How to Train a Wild Elephant_ And Other Adventures in Mindfulness - Jan Chozen Bays [57]
Each person has different sensations in the body that signal “anxiety is arising in me.” The heart may speed up, breathing becomes more shallow, the stomach tenses up, armpits tingle, then a leg starts to jiggle. Each person has different thoughts that accompany anxiety. “I’m failing, again.” “He’s going to leave me.” “This is a hopeless situation.” “I’m getting sick, and I’m going to die from this.”
People who are able to recognize and then observe episodes of anxiety within themselves begin to see patterns, certain types of events or situations that are the seed from which anxiety quickly grows. Often these seeds were planted in childhood. One man whose brother choked him almost to death in childhood play became aware of anxiety arising whenever he wears tight collars or turtleneck sweaters.
DEEPER LESSONS
Anxiety is a manifestation of what the Buddha called “personality view,” the notion that I am a separate and lonely self that is threatened on all sides by the “other.” It is very important to learn to recognize anxiety in its earliest manifestations, and to develop tools to dispel it. Deep breathing is a powerful antidote.
We need to look to the bottom of anxiety in order to see through it clearly. Anxiety is always accompanied by thoughts, though these thoughts may be a form of inner talk that is too subtle to detect at first. Thoughts always refer to the past or the future, even the past a split second ago or a future a split second from now. When the mind rests in the present, we are not thinking. We are just experiencing. Even when the event is dangerous, such as a car accident, we are just experiencing it as it occurs, often vividly and in slow motion. The fear and anxiety come later. “I hit a patch of ice and skidded. I could have been killed. My kids would have been orphans! What if it happens again?” Thoughts can both give rise to anxiety and also escalate it. When we are driving and thinking anxious thoughts, we are not “just driving.” We know that talking on the telephone while driving is not safe. What about talking on the inner telephone?
For most of our lives, we exist in one of two states: either upright, alert, and anxious (when we’re awake); or horizontal, relaxed, and at ease (when we’re sleeping). In meditation we are combining the best of these two states of being, moving toward a state in which the mind is calm but alert, the body is upright but relaxed, and the heart is open but strong.
As we see anxiety creep in, we become aware—“Oh, anxiety is present.” Because sustaining anxiety depends upon thoughts, we turn the mind away from thoughts and toward a counteracting and wholesome practice such as deep breathing or loving-kindness. Gradually we learn to detect and disarm our anxiety earlier. The habit patterns or “mind ruts” it has created become weakened, and anxiety no longer has a hold on us.
Some people say, “Well, if I let go of anxiety, I’ll stop making plans for the future. The very thought of letting go of anxiety makes me anxious. I’ll turn into a jellyfish, just floating around, pushed by life’s currents.” They are confusing letting go of anxiety with letting go of planning. Anxiety and planning are different things entirely. Anxiety is the suffering that our mind layers on top of planning. Anxiety actually interferes with good planning. Anxiety is self-centered and it makes us lose objectivity. Good plans arise from objectivity, not emotion.
Here is an important clue about how to unwind the clutching fingers of anxiety from our heart. Find a way to switch from thinking to experiencing. In particular, switch to experiencing with the body, feeling the flow of breath, listening to sounds, obvious and subtle, looking at colors and patterns of light and dark. When we are truly present, time