The Headspace Guide to: Mindfulness & Meditation

by Andy Puddicombe

The road He began by asking me to imagine I was sitting on the side of a very busy road, with a blindfold around my head. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘maybe you can hear the background noise, the cars whizzing by, but you can’t see them because you have your eyes covered, right?’ I imagined myself sitting on the grass verge of a motorway (the M4 as it happens) and nodded in agreement. ‘So,’ he went on, ‘before you start to meditate it can feel a bit like this. Because of all the background noise in the mind, all the thoughts, it means that even when you sit down to relax or go to bed at night, it still feels as though this noise continues, yes?’ It was hard to argue with this, because it did indeed feel as though there was always a certain amount of background noise or restlessness in my mind, even when I was not consciously aware of the individual thoughts. ‘Now, imagine taking the blindfold off,’ he continued, ‘For the first time you see the road, your mind, clearly. You see the cars racing by, the different colours, shapes and sizes. Maybe sometimes you are attracted by the sound of the cars, at other times more interested in their appearance. But this is what it’s like when you first take off the blindfold.’ He started laughing to himself. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘sometimes it’s at this point that people learning meditation say some very funny things. They start to blame their thoughts and feelings on the meditation. Can you believe it?’ he asked mockingly. ‘They come and see me and ...