I always have the option of adopting the vantage of the witness, watching my own responses. It is a practice that can carry me from beating myself up for what I should have done to being the impartial observer of a struggle within myself. Instead of being consumed in anger, I can watch my anger playing itself out. If I have a difficult decision, rather than try to figure out what I "should" do, I step back to watch what I do.

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My meditation practice is to observe what is going on inside me, breath and heartbeats, physical sensations, and also thoughts and emotions. The practice is not to judge or to decide, but when I catch myself judging (or deciding), I just remove myself one step and watch the process of judging (or deciding).

In life as in meditation, I always have the option of adopting the vantage of the witness, watching my own responses. It is a practice that can carry me from beating myself up for what I should have done to being the impartial observer of a struggle within myself. Instead of being consumed in anger, I can watch my anger playing itself out. If I have a difficult decision, rather than try to figure out what I "should" do, I step back and adopt a stance of curiosity: I wonder what I will decide"

What about experiences of fun or pleasure? Try abstracting yourself--watching yourself laugh--and see whether this destroys your fun or enhances it.
-- Josh Mitteldorf

Archive of the Daily Inspiration

Authors Bio:

Josh Mitteldorf, de-platformed senior editor at OpEdNews, blogs on aging at http://JoshMitteldorf.ScienceBlog.com. Read how to stay young at http://AgingAdvice.org.

Educated to be an astrophysicist, he has branched out from there to mathematical modeling in a variety of areas, including evolutionary ecology and economics. He has taught mathematics, statistics, and physics at several universities. He is an avid amateur pianist, and father of two adopted Chinese girls, now grown. He travels to Beijing each year to work with a lab studying the biology of aging. His book on the subject is "Cracking the Aging Code", http://tinyurl.com/y7yovp87.