Wait… wrong Nirvana… heh.
We all have things we are not happy about. We all want things we don’t have. We all want to be some way that we are not right now. There is no simple One Quick Fix, regardless of what those big haired women on QVC may be telling you. Or Dr Oz… don’t even get me started on that kook. That foot bath, yeah, it isn’t going to fix your life, neither is a pair of knock off earrings that will turn green, but you might be pissed when you get your credit card bill because you wish you had more self control, lol. Well guess what? You might start discovering that self control if you just try this tiny little thing. No one will even know you’re doing it!
de·sire
dəˈzī(ə)r/
noun
a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.
verb
strongly wish for or want (something).
nir·va·na
nərˈvänə,nirˈvänə/
noun
(in Buddhism) a transcendent state in which there is neither suffering, desire, nor sense of self, and the subject is released from the effects of karma and the cycle of death and rebirth. It represents the final goal of Buddhism.
I have a lot in my life to be hurt, sad, unhappy, and mournful over. Like, a lot. Eventually I’m sure I’ll end up waxing poetic on that, but it won’t be right now. So what do you do in those moments when you are sitting at the kitchen table, forehead resting on the heels of your hands, trying to figure out what to do with no end in sight? I don’t know. But as soon as I figure out how to erase all of my problems, you will be the first to know how I did it.
I know it sounds dumb, but try this…
- First, identify three things you can see. See them. Notice them. See their texture, their solidness (or not solidness depending what you see), the colors, the shapes. SEE them.
- Next, identify three things you can feel, tactile sensation, not emotion. Are you sitting? Feel the chair on your skin, pressing your muscles, feel the cushion or the texture if it’s a hard chair, feel how elevated you are from the floor. Does the chair have arms? Can you feel the fabric, wood, or metal?
- Then, find three things you can hear. Where are you? Right this moment I can hear typing, I can hear birds singing from the nature sounds machine I have, I can also hear a heater running.
- Now identify three things you can taste. I can taste my mouth. Yes, your mouth has a flavor, if you’ve never noticed, these mindfulness exercises are for you. I can taste my coffee as it swirls through my mouth and down my throat. I can also taste the air the plants next to me are making. It’s quite clean.
- What can you smell? Try, we tend to be desensitized to the scents constantly around us. I am in my attic room, so I smell years of dust in the little cracks of things, I smell heat from the heater, I can also, unfortunately, smell dead plant pieces in my trash can. I should probably take care of that…
Congrats. You are now in the here and now. Not always an easy achievement for some of us!
Now that you’ve hopefully done that and you feel pretty aware and grounded in your surroundings, get comfortable. I do not mean to run out and buy a new wardrobe of bedclothes, lol. I mean be in a position that is comfortable for your body to be able to relax. Now your breath.
The definitions above are a perfectly good starting point to understand those words. And, of course, feel free to think of them however you want. We are going to first take 3 (or however many you want, I like it to be multiples of either 3 or 7) nice, clean, big, deep, slow breaths. Feel that air hit the very bottom of your lungs and notice how clean and good that feels. As you exhale, know that you are releasing the parts your body has no use for, you are now just left with good, clean oxygen to fuel your body and mind. Now exhale in the same fashion, all the way. Empty those lungs. And repeat for however many times you feel is good for you.
At this point, let’s consider desire. There are no “wrong answers” while you consider what it is you desire. Maybe you want love, money, happiness, a new couch, I don’t know. Concentrate on that desire as you breathe in, just as described previously. A nice, clean, big, deep breath that fills your lungs. Then suck in just a bit more. Now those desires are in you. You are focusing on them, they have your full attention.
Let’s look at exhaling nirvana now. A very short and simplified way to explain nirvana is the absence of suffering, desire, or sense of self, as the definition above states.If you are more familiar with the idea of Heaven, use that, without the part involving death to get there :). On your exhale, this is what you need to think, to feel. You have just taken this desire into yourself, now send it out and give yourself a tiny sliver of nirvana by imagining that desire leaving with your breath. You are exhaling Nirvana/heaven. It comes from you. It was in that breath contained in your lungs. Now think about that a minute. You have a perfect being inside you, you just have to figure out how to bypass that darned brain to access it. Use your breath.
Do that as many times as you like, as often as you like. I know it sounds pretty silly, but it does help. This is an incredibly basic way to explain how to do this, but if you decide you want to know more, look toward Buddhism and/or mindfulness, as this is from there.
Happy breathing 🙂
Til Next Time…
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