The Lost Art of Simply Being Still

In the summer of 1990, my husband and I moved back to California after an absence of 13 years. It was culture shock for me on many levels, and I returned with ambivalence.

Aside from trying to cope with grief over leaving good friends, and anxiety about making new friends, I felt groundless, rootless and adrift. The most difficult adjustment was trying to keep pace with the California lifestyle: lots of freeway driving, lots of recreation to take advantage of, and lots of opportunity to fill my life with busyness.

Keeping busy served as a temporary antidote to my loneliness, but instead of feeling fulfilled, I felt more and more frantic with the pace I had set and was finding impossible to maintain. It was shortly after the realization that my life was nearly out of control that I discovered Zen.

The contrast between my busy day-to-day life and the simplicity of sitting on the pillow was so extreme that I could not imagine sitting still for 10 minutes, let alone for the hours that I eventually spent in intensive retreats. In spite of the seeming impossibility of sitting still, I was drawn to the opportunity to simply be still, to be present, to be receptive, to be here, now.

The more I practiced zazen, the traditional Zen sitting meditation, the more I realized how I had unconsciously created my frenetic life of appointments and deadlines and incessant activity. I was able to witness the choices I was making, and realized I could choose to live differently.

And I did. I cut back the pace, took time to reflect, and amazingly found that I was more productive, not less, and enjoying myself much more. More important was the subtle experience of simply “being.”

When we take time to “be” in our lives, we begin to truly open to our lives as they reveal themselves. We see our lives more clearly; instead of being trapped by our choices, we begin to see that we have many more choices for living our lives in more meaningful ways. We also begin to appreciate stillness, how it opens up possibilities for relating to spirit, and filling our soul space.

If life has become constricted, it begins to expand. If we have bound ourselves up, our ties begin to loosen and fall away. Instead of being captivated or held captive by the demands we put on ourselves, we begin to realize how we have entrapped ourselves; we may stay where we are, but we will realize that seeing our lives as a trap is a matter of choice, and that we can choose to see our lives from more expansive and joyful perspectives.

Many of us keep so busy that we never have to face the emptiness in our lives. By keeping busy, we never have time to reflect on our spiritual isolation, our loneliness, our desolation. Boredom becomes the enemy; we will do just about anything to keep from being bored, even when the effort increases our stress and anxiety.

When we develop a spiritual practice that allows us to simply “be,” however, we begin to understand the nature of boredom. Rather than judging it, we can study it with curiosity. When we are bored, we can, without discrimination, realize that it is simply another fleeting state of mind; that in one instant it can transform into wonder or joy.

Perhaps most important, though, is that when we learn to “be,” we open ourselves up to a connection with God. We learn there is not anything to do or anywhere to go, for to know the ultimate spirit can occur in the simple act of surrender.

In stillness, we can open to the experience of each moment, and in each moment we make ourselves available to the transcendent that is beyond our comprehension, yet resides within us. Each passing moment of silence honors the divine; in stillness, we invite in the presence that can quiet our minds and open our hearts.

On Faith is a forum for Orange County clergy and others to offer their views on religious topics of general interest. Submissions, which will be published at the discretion of The Times and are subject to editing, should be delivered to Orange County religion page editor Jack Robinson.