Как медитация помогает пережить резкие перепады эмоций в жизни

Do you like rollercoasters? How about the kind with a loop-the-loop? Is the physical sensation all thrilling, pure terror, or equally exciting and scary? We can choose whether or not to get on a theme park rollercoaster, but we can’t really get off the rollercoaster of everyday life. And unlike the ride, we can’t always see the next big loop or drop coming in real life. The Buddha called the path of meditation and mindfulness the “Middle Way” not because it encourages apathy or detachment from the world, but because it enables practitioners to neither crave nor avoid the ups and downs while staying intimately connected to the world. This week I got to ride life’s rollercoaster with mindfulness as my seat mate. Our family had to abruptly pivot from joyfully honoring our son’s college graduation to handling a medical emergency during the return trip from the celebration. For the former, being in the present moment meant being filled with happiness for my son’s joy and satisfaction in finishing his BFA. I was delighted to see his accomplishment with fresh eyes. It meant cherishing the fellowship of our entire family being together. Then suddenly, my father-in-law was hospitalized for a heart episode during a flight layover, and I was at the same time visiting another elder family member struggling to face the prospect of his own decline. The juxtaposition was intense. Being in the present moment meant directly engaging the greatest fears we face: old age, sickness, and death. These, the Buddha saw, underlie much of our psychological and physical suffering, and require skillful means to navigate gracefully. I needed both the deep insight that everything and everyone changes and the ability to pause, breathe, and look clearly at this moment, the one we are faced with right now. Without those tools, it would have been so easy to resent the whiplash of going from happiness to concern so quickly. The worry for my father-in-law could have swamped the happiness for my son. Our trip could have been “ruined.” But because I have regularly meditated on the unpredictable but inevitable fragility of our lives, I found myself being able to hold both. This is, yet again, aspiring to “see the world as it is,” full of joy and sorrow that do not cancel each other, but which together illuminate the rich and changing nature of our human existence. Additionally, cultivating joy for my son’s graduation and our family reunion helped fill the reservoir of “enoughness” with the world. That capacity helped me to compassionately see my other relative’s fears for his future with less frustration, easing my own anxieties about the difficulties I may have helping him. I am grateful that my father-in-law is recovering and everyone is now home safely. I’m equally excited for my son and the next chapter of his life. I am also so happy to be confident that when it gets real, these practices can indeed help me ride the rollercoaster of big feelings without screaming to get off.