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ShareIn the middle of a particularly difficult week, I was looking for comfort and solace. All I needed was for someone to tell me everything is going to be okay. So I called my meditation teacher.
"Guruji, I'm feeling stressed out. It's all getting to me," I said, well aware that he has lost count of how many times a similar phone call came from me.
"What happened, Susie?" he asked, in the same comforting manner, like he does every single time. (He calls me Susie. I've never asked him why.) "It all seems too overwhelming. I don't think I can handle it all. I feel like I'm crumbling," I said. Then he asked me a few questions about my daily routine and came up with an instant solution.
"Every afternoon, after lunch, take a walk outside the office. Take small, slow steps. Don't walk like you're in a hurry to go somewhere. Focus on your breath as you walk. Concentrate on every step you take," he said.
The trick, he explained, is to ensure that the thoughts are focused on the walking and not on the problem inside the office waiting to be solved. I thought this would be a cakewalk.
And so diligently, the first afternoon I stepped out to apply this new stress-relief strategy. I found that it almost hurt to walk slowly. My mind had been racing with the things-to-do list all morning. I couldn't slow it down, nor could I slow down my pace of walking. I realised that to be able to walk slowly, I needed to also calm my mind first.
Later that evening, I picked up the August edition of the Spiritual Link, published by the Science of the Soul Research Centre. It had a chapter on the 'So far I'm okay' mantra. Our spiritual development is not a race; it is a gentle unfolding of infinite beauty, the book said.
At each step of the way, we should pause and reflect, "So far I'm okay." This mantra gives you the strength to take one more step. Our approach to meditation should be similar too.
For most of us, to sit in meditation is not the problem; it's the two-and-a-half-hour wait for it to finish that's the real drag. We perhaps don't realise that taking it one step at a time makes it easy, effortless and uses lesser energy.
As for the post-lunch walk, I'm still practising.
