When Everything Goes Wrong

 Sometimes life knocks us in the dust and doesn't give us a hand back up. Sudden events or tragedies, such as a death in the family, colossal disappointments, huge losses—so many things can cause the ground to just disappear from under our feet and leave us just falling through the air. At such times, forget the usual kinds of negative emotions. We go into absolute turmoil. Or we become completely numb and unfeeling, like zombies, as our mind puts out emotional anesthetic. We feel a total loss of security. We are left without hope, a bundle of frayed nerves, stumbling through our own personal catastrophes. I've painted a bleak picture, but maybe you're already familiar with it. The fact is, we don't know where or when disaster will hit us. Remember how we talked earlier about not getting knocked off your seat? Hard times will almost certainly knock you off your seat, again and again, and meditation will not take away your pain. But it's important to keep regaining your seat anyway. And it's important to keep up your practice. No, mindfulness won't fix everything. But it will bring you in touch with your center, your innate wisdom. It will allow you to weather your trials with courage and presence of mind. It's too cute to say it's all a lesson or a test. Whatever is happening in your life, good or bad, is not a rehearsal. It's the real thing. It's your life, and it's happening to you right now. Mindfulness gives you the ability to live it fully, with dignity and grace. Meditation in hard times is about the willingness to expose yourself to life, to make yourself vulnerable again and again, without the fear that it will destroy you—because it won't. Whatever experience you have, no matter how good or bad, will be followed by another experience, and another, and so on. The

great meditation teacher Chögyam Trungpa famously said, “The bad news is you're falling through the air, nothing to hang on to, no parachute. The good news is there's no ground.” Whatever we go through in life is all experience. Whether we like it or not, we're always moving forward and things never remain the same. We are always at the edge between the past and the future. And, for all our planning and hedging, the future is a complete unknown, an abyss. We're in no-man's-land, heading into uncertain territory. Meditation is about not running from this reality but having the courage to take whatever comes and willingly confronting the unknown again and again. It is about going forth and finding the challenge rather than waiting for it to come to us. Three Fierce Mantras The so-called “three fierce mantras” are mottoes attributed to a 12th-century Tibetan master. They express, very concisely, an undaunted spirit willing to face any challenge or hardship. Repeating them to yourself may give you some courage in trying times. They are: Whatever is coming, come! However it goes, so be it! Nothing whatsoever is necessary. These three mantras have a gritty determination to them. They show a willingness to accept any and all experience unconditionally. Even if you don't feel like you have the same level of determination, you can still repeat them to yourself

whenever you need a quick dose of bravery or a reminder to bring a fearless spirit into your life. Don't Lose Your Practice When you're going through hell, it might not always seem relevant to keep up a meditation practice. But hard times are when you need meditation the most. You can't help being shaky at such times. You can't help that life is putting you through the ringer, that you're sometimes falling apart, that you just can't keep it together. In trying times, you could give up and just let life kick you in the rear. You could actually just let yourself go completely, stop caring, stop trying, just let everything fall apart. You absolutely could lie down and surrender to your fear and despair. But I wouldn't recommend it. Even if everything is going wrong, you can still keep returning to the cushion every day and showing kindness to yourself. You can keep expressing your willingness to work with your mind by sitting and meditating. You can keep up this dignified and noble activity, which allows you to get in touch with that most dignified and noble part of yourself. What to Do Those are encouraging words, but let's take a look at some actual concrete steps you can take to cope with difficult times. Like I already said, the first thing you can do is maintain your daily practice. Let it be a rock of stability in your life, a place you can return to when you need to recover your equilibrium. Meditation sustains us, and we need that when times are hard. In addition to that, here we'll

present a couple of mindfulness techniques you can use when you're in the thick of it. R.A.I.N. Meditation teacher Tara Brach recommends a mindfulness technique called R.A.I.N. for dealing with difficult emotions and difficult times. R.A.I.N. is an acronym for a four-step mindfulness process that cuts through powerful emotions and helps us find our center and equanimity. It stands for: Recognize what is happening.  Allow life to be just as it is.  Investigate inner experience