My resolution for this year is to meditate on emptiness every evening before I go to bed .
Last year, my focus was on abundance. This year I move to the other side of the spectrum and familiarize myself with emptiness.
I'm nervous about this resolution, because I know that I'm fundamentally afraid of emptiness. It's like the glass bridge I read about in Tsoknyi Rinpoche's book. I know that meditating on emptiness can't hurt me, but letting go of expectations, plans, thoughts, memories, feels like a loss of self. And how do we live without this constant self-building? If we stop for an hour or a day, will we have less of a self to be proud of and to make us feel powerful?
Meditating on emptiness is where I really test my belief. Conceptually I believe that selflessness is key to true happiness. Or I believe that I should believe that. But experientially when I'm not working on the self, I feel at risk. If I'm not planning, hoping, worrying dreaming, what am I creating?
Yet, meditating on emptiness doesn't mean an empty life. I'm sure. It's not about creating an empty head. Or a life empty of action. It's about creating space, and cultivating the power to let go of the things in life that don't really give us joy, or aren't truly useful. A painting or picture that is too busy is not necessarily creative, it can be cluttered and complicated.
I've spent too much of my life holding on to things, people, situations, places, behaviours that haven't brought me real joy. This year is about discovering the source of true, stable, enduring joy. Emptiness is potential, a fresh start. Yes it's a little frightening, but so is any change.
It's a risk I take for myself, and for the people I care about. And for everyone I touch in my life.
Here goes.
Happy New Year.
