Meditating at High Noon

People often tell me that they don't have time to meditate. Sometimes I answer by asking, "You have time for lunch, don't you?" Meditation is no more time-consuming than a lunch break. In fact, meditation can be your lunch break, as I explained recently to a group of staffers at the San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco's morning newspaper.

Phyllis Kittleson of the Chronicle's Human Resources Department, an organizer of the event, had arranged for everyone attending to have a sack lunch waiting for them. Our session was limited to forty-five minutes, as newspaper people are always working under pressure of a deadline. Once everyone was seated, I invited them to unwrap their food and eat slowly, enjoying each aroma, taste, and texture. I suggested that they try as much as possible to eat with their eyes closed. Though they were surprised by this unusual request, they quickly agreed to try.

While people ate, I brought their attention to their bodies sitting comfortably on the chairs. I suggested that they be aware of the flavor of the food in their mouths, how much they were enjoying the lunch they had chosen, how easily their digestive system was processing the food. I encouraged them to be totally present, to engage for this short period in only what they were doing-eating lunch and nothing else. Normally, I had been told, most people who work at the Chronicle eat lunch at their desks, and continue working at the same time. Traffic from the street, ringing telephone, laughter, and conversations punctuate most of their lunch breaks. As sounds intruded into our lunch break-the sound of the door opening and closing, the rustling of lunch bags as people came in late, even the sound of my voice-I incorporated these interruptions into the meditation. I wanted people to learn to stay relaxed and focused without being disturbed by other people's activities.

This is one of the special tricks of meditation. I find that once people have experienced this feeling of relaxed focus, once they understand that it is possible for the body to remain calm and centered though they are surrounded by busyness, they find it much easier to stay relaxed under similar conditions in their offices.

At the end of the session, everyone said they had enjoyed eating lunch this way. They reported being more satisfied, less anxious about how much they ate, more at ease with the whole process of eating.

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