Greg's Personal Note: Judith has given us permission to post this. Her open-hearted message authentically offers the truth of her heart while she is blazing new trails into uncharted territory. Thank you Judith, for expressing the intimacy of your process as it unfolds, moment by moment, with such inspiration & clarity.

 

 

I can’t believe I’m writing this but I think I am finally settling in to meditation. Why is it we go through life believing false stories? I have lived my entire adult life telling myself that I cannot meditate and that I have tried and it never works and it is not humanly possible blah blah blah. But now I see I was deceiving myself and that if I had just had the right training and viewpoint I would have been meditating years ago.  
 

What has always been the biggest hangup for me is the idea that it’s possible to empty the mind. Well maybe for some people but my mind starts kicking and screaming at the mere hint of it. I see myself now, anticipating trying to meditate and getting frustrated before even starting, knowing that my mind will rebel by being more active than usual. Going into it expecting to fail dooms it from the start. The second thing is that I always felt that if you’re going to meditate you better do it for a good long spell. So I would expect to be “out of it” for at least an hour, my mind peacefully drifting along until time was up. Yeah right. What I anticipate is telling myself I am going to sit there for the allotted time and the clock just seems to stand still and I can’t get comfortable and I quit after a few minutes and wish I had never tried. I have had a little more success with creative visualization but that’s cheating because I have always been a master daydreamer and can go on literally forever in fantasy. - 
 

So what’s new with me on the meditation front? Why am I suddenly seeing the light about it? How am I all of a sudden turned around concerning meditation and so many other things in life? I can sum it up in one word; Vibration. For me the turnaround has come as a result of having been introduced to the amazing vibrations of Himalayan Singing Bowls. I never would have believed it if someone had told me this would happen. So let me explain how this all came about. - 
 

A month or so ago I heard from an old friend that he would be traveling through the Southwest and would like to include a visit to Abiquiu. We had not seen or talked to each other for 51 years, hard to believe I know. Are we really that old? Anyway, I had seen on his Facebook page that he had been studying the bowls for several years and was offering sessions to people at each stop on his road trip. He described the value to me as a way to relax and get into your meditation. Of course I thought that was great as I had been so unsuccessful at meditation and if this was the key I was all for it. So Greg arrived and it was so wonderful to see him. We clicked right away as if no time had passed in our friendship. We spent a little time together before he introduced the bowl ceremony to me. My first impression when I saw how everything was set up was that it was much more elaborate than I had assumed. Greg had the bowls beautifully arranged on the floor around a cushion that was draped with a decorative fabric. He had set out other relevant and pretty things, a crystal, bells, wind chimes and of course the many different strikers. It was so colorful and beautiful and had been arranged with such care and love. I was really quite impressed even before I heard the amazing sound of the bowls.  
 

Greg was wonderful about explaining what would happen and what I should be doing. His gentle heart and love seemed to create an invisible shield around us protecting us and closing us off from the rest of the world. I was free to let down all defenses and allow myself to relax into the meditation. I lay down on the cushion with these incredibly beautiful bowls all around me including one or two between my lower legs. I put an eye pillow over my eyes and felt my body release tension. Greg started out with an excellent visualization of a mist entering my feet and making its way swirling up my legs and through my body. This was easy for me to see and was very effective. Then he started striking the bowls with just the right percussion. Something about the sound of it, something in the vibration went straight to my heart and I felt it open up. Sitting here now and trying to remember what was going on in my mind is impossible. I have no idea what happened. I don’t know how long the session went on or any of the details. It is almost as if I went under mental anesthesia, work was done on my mind and heart while I was out and when I woke up my world was different. Greg tells me I lay there for a long time after the session was done. I do not remember that. When I finally tried to sit up I felt so weak I had to lie back down again. When I was able to sit up the tears started. A floodgate of emotion let go and decades of fears, disappointment, guilt, sadness and feelings of inadequacy escaped on torrents of tears. My emotions were completely out of control. As soon as I would feel I could stop crying it would come up again so strong it could not be reined in. I felt my body tremble uncontrolably. This went on for an incredibly long time. I think it lasted the entire night. I remember telling Greg this was his test as he sat calmly and patiently, a tangible lighthouse and rock for me, protecting me and allowing me to be totally vulnerable. 
 

In retrospect I can see that I have spent my entire life avoiding this very thing. I had shut down my feelings as a way to cope with life, not allowing myself to feel anything because sometimes feelings are hard to take and it was easier to just eliminate all of them. I lived under a blanket of guilt and disappointment in myself and rarely felt anything even close to joy. It was always so much easier to see my failures rather than my victories. My heart was closed off from reality for many years, since I was 12 and the bottom sort of fell out of my life but that’s another story for another time. The point is that it is possible to change, to tell yourself the truth, to allow emotions to surface and to deal with them successfully. What an amazingly powerful lesson! The explanation is that our bodies are 70+% water and the vibrations travel through the water of each cell and are able to reset the cell in some way. If someone were to tell me this I may entertain the thought, not sure if I believed it, but having experienced it firsthand I have to say it is not important to understand how it works just that it most definitely does.

 

Greg and I continued the sessions for another 10 days or so. I had some very strong visions and reactions and felt a definite reset to my thought process. Honestly it is like a miracle to me, one who has never had enough perseverance to break even the tiniest bad habit. I think we had maybe 7 sessions in all. I am convinced that I needed every one of them. I cannot see having such dramatic results after one or two sessions. I felt a progression and as I said to Greg, I have always been a sort of slow to absorb new concepts. Sometimes there were definite immediate reactions, crying and anxiety caused by the strength of my emotional responses. For someone who had spent her entire life attempting to control everything the feeling of being out of control was truly frightening. However it was also incredibly liberating. This was a huge object lesson in what happens when you let go of control and let life happen. What a revelation! A huge light went on in my heart. I opened up to love. These words seem so anemic it’s pathetic to even try to explain it.  
 

I was slightly apprehensive about how I would continue to meditate without Greg here to help but of course we both knew he would be moving on. Saying goodbye was hard for both of us but somehow the lightness of my heart continued as I understood his journey. The gift of a crystal, a bowl and a couple of strikers was generous and well appreciated. I started meditating with my bowl right away. As is to be expected I went through a melancholy period a couple of days after Greg left. I was still tired from all the emotional activity, lonely for the conversation and comfort of being together, having trouble integrating all of this new information and thought process into the reality of my life, feeling sort of hopeless of ever being happy without Greg here to guide me. But like a baby bird who has been ejected from the nest I spread my struggling little wings and flew, a little wobbly at first but soon doing OK. There was a spell where I could not get into the meditation. I would lie there waiting for the relaxation to set in but instead would be treated to the big to do list in my head. I would quit in frustration, get up and make that phone call or note or whatever that important thing was. I see this now as another example of my taking time to absorb new habits and ideas.

 

Yesterday after my house guests had left (Yes I have had company through this reset period too) I settled down with my bowl and crystal for a good long meditation. When I started the sun was shining brightly and when I finished it was almost dark out. I did take one small break but went right back into it. I had been concerned that I would not be able to go deep without Greg or someone else to strike the bowls but I found I sort of fell into a rhythm with striking the bowls. At first I hit them frequently then as I went into deeper relaxation I let silence take over. Time went by. Even in my state of semi consciousness I could tell that a lot of time had gone by but I did not want to stop. I didn’t know what to expect coming out of it. I felt kind of fuzzy and hazy. When I finally roused myself I felt absolutely wonderful. I felt relaxed and calm. I felt genuinely content in my heart and mind. All these expressions seem so cliché but I cannot find the words to convey the true meaning. I went to bed early, fell asleep immediately and slept soundly, quite a departure from my usual insomnia and sleep apnea.

 

I can clearly see the general benefits of this amazing experience. Before I was introduced to this I had a constant chorus singing in my mind, like the chorus in a Greek play. There was never any rest from the relentless list of things to worry about, the kids, the family, money, relationships, unfinished projects, the past, the future, and on and on. Even relatively good days were always interrupted by negative thoughts. A phone call from someone with bad news would throw me off for days. I am finding that now I am not dwelling on things as I used to. I still see the problems the kids are having and I still see how unhappy my mother is in her situation. I still don’t know where the money is going to come from or if I will have the strength to get my many projects done. But for some reason my mind is calm and my heart can handle it. I have no explanation other than the vibrations from the bowls along with the love and guidance from a dear friend and my own receptive heart and mind have combined to clear me of my past negativity. It is still unbelievable to me but I have no choice but to believe what is clearly right before my eyes. I have achieved something I have tried to do for years and all of a sudden it is not impossible any more. How did this happen? Do I really need to know that?"