Literary Meditation

From my previous post, you may have picked up my lamenting of a wasted life.  Ten years working on a novel and I didn't want to spend time on it anymore.  From some gentle nudging from friends and colleagues, I decided to spend ten--fifteen minutes at most--doing rewrites. After those minutes I was going to live my life.

Those minutes turned into an hour, and what a wonderful hour that was.  I was in the zone of writing and caring about this novel again.  I might hate it again, but at this time, I cared.

That hour was not about wasting my life.  It was a deep, creative meditation.  I didn't waste ten years of my life, I grew creatively and spiritually.  For ten years, I was sitting at my own banyan tree. The sentences I wrote were my mantra.  The resistance I felt was Mara sending arrows toward me.  Writing turned those arrows into flowers that fell at my feet.

I meditate.  Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad.  Whatever the "sit," it aims for my overall piece of mind.  Once I finished writing, I went for a run--something I hadn't done in awhile.  I felt jazzed.

Not a single story is wasted.  It may not find publication, but it help pad the meditation cushion where I sit.