Finding Zen in a Wildfire
So, uh… there’s a lot going on in the world. Political upheaval, floods, wildfires, and now a potential pandemic. It’s overwhelming and fear is rising. With so many things needing our attention, where do we even begin?
While turning a blind eye isn’t an option, we still must take care of ourselves. The single greatest thing we can do to find our zen in the middle of chaos is meditation. Before you roll your eyes, hear me out! Meditation is the most effective tool we have to control the only thing we really have control over: our minds. We cannot control how others behave, nor how the world at large responds to our most pressing issues. We can, however, control how we respond.
I use an app called Headspace that offers lots of different kinds of guided meditation. Sleep, stress, energy, work problems, relationship issues—there’s a meditation for each of them, and so many more. I also use a free app called Tap-In, which holds a live, 5ish minute guided meditation every single day at 3pm ET / 2pm CT. It’ll notify you a few minutes prior to the session beginning. I like this app not only because it’s free, but because it offers community with dozens of other stressed-out folks coming together to center ourselves.
Now, you may say you’ve tried meditation but it just doesn’t work. That’s okay! Meditation needn’t just be something where you sit quietly in a dark room for a few minutes. Meditation can take different forms. Whatever gets you into a state of flow is technically a meditative act. Whether you are planting vegetables, painting, bike riding, playing games with your kids, or creating something, the goal is to get out of the mental vortex of fear and anxiety for as long as you can. No matter how you get there, doing so has a profound effect on your ability to find zen in everyday life and your endurance to fight injustice. And goodness knows, we need all the zen we can get.
Image by Sage Friedman on Unsplash
