Rev. Christie Bates (She/Her/Hers)

When people get into trouble with meditation, it's usually because they are practicing without knowledgeable support. Ideally, your practice of meditation leaves you feeling more connected to life and your own experience. But sometimes, people think they are meditating when they are just dissociating, and that is the very opposite of improving your connection to yourself and your life. Additionally, sometimes people will push themselves to go into difficult material (past traumas and such) without support, and in the process re-traumatize themselves. But when there is appropriate support - from a meditation facilitator, spiritual director or contemplative therapist - you can get knowledgeable guidance and a safe place to ask questions and share experience.

Sometimes, the quickest way to feel better about something is to allow yourself not to like it. I'm not sure if you like your job but struggle with transitions, or if you really dislike your job. But either way, giving yourself full permission to hate Monday mornings can even bring some humor to it - but it doesn't have to! If you happen to have a job you don't enjoy, it's easy to feel guilty for not liking it, because so many people don't have a job, or because there are things about it you appreciate. But if you can lift your requirement that you have to feel good about it, then you can just put one foot in front of the other and do what you need to do. You're allowed to respect yourself for overcoming the power of your preferences to take care of yourself and your loved ones. And if it's not an option to change your job - for whatever reason - just be sure you are spending a few hours a week doing something that you do enjoy, so that you can occasionally remind yourself that the work is supporting the parts of your life you DO like.

When we are particularly in touch with chaos, we can take refuge in three things - an orienting value, learning and practicing in accordance with that value, and community with people who also practice that value. While we can have more than one core value, it's good in times of stress to distill them all down to one that gives you a home base in the swirling world. So, we identify what is important to us that transcends circumstance. One of my daughters has a t-shirt that says, "Kindness over everything." That is a reflection of what matters most to her, no matter what else is going on. For you, it may be living fully awake, or truthfulness, or service to others. Whatever it is that you can commit to - maybe you try one out for a week or a month at a time - that becomes a refuge during that time. And then the other two legs of your stabilizing three-legged stool are active practice/learning about your orienting value and finding others who can support you in living your values. This is certainly not the only way, but it is a way to move through life that allows you to embody the best of being human no matter what.