Day 24 - Incense

Usually, I use the incense in the same way that I use bird songs, to come back to the moment. Like sound, though not quite to the same extent, smell seems to be an effective focus point. I assume that's why incense is used so often during meditation. Today, I used my incense in a different way.

Just before starting my meditation, my phone rang. Normally, I would completely ignore the phone during a workout or a meditation session, but I knew this would be my Belizean soulmate calling to check-in. We only talk about once a month, and I think it'd be nearly 6 weeks since our last phone conversation. I decided the phone was more important than meditation at that moment. I ran for my phone, sat back on my cushion and chatted while staring out the window at the morning. Per usual, my incense was in the window so as to waft through the room at the slightest hint of a breeze.

After hanging up, I had every intention to do my normal meditation. Sit facing the wall and focus, but instead, I noticed the two streams of smoke billowing off each side of the incense stick. For some reason, I'd never payed close attention to this smoke, other than just to wave a breeze at it and watch as it parted and swirled chaotically. This morning, I was sitting still and right in front of it. Instead of chaos billowing off the stick, I noticed a fascinating pattern. The smoke fell off the stick forming a vortex on each side. They looked something like this:

I would choose one line and follow it until it disappeared. As the vortex opened up the lines of smoke danced gracefully to the ground like ghostly ballerinas. Seriously. Beautiful. One teeny weeny breath and everything fell into chaos, but then immediately back into order. I don't know how long I sat there, still, watching, then puffing a teeny breath just to watch everything disintegrate and re-pattern into a unique but always similar vortex.

I don't know how long I sat there in complete and total focus on this smoke, but long enough to count for a 3-5 minute meditation. So, I counted it. I was more in the moment then than perhaps any of the formal sitting meditations. Though, I realize that sitting meditation is difficult because you are actually observing the mind and that's part of its benefit. But, this was good, too. In that moment, it was me and the smoke and it was perfect.

P.S. No, I WAS NOT stoned! Remember, 90 days of sobriety, baby, 90 days!