A Sense of Wonderment
In meditation we escape the incessant chattering of thoughts by focussing on the present moment and fully engaging our senses. This allows the body to relax and the mind to calm. Sometimes however, our thoughts are just too turbulent. Our attention sticks to them and they gain a disproportionate importance in our mind. It's almost as though we feel the world would end if we stopped thinking.
One way to give the present moment a chance to do its magic is by developing a sense of wonder, an intense curiosity in the things around us. We tend to take much for granted. Our own existence, for example, seems quite ordinary. The food we eat, the fact that we can communicate with others - all our everyday experiences.
When I notice that I'm feeling rushed, restless or irritable I recall the words of G.K Chesterton, who said, "It is one thing to be amazed at a gorgon or a griffin, creatures which do not exist; but it is quite another and much higher thing to be amazed at a rhinoceros or a giraffe, creatures which do exist and look as if they don't."
His words prompt me to rediscover the realisation that the way things normally are is actually very odd, uncanny and highly improbable.
Kick start your senses by contemplating some of these:
- Imagine what it must be like for a baby to arrive on this planet. How would he or she view things?
- How would you sense the world if you'd been locked in a dark room for a decade?
- What would it be like to regain your sense of sight or touch or hearing having been blind or deaf since birth?
- How do you engage with the world when you travel to an exotic country, where the people, culture and languages are all completely different?
- What would it be like to visit Earth as an alien?
- What kind of intelligence exists inside a flower that enables it to grow and bloom in such perfection?
- What kind on intelligence breathes my body, beats my heart and creates my thoughts?