New Moon, MLK & a "Beginner's Mind" Meditation

"In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, in the expert's mind there are few." - Zen master Shunryu Suzuki

Psychologists who study the climate change movement – and social justice broadly – think that one reason we don’t do more to make things better is that we, as humans, are incredibly uncomfortable with uncertainty. We’d rather “know” that things are going to be bad, than be unsure that they could be good. 

A little crazy, right? And, I can also see it. 

Uncertainty is uncomfortable. But it also allows for “beginner’s mind” and creates space for possibility. 

In No Straight Road Takes You There, Rebecca Solnit wrote, 

“...if you already know what's going to happen, there's nothing more or nothing else possible, a view that often leads to disengagement and passivity. But mostly we don't know... Hope in this sense is just the recognition that in that uncertainty there may be the space in which to move toward the best and away from the worst of those possibilities, that the future is not...a place that already exists, toward which we are trudging, but a place that we are creating with what we do and how we do it (or don't) in the present." 

It seems fitting that January’s New Moon - a symbolic time of new beginnings and their inherent uncertainty - falls on the weekend we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr’s legacy. MLK led people to imagine possibilities – to let go of how they knew, for sure!, things were, so that they could move towards something different, and create change. 

Things changed. And are still changing. We don’t know how it’s going to turn out. Maybe there is some wisdom in cultivating a beginner’s mind so that we can imagine – and then move towards – good case scenarios. Even if we don’t know what things will look like…what if? What vision would we like? 

A lot of meditation is developing a beginner’s mind. It is practicing being with things just as they are in this moment (including the distracting noise, the thought that plays on repeat in our head, our itchy knee), rather than our assumptions. We practice letting go of what we “absolutely know to be true” and instead rest with what is. We become more open to possibility. It’s giving me a little hope right now. 

Here's a 17-minute meditation to go with this post...