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Katherine Marr

~ MA, CCC, RP, E-RYT

Katherine Marr

Monthly Archives: June 2015

Sharing a Poem: Why I Meditate

07 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by katherinemarr in Uncategorized

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IMG_5039 - Version 2It has been a while since I have written. Sometimes, the best way to overcome a form of writer’s block is to share the words of others.

Meditation and Pranayama have become a daily part of my life. Each day, my reasons for practicing and my perspective on the experience change. Here is a poem by Wes Niskar, apparently inspired by Allen Ginsberg,  that was once shared with me by one of my teachers/ mentors.

Thank you for reading.

Why I Meditate

I meditate because I suffer

I suffer, therefore, I am

I am, therefore, I meditate

I meditate because there are so many other things to do

I meditate because, when I was young, it was all the rage

I meditate because of Siddhartha Gautama, Bodhiharma, Marco Polo, the British Raj, Carl Young, Alan Watts, Allen Ginsberg, Alfred E. Newman, et al

I meditate because evolution gave me a big brain, but it didn’t come with an instruction manual

I meditate because I have all the information I need

I meditate because I want to touch deep time, where the history of humanity can be seen as just an evolutionary adjustment period

I meditate because life is too short, and sitting slows it down

I meditate because life is too long, and I need an occasional break

I meditate because I want to experience the world as Rumi does, or Walt Whitman or Mary Oliver

I meditate because now I know that enlightenment doesn’t exist

So I can relax

I meditate because of the Dalai Lama’s laugh

I meditate because there are too many advertisements in my head

And I’m erasing all but the very best of them

I meditate because I have discovered that my mind is a great toy and fun to play with

I meditate because I want to remember that I am perfectly human

Sometimes I meditate because my heart is breaking

Sometimes I meditate so that my heart will break

I meditate because a Vedanta master once told me that in Hindi my name “niskar” means non-doer

I meditate because I am growing old and want to become comfortable with emptiness

I meditate because Robert Thurman calls it an evolutionary sport

And I want to be on the home team

I meditate because I am composed of a hundred trillion cells, and from time to time

I need to reassure them that we’re all in this together

I meditate because it’s such a relief to spend time ignoring myself

I meditate because my country spends more money on weapons than all the other nations in the world combined

If I had more courage, I would probably immolate myself

I meditate because I want to discover the fifth Brahma Vihara, the divine Abode of Ah

And then I’ll go down in history as a great spiritual abbot

I meditate because I am building myself a bigger and better perspective

And occasionally I need to add a new window.

Wes Nisker

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Every moment of every day presents us with opportunities to practice being present, speaking truth, listening, letting go, grounding, observing, paying attention to what is and what isn’t happening inside and all around us.

I am interested in all the beautiful complexities that make a person whole. I can only offer what I know. The rest I still have to learn.

 

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