Coming closer to what gives life meaning
"Icelanders are an open-hearted people," says meditation teacher Tristan Gribbin. Eggert Jóhannesson
Meditation is becoming an increasingly popular way for people to reduce stress, to increase productivity and raise the overall quality of their lives. Tristan Gribbin discovered meditation 15 years ago and has never looked back. She now teaches meditation and says that everyone who tries it finds something unique and beneficial.
More and more people are becoming aware of the need for meditation and are feeling an inner pull. As the stress of our lives increases, and as the world situation reaches higher levels of crisis, this pull gets stronger, says Tristan. More often than not we are dealing with stress of some kind whether it is at work, or financial, or with family, or relationships or whatever.
The negative feelings associated with stress are typically something we wish to avoid, or push away, or deny. We often just hold the feelings down, which does not help. The type of meditation that my friends and I teach, Modern-Day Meditation, or the Gourasana Meditation Practice after its founder, helps us face and feel our feelings, because releasing excessive emotion allows us to be more open and access calm. By letting go of inner obstacles, and freeing ourselves up, we can then begin to experience more peace, light, trust, love and connection with our inner being and spirit. From there we can find solutions and start to live more the life we want to live.
Creative and dynamic nation
Tristan was born and raised in California, and grew up in Palo Alto. She has lived in Iceland for many years now and speaks Icelandic remarkably well. I was tempted to ask her, from her outsider perspective, if Icelanders seem unusually addicted to stress compared to in other countries, for example her native Northern-California. She was not so sure about that. ‘My friends in California have a pretty good lifestyle but they also deal with lots of stress, like everyone these days. Icelanders tend to take on a lot of projects, and are busy people. They also seem to be especially energetic, talented and creative. They get a lot done, but are also dealing with lots of stress. My view of Icelanders is that they are open-hearted people, or heart-centered, and this could be because its less than 100 years ago when Icelanders were mainly fishermen and farmers, living completely connected to the earth and mother nature. Iceland has evolved rapidly since then into a highly cultured and progressive nation but still having roots to the earth and its history. By luck, Iceland is small, so Icelanders are not dealing with the kinds of environmental stress people live with in London, New York or Los Angeles, for example, with the immense traffic and pollution. Icelanders are also lucky in we have many healthy ways to de-stress like to go to the summerhouse, to the pool, or horseback riding. Even though there is a lot of stress, especially after the financial crash, there is not as much stress as what I see in people in Los Angeles or other big cities. All people in the western world are dealing with increasing stress.’ And that is where meditation comes into the picture.
A Deeper Awareness
For those unfamiliar with meditation, the word ‘meditation’ may be confusing because it covers such a wide variety of traditions and forms. Usually we imagine a person sitting with their legs crossed and their eyes closed and focusing on one’s breath, or on a mantra. This may be true for Zen, Transcendental Meditation (or T.M., the one that David Lynch has been promoting in Iceland), Mindfulness, or Vipassana. Modern-Day Meditation is a little different in that it has four parts (Opening, Calming, Thinking and Action) but the end goal is the same. If I were to try to boil it down to the core of what all meditations have in common it would be that in meditation we are going deeper than our minds, more into the heart. We access a deeper awareness, which is more from our whole self, our true self. Ram Dass calls it ‘Loving Awareness’. We get to to a depth of calm, and from there we can access our higher intelligence - not just the old patterns the mind or the ego that are running us on a day to day basis. My teacher, The Lady, taught me ‘The real purpose of prayer and meditation is to travel so deeply within that you begin to attract to you the presence of God.’ You don’t have to believe in God, you can substitute Universal consciousness, truth, love or light. In meditation you go beyond your limits to connect to something much larger and to more of who you really are. The greatest treasures are within you.’
How long does it take?
Some may ask about long-term benefits. To take a short break from the daily grind and routine is surely helpful, but what gains can be made from longer meditations or from a regular practice?
‘I believe that spending daily time in meditation helps us connect more to our true selves, or higher selves, which we all have. Longer meditations can sometimes provide a real breakthrough we have been hoping for. Many people, like myself, are addicted to stress and meditation can help us detach from stress and get clarity. We can make better decisions and deal with the stresses of life in a better way. People find better balance, have clearer judgment, and take positive steps. People are more true to their heart, their feelings, and longings for what they truly want in life. It does not necessarily make life easier, but it makes life richer in quality. It is said that ‘meditating takes time but it makes even more time’. That may be one of the greatest gifts of meditation, that we end up spending more time doing what gives us fulfillment. We are more connected to our heart’s longing, and our core essence. In meditation we are coming closer to what gives life meaning.
Tristan and her friends hold weekly Wednesday night meditations at Dansverkstæðið and also occasional workshops. Tristan also leads private sessions. You can find out more about these offerings at https://www.facebook.com/ModernDayMeditationIceland
