The following is something like a reaction or thoughts related to the current bizarre and unsettling situation… When we meditate, which is almost daily, the first thing we think about (wholly involuntarily) is death. And not only like dying of old age death, but of like painful, horrifying deaths (of those that have occurred and those forthcoming). Sometimes, which is perhaps the most difficult to take, we get besieged with scenarios of deaths caused by our potential negligence; repugnant thoughts of deaths that are our fault. It is not great; basically just a relentless confrontation with mortality and shame. Suffice it to say, we do not enter a relaxing, New Age bubble when we sit — rather our mind is completely exposed. But — this is just when we first sit down. Always, and this is why we sit, a transformation occurs (also involuntarily). Invariably, by the end of the 20 minutes something like an inner poise takes hold. No longer are we “like a running grave” or “a scythe of hairs”. We are not necessarily at peace but we are calmer, perhaps transcendentally realistic about the situation. We think the sitting helps us to develop a confidence to outlast the quotidian panic and anxiety — like the dispassionate materiality of a stone facing a storm. 😑