birth meditation April 2, 2008
A lovely friend of mine invited me to go to her Zen temple with her one Sunday morning, which I of course thought was a lovely idea. Quite time alone to just breathe, no children jumping all over me, great! Sunny late spring, the perfect day. I throughly enjoy my adult conversation time while driving, drinking in every moment of it along with the magic sunshine, after a long cold winter. We arrive to the temple and stop outside to enjoy the fragrant blossoms and colors dancing around the grounds like sparkling jewels. I am ripely pregnant feeling the magic web of life flowing freely through me. My heart open and joyful.
We enter the temple doors, greeted by lay buddhists very seriously clasping their hands together at their chests. I have been in numerous Zen temples before, ashrams and Tibetan monasteries in India, feeling proud that I know this routine. Feeling as though I am one of the elite, a knower in my own right. I know how to do this, I know what to do in a temple. I formally learned meditation, almost a decade ago. Barefooted we bough and shuffle to the right, enter the shrine room and sit on our cousins. My friend looks over to me and smiles, then begins her before group practice, meditation session. So I follow along, imitating my guide. Truth be told, I haven’t meditated in a very long time. I could count nursing two children for fours years as meditation, but sitting thoughtless-No. But nevertheless, sitting and breathing always a welcome break.
It’s been 10 minutes and we are still sitting cross legged on our mats. I can feel people coming in the room, clearing their throats, shuffling around to find a mat, breeze blowing through the windows stopping with the standing bodies. !0 minutes is a long time to sit when you are rusty.
My legs completely numb and my round belly to integrating to not stroke. Thinking about this baby, who are you, what do you look like, what will your cry sound like, what is your journey here about, will you be a boy or girl……….
10 more minutes, now I hear the bell. Formal meditation just began. I rearrange myself, uncross my legs, and cross them the other way. I last about 3 minutes in my meditation, and my mind drifts off to hear the fans over head, squeeking squeeking squeeking…. wondering how anyone else could possiably meditate will all this noise squeek squeek squeek…… I seem to become more uncomfortable with each noise, each sound. My whole body feels numb, now thinking that their must be some verse somewhere in some scripture, some sutra, some sura…..something about pregnant women not meditating in this position. This must be why it’s a monastic culture, trying to rationalize my own uncomfortablity to my self in my own mind with a little bit of grasping humor. I hear that voice, the one about sitting in your uncomfortability, (which I literally was) not trying to escape it, but relating to it the best you know how, not making it your enemy. I remember clearly when this voice was clear, during giving birth to my son and daughter. That was a completely uncomfortable time physically, but i was tender and present. Surely the most present time of my life was during labour, giving birth and the week following.