Back when my oldest was a baby (about 7 years ago now!) I bought a black wooden mala at my local occult store. Until then, I used a carnelian mala (written about in XO) when I meditated. Many things changed when I became a mom, but for a while I was able to hang on to a fairly steady meditation practice. I switched materials because wood seemed more durable, and because I was very attached to the carnelian mala (funny, given that the non-attachment tenet of Buddhism is at least half of what draws me to the philosophy) and was less attached to the wood one: if my oldest pulled, chewed, or otherwise applied baby force to the new one, I didn’t mind too much.
Attachment is an interesting word in the context of parenting. It can seem, perhaps, to be the exact opposite of Buddhism non-attachment, and perhaps it is. If you speak contemporary parenting lingo, you know secure attachment is the goal, and insecure attachment (honestly, what most of us feel/are most of the time) is to be avoided. There’s the attachment parenting style, which dictates that when the child wants to be held/near you/sleeping in your bed, you give the child what they want. I like the concept of AP but knew the reality of it would never suit me. As a kinetic-tactile person, physical space is a necessity for me.
For a while, as evidenced in the photo above (how young we were!), it appears I wore both malas together. You can see, just barely, at the bottom center of the photo, that my oldest has the beads wrapped in his chubby little fist. I held on to my meditation practice until I got pregnant with my youngest. From there—well, I’m not sure. I actually really don’t remember. Somewhere between then and now I acquired a new zafu, so the thought of meditation stayed with me, but a regular practice slipped off my radar.
Over the winter, I started meditating again, in a very sporadic, un-structured way. For weeks, I sat in a chair to do it, and I was happy if I got five in-and-out breaths for a sitting. It was what I was able to give myself. Sometimes, that’s enough.
I loathe to admit that I’m in a bit of a dry spell in my writing. In May, I tallied only nine writing days and seventeen thinking days, both way lower than my usual numbers. About halfway through the month, I realized I was entering a fallow period and I did what I always do when one arrives: I resisted. Even this little essay is a form of resistance.
A mala is similar to the Catholic rosary: its purpose is to provide physical assistance to the act of meditation (prayer). One bead, one breath. When I was a child I had an inexpensive pink (probably plastic) rosary. I’m not sure I ever wore it, except maybe at church or for my first communion, but I remember it hanging in my room. I remember being drawn to it.
During meditation, you pass the beads of the mala through your fingers. An anchor, a guide, a thread to follow.
Sometimes when I am “not writing,” I look up words I already know the definition of in the dictionary. Often I am surprised. Often the phrasing of the definition makes me see the word in a new way. I did this recently with literature n. 1 : the production of written works having excellence of form or expression and dealing with ideas of permanent interest. “Excellence of form” led me to look up form n. shape, structure, figure, formula, orderly method of arrangement (these being the keywords, not the definitions themselves).
When I am not writing, I begin to grow uncomfortable, loosened from myself, as if my identity will slip away in the night. Never mind that I’ve lived through plenty of fallow periods in my life as a writer. Never mind that, thanks to an unexpected question from a friend, I realized I never even took myself seriously as a writer until I was in my early 30s.
I love the act of writing, and when I’m not doing it regularly, I miss it.
But, AND THIS IS REALLY HARD TO ADMIT, the thing that resists these dry spells is an attachment to the idea of being a writer.
Almost a month into what I now can see as a rest period (“no plant on earth blooms in every season and nor should you”), I’m up to seven minutes of meditation per morning. After several days of wearing my wood mala, the tassel fell off and the thread came loose during class. I caught it before the beads could scatter, but I couldn’t help but laugh inside: I bought this guide to help me navigate early motherhood and it survived two kids (partly because I didn’t wear it a ton!) only to fall off several years later when my kids were nowhere in sight. My kids are still young enough to be snuggly but they’re much too big to be carried and they can understand why not to pull on a piece of jewelry. How many days I held my breath and wished for right now.
But now, how many days I think back to those young, slow, claustrophobic, and raw days and wish I’d been more present.
I sense the form of a metaphor here.