The Opposite of Meditation

Summer break has been more of a breakneck summer with our kids in different camps across the city, an unrelenting workload, and a maxed-out social calendar. I’m grateful that all of this busy-ness stems from tremendous blessings, but a lesser man would confess to being tired. Not me. I’m too tough to be tired. This strength comes from a lifetime practicing the opposite of meditation: denial.

In meditation, you pick a focus (e.g. watch your breath, repeat a word), notice your mind wandering (perfectly normal), and then gently return your focus. It can train attention to the present (mindfulness), facilitate deep thinking (contemplation), or increase awareness of your physical feelings (body scan).

Denial is the opposite in every way. Rather than pick an internal focus, you have an external target or task that you are trying to accomplish. Your mind doesn’t wander but there are forces (such as the feeling of being tired) that try to take you off-mission. When that happens, instead of gently returning your focus to the task, you wall-off and harden yourself, stiffen your defenses and double your resolve.

The effects of meditation include reduced stress, a calmer mind, and inner peace; no surprise, the effects of denial are the opposite. The good news is that if you’re as well practiced in denial as me, you won’t notice these effects for the most part because, well, you can deny them. The bad news is that it eventually catches up.

One night recently, I wanted very badly to fall asleep but I couldn’t. The day - headlined by twelve-thousand steps ruck running across Manhattan and Queens from work meetings to parenting duties while enduring a summer cold and the summer heat - was the epitome of this breakneck summer. There in bed, I was in a state of involuntary resistance; my consciousness sustained by an invisible force akin to two misaligned magnets’ refusal to touch. Through the clenched fist of my daylong denial, I had achieved an odd, undesirable singularity: my body cried out for sleep but my mind would not and therefore could not hear it.

I don’t think denial is universally bad. As with anything, it comes down to how it is applied. Anger, for example, is an appropriate and good response to injustice, and self-denial is a close companion of grit, the modern day virtue of successful people.

And of course, there is Jesus who said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Stating the obvious, my form of denial falls far short of the denial Jesus calls for. In fact, it’s much the opposite: rather than deny me, it’s all me, good and bad inseparably marbled together.

My wife’s sixth sense told her I was still awake. “Breathe with me,” she prompted. Reluctantly, I obeyed. “Deep inhale,” she continued. “Now exhale everything out, until it’s all empty.” That’s the last thing I remember before falling asleep.