"Summer time and the living is easy..." Unless, of course, if you live under this summer's Heat Dome hovering over the midsection of America. I grew up in the Midwest, but now happen to live in a much more forgiving climate – California. I wonder why?

No matter where you live, summertime is the official season for doing as little as possible for as long as possible. So this summer I've decided to master a skill I've never quite learned:

Sitting.

I know, I know, we all sit all the time, we wheelchairs aficionados, but we are usually sitting while doing something else – moving, watching TV, tracking down those amusing bulldog-skating-boarding videos on YouTube. Your derrière is firmly planted on your silicon cushion, but your mind is elsewhere. Sitting, for the permanently seated, is usually perceived as a pain in the butt, excuse the pun, something that prohibits or inhibits you from doing things "normal" people do. It is impolite these days to use the term "wheelchair bound," but that's how most of us still feel. Rarely do you hear anyone say "wheelchair liberated." "Man, I used to have to walk everywhere and stand at a urinal, but now I'm liberated from all of that hassle by spending every waking minute in this zippy chair!"

But what you can do, and probably better than the next ambulatory guy, is sit with a purpose. Sit to relax, empty your mind, and maybe gain a measure of calmness and clarity. Your mind doesn't care if you just sat down or have been sitting for a lifetime when it is directed, by you, to stop all of that discursive babble rolling around inside of it.

I'm no guru, that's for sure, but I think what I'm talking about doesn't demand an advanced degree in gurutology. The New York Times recently ran a long piece on a hot new English meditation teacher who they dubbed "the Dr. Phil of the yogi set." His name is Andy Puddicombe and his mission is a religion-free (and yoga-free) brand of meditation that only takes ten minutes a day to practice. His method, in a nutshell, is sit upright in a relaxed manner, close your eyes, count your breaths slowly, and let go of wandering thoughts. If you want to know more, go to his website.

It's simple, it's struck a cord with a lot of over-achievers in London and New York, and since you are already sitting, you are way ahead of the other harried souls trying to find something, anything, that gives them even a momentary sense of tranquility.

Another writer has said that Mr. Puddicombe is "doing for meditation what someone like Jamie Oliver has done for food." Jamie Oliver promotes simple, healthy food – nothing fancy, nothing threatening, nothing demanding you attend the Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. Mr. Puddicombe is simply, even simplistically, trying to get you to stop for ten minutes a day and do nothing. It may sound like yet another self-help con, but it's just a technique. If it works, do it. If it doesn't, just sit there for ten minutes and stare into space anyway. It can't hurt.

In my own wheelchair using life, I find that most of the problems I encounter occur between my ears. I have my share of infections and all the rest, and they are both irritating and demoralizing, but most of the job is to spot those often obsessive thoughts that do me no good and try to expunge them. There's a constant battle going on in there between despair and acceptance, between "this is a horrible fate" and "it is what it is, move on." Unless I get a lobotomy or a divine revelation from on high, it's probably a battle that will never end.

For ten minutes a day, I've decided, I'll sit on my front porch and actively forget about it. For ten minutes, the wheelchair doesn't exist. It's just a place to sit while I'm sitting.

© 2011 Allen Rucker |