Sit Spot, Day 17

Sat out tonight, 11-11:30 p.m.

Being with the trees and plants in the yard tonight was like gathering with family, easy togetherness. It's a still night, no wind, no appreciable cloud movement even. Only the sound of cars on the roads and the faint chirping of spring peeper choruses in the distance. The moon waxes full, floating, lost, in the cover of thin clouds.

The air was moist, delicious with the smell of cut grass. One bird - a warbler? - sang out a little tune from the trees across the field, across the dark night holding us all together.

Yes, Kate, I did have expectations of how this month would be, though they were, in fact, conscious. My memory of my monthly sits from two years ago is of a profound waking up to my senses. As I understand that the sense meditation is a big part of the sits, I'd wanted to accomplish this again this year. Thank you for helping me to re-evaluate these expectations, however, because I had become entrenched in my disappointment of not acheiving them. Tonight, coming at it with a fresh perspective, I was able to harness all of the energy I've been reserving for my disappointment and put it, instead, into simply using the sense meditation - this time, finally, without any preconceived notions of exactly how I was going to feel. I stopped trying, and this freed me up to experience what came along fully.

Raven, thank you for sharing about your own struggles at your sit spot, and especially for sharing so frankly about your sit yesterday. Sometimes we need to hear the stories of failure more than the stories of success, to remind us that failure is simply a portion of success. And yes, it seems as though our schedules are quite in synch. Knowing that there is at least one other soul out there in my shoes (and I know there are more of us who simply haven't written...yet) bolsters my faith in the existence of alert, weary sits!