Meditation

By Jean Kirkpatrick, Ph.D., WFS Founder

To meditate is to reflect, to think, to ponder. Dorothy Canfield Fisher once wrote, “We need to meditate, for meditation brings that calm continuity of spiritual and mental effort without which few can have the heart-satisfying sense of understanding.”

Meditation is a way in which we can glimpse that glory of life… our life.

Meditation is part of the recovery process used in the WFS “New Life” Program. It is, in fact, an integral part of the program because it provides that part of our recovery that helps us to center ourselves and our place in the scheme of things.

Too often our lives are merely centered on our family and our jobs. We do not take the time to see ourselves in relation to the larger fabric of life. Too often we do not make time to reflect, to think, to ponder.

To practice the “New Life” Program to its fullest extent is to take a part of each day for meditation, for a time to think, for a time to reflect. The time of day selected can be different for each of us, but, for me, the very best time (and the time I most urge members to use) is the first segment of each day… that time of day before anyone else arises, so that each is entirely alone with her thoughts, her reflections, her meditations.

The meditative period should be that period in which each sees herself and her values; it should be that period of time when we are thankful for our sobriety, for our new life, for our ability to think straight, for our family and friends. It can be a period of spiritual reflection and it can be a period of quiet time for thought. It can be a period of time to make affirmations to oneself about what one wishes to achieve.

Meditation is very effective when one sits close to a window so that the outer world of nature can be observed. This provides a means for reflection, for it helps us to realize that there is a much larger but much less complicated, more normal life out there, a life not riddled with arguments, fights about money, worries about mundane things. It is a world of order and harmony. There is the dependability of the moon rising and the sun setting.

Seeing the natural world… looking at a tree … helps us to drop the worries and the tension. It changes our focus. It allows us to know that life is greater than arguments and sticky relationships.

We are a part of a greater whole. We are an important part of that living, natural world.

A twenty-minute period of meditation helps us to ponder ourselves. It helps us to think about ourselves and helps us to feel good about ourselves. (At least, that’s what it’s SUPPOSED to do!)

It helps us to be centered. For those using the WFS “New Life” Program, it gives us a time to read the Program Statements each day and to reflect on them and their meaning for us. It gives us a time to select one Statement that we will use all that day.

There are many forms of meditation. Perhaps the form that became the most popular is transcendental meditation. This form means to transcend, to go beyond. Usually one assumes a certain position and makes use of a ‘mantra’.

Some persons use a form of meditation that is more like relaxation, lying on the floor in a relaxed position, listening to soft music.

The form of meditation suggested by WFS is the form in which we reflect, we ponder, we think, we relate, we center on ourselves and where we are going and what our relationship is to the world around us.

There is no one form of meditation that is right or wrong. To meditate, whatever form one uses, is to grow. It is the time in which we see ourselves in relation to eternity.

(This article is from The Collection of Sobering Thoughts Booklet, Volume 11 and copyrighted by Women for Sobriety, Inc., PO Box 618, Quakertown, PA 18951.)