Posted: November 9, 2022

I recently completed 900 consecutive days of meditation. And on day 901, I didn’t feel like meditating.

If you’ve been following along on this journey, you know that I use Insight Timer, which has a built in tracking feature. It tracks all types of stats. If it didn’t, I would have no idea that I had crossed this threshold. Although I started out seeing if I could make it 40 consecutive days, the number has never been the goal. As with most things I do of this nature, it started out as an experiment, an exploration, a what if? What would happen if…and here I am more than two years later.

In my last reflection or maybe on my meditation moments Instagram, I said that I never even consider skipping a day because it has become such a valuable part of my day. Imagine my surprise then, on day 901, when I did want to skip it. It wasn’t because I didn’t have time or space in my day, or I forgot, or did something else. I simply didn’t feel like doing it. I was slow to get out of bed, which is not that unusual for me, as anyone who has ever had me as a houseguest can attest to. It takes me a while to become human every morning. I get really deep into the dream world at night and it takes me a while to collect myself. Day 901 was one of those mornings. Plus I had some heavier personal stuff weighing on my heart, which added to my lethargy. So, I considered skipping it, truly.

Then I took a moment and thought, what’s really going on here? (This is a question I ask myself quite a lot.) It wasn’t laziness, or disinterest, it was resistance. Now, if I hadn’t had literally decades of awareness practice under my belt, I don’t know if I would have noticed this because it was extremely subtle, but I did. (My meditation practice, which is an awareness practice, of course helped too.)

Noticing this resistance was both easy and hard. I didn’t want to sit with the heaviness I was feeling. I was having resistance to what was truly present, mostly fear of the unknown. Once I figured this out, I made a conscious choice to get on my cushion anyways. I made a loving choice towards myself. I decided to be with myself, to listen to myself, hold space for myself and what was really going on.

Now you might have two questions at this point (or more). One, who has time go through a long awareness process like that? And two, why are you telling us this?

The first is easy, the whole back and forth with myself from noticing to sitting was less than two minutes. Awareness is a muscle. The more you use it, the more you can call it into action when needed. Of course situations vary, and yes, sometimes it takes a long time, and sometimes it doesn’t. As you get to know yourself through inner evolution and discovery, you will begin to know your own inner language and cadences. Sometimes you’ll need a longer exploration, sometimes you’ll just know, and everything in between. This part is about holding space for yourself, whatever that looks like.

The second, is twofold. I’m sharing this because I think at some point with whatever we are doing, we reach this point. Gay Hendricks calls it the “upper limit” in his book The Big Leap. Some call it up-leveling, some call it the next landing on the staircase, etc. We all reach this point. I might even venture to say it is inevitable in a growth process. It’s that point where we feel like we have reached the top of our ability, or belief system, we have reached our ceiling, consciously or unconsciously. It feels like we’re done or we want to quit even if we don’t know why. What we do when this moment arrives makes all the difference, noticing it makes all the difference. The second part is because I think it is important to highlight the learning here. No matter how practiced we are at something or how good our habit process is, there is always something more to learn. We are all always beginners. It is our choice to stay open to it, show ourselves compassion and kindness, and progress once again as a beginner. I think this applies no matter the topic or activity. Resistance is (can be) a facet of learning and practicing. Sometimes it is a redirect, sometimes it’s a challenge, and sometimes it’s a reminder. Only you can know what it is for you, but first we have to slow down (or get still, or quiet) enough to notice it.

Ways My Practice Has Changed Lately:

- I find myself sitting longer naturally. My timer is still set for 10 minutes. Insight Timer has this wonderful feature where you can “add time” at the end of your sit if you stay longer than your timer time. I find myself using this more and more. If I have the time and space, I sit until I feel complete.

- I’ve been doing a few guided meditations in addition to my morning silent sits. I find this is a nice way to check in at various times through the day when I feel called and have space.

- Pranayama (breath work) floats in and out as needed. In the morning, I find that when I am not doing a specific practice, different pranayama will float in as I need it.

- Formal practices come and go. I find myself doing formal practices of various types until they no longer serve me. Sometimes they will come back in, but mostly practices seem to have a reason or season for me.

- Making my morning practice a priority helps me to connect with my needs and make myself a priority in my life.

Author’s Note:

For me, right now, staying committed to my practice works for me. However, I always reserve the right to allow that to change as needed, and I invite you to allow your practice to change as well.

I am really intrigued by an idea that the writer/teacher/explorer of spirituality, Danielle Laporte has spoken about in her podcast and in her writings. She suggests taking a break from all practices, especially if you have a long term practice. The idea is that we can become attached and dependent on our practices in a way that can hinder or alter our growth (I’m paraphrasing here). It’s an interesting concept, especially from the yogic perspective of Aparigraha or non-attachment. My interpretation of what she says is that we can become fixated on the practices or the outside guidance instead of being in and with the experience in the moment. The experience of being ourselves in the moment. She also says, see who you are without your practices. Interesting question, huh? Perhaps a future experiment!

Fun Fact: I was having a tech free afternoon when this I decided to write this post, so the original draft was done with my old favorites, pen and paper. :)