A short conversational video (Connor Beaton with Henry) about the role of meditation in treating depression in the UK and how mindfulness practice helps. The clip opens with the claim that UK doctors are encouraged to prescribe meditation for depression and that meditation can be as effective as medication. The bulk of the excerpt explains practical mindfulness aims (appreciative, patient awareness) and novice obstacles, emphasizing 'allowing' experience, simple labeling of mental events (talk, images, emotions) as a practice (attributed to Shinzen Young), and an Alan Watts-style meditation framing (the 'happening' or collapse of subject/object). Personal anecdotes and teaching lineage (Zen, TM) are used to illustrate points.
Chapters
In the uk, I believe that doctors are, if I read the research correct, doctors are actually encouraged to prescribe meditation as a treatment for depression, which I love, because what they found is that meditation is as helpful, if not more helpful, than any of the medications that they can prescribe. I would be remiss because I know after having worked with so many men that I can hear the guys being like, okay, but what do I do? What do. Like when, when I become present to that voice is there, the chatter is there or the imagery is there or the emotion is there? Yeah, like what do I do? And do I handle those things differently? Is how I handle the chatter different from the image or the emotion? So let's just piece this apart. I'm really going to go in on this, Henry. I apologize in advance.
No, I love it. I love it. It's my bread and butter, you know, Y. I would say, you know, the. Where we want to get to is where, you know, mindfulness is a beautiful state of mind that is a. It's got a flavor of love and it's a deep awareness, it's a very patient awareness and an appreciative awareness. So where we want to get to is being in that state of appreciative awareness and welcoming whatever is arising and appreciating it. So that means that if it's talk in the mind arising, no problem. If it's images in the mind arising, no problem. If it's emotion in the sort of roughly heart area arising, no problem. And so we've got. So there's a kind of built in compassion that comes with it that allows us to. Yeah, I think the right word is appreciate or even cherish experience, you know, so then, yes, sometimes the mind's blissfully quiet and there's this broad peace and we're just resting and it's silent and it's beautiful. That's wonderful. But I think kind of a true mindfulness will enjoy that and will also appreciate when the mind's busy. Because this is how it is. Because that's how it is right now, you know, and to be able to.
Appreciate it. So I'm this, if. If that's the end point kind of thing, how do we get there? Right? So, so the, what we. What the first step for most sort of novice meditators is, is that they started to be aware that there is all this stuff going on in their minds and maybe their heart area as well, and they don't want it because I'm supposed to feel good meditating. Aren't I supposed to feel good kind of thing. And this is getting in the way and it's, you know, it's frustrating me because it's not the way I think it should be. I should be doing this practice that gets it all quiet and gets rid of all that. So then it's a double frustration. And, you know, obviously that's not the way to go, you know, so there's a. I mean, one of my teachers, actually a Zen teacher, funny enough, who's a bit unusual among Zen teachers, he said the three most important things in practice, Henry. Allow, allow, allow.
And, ah, man, it sank in with me because that was so kind of counter to the kind of schooling I'd had, by the way. I did maybe five years of the Transcendental Meditation and I switched to Zen for various reasons. But, you know, some of the training I got in Zen was pretty kind of brutal. It's like, you know, stop thinking, well, how do I do that? You know, it doesn't work, that instruction, you know, don't move at all, you know, but my knee's crazy. I gotta. I've got to unbend my leg. No, you can't move. You know, it's silly. I think now, you know, as a young man, I kind of. I kind of liked it. I wanted to measure up to that. But really.
I don't know. I think it just slows things up in the long run, probably. But that aside.
The methodology that I like to use one of them, because there's a lot, you know, is simply labeling is like using a little label in the mind to let me know what's going on. So if there's talk in the mind, I might use the label talk. In other words, I just say to myself in my mind, talk.
Talk. If there's a lot of imagery, I'll say to myself in the mind, images, images. Because that way, it just helps me. Sorry, it just helps me be aware, you know. By the way, that's basically a methodology from Shinzen Young, who's a great meditation teacher. He's a little bit of a sort of hybrid guy. Bit of a person, a bit of Zen, bit of other stuff and interesting guy. But it also goes back in the tradition to just label what's going on. So it helps us.
It helps support.
Our coming to a place of mindful awareness.
Yeah, I think that's. That's very helpful. I know, for myself, when I started meditating, there was.
Almost like a desire to swipe those things away. You know, thoughts would come up in the mind. And my immediate response was like, well, how do I get rid of that? Or, you know, an image would come up and okay, that shouldn't be there. How do I, you know, how do I move that out of the way and get back to what I was doing? Or a frustration would then arise of, you know, how come I can't stick with the breath and the, you know, the process that I'm working on here. And it is, you know, it is this sort of surprising practice in the allowing that I think you're talking about, that is one of the most potent elements for me personally, has been one of the most potent elements for me personally as somebody who wants to drive at things very quickly, wants to get to the end destination very fast, wants to have mastered things, you know, like that and to really sort of like bask in the, in the sunlight of the process and of the happening. Right now I think one of the most beautiful meditations that I did and have done consistently was just this Alan Watts meditation where he, he talks about the happening and this sort of the dual nature of you're the one doing the breathing, but the breathing is happening to you, right? You're the one seeing the object, but the object is also happening to you, right? You're listening and the sound is happening to you. And like all that, you know, there's sort of like the collapsing of the, of the binary has been a very interesting practice, but none of that's possible without the allowing. And I find that it's, it's expanded out into my life. You know, I have a 3 year old now and so there's a lot of allowing.
There's a tremendous amount of like, let's surrender to this. You know, it's like I can't force him to not feel the way that he's feeling, or I can't stop him from having the tantrum. And so there's, it's really like, I just, I mean, I think, you know, I, I'm just so thankful every day that I started this practice, you know, 12 years ago because I just think I would, I would have a lot harder time in life today.
