something useful, multiple correlation analysis must be based on a relatively large number of people and a much smaller number of characteristics.  Yet the insights that come from stories and everyday life are precisely the opposite.  We each know, in a full-bodied way relatively few people, and for these people the number of characteristics, relationships, characteristics of relationships, relationships of characteristics and so on that we are aware of is indeterminately large.  Thus we tend to overestimate our general knowledge of others and are convinced of all sorts of associations that are simply bogus.  By failing to adjust downward our multiple correlation coefficients, so to speak, we convince ourselves that we know all manner of stuff that just isn’t so.

Paulos, John Allen, Once upon a number: the hidden mathematical logic of stories. Basic Books (1998),  pp. 26-37.

Well, let’s see… Perpetual distractions prevented my progress on a late project that I am not at all interested in.  And yes, I would like some cheese with my whine.  Perhaps a nice gouda.

  Definitely worth the 80 foot climb.

Saw this a block from my usual parking spot in Wallingford a few days ago.  What we can learn from this: 1) one should run one’s locking  cable, or U-bar, through the frame of one’s bike, not just through the seat loops, 2) locking one’s bike in plain view of an I-5 freeway on-ramp might not be the smartest move ever. 

Even if these suggestions had been heeded, if his desire is strong enough, a thief will find a way to steal a bike, no matter what security measures the owner takes.