Rolling Meditations

In 2025, I started meditating. It’s a thing I’d attempted many times before but was never able to stick with. I could never shake the feeling that I was doing it wrong, that my breathing wasn’t right, that my mind was just too scattered to settle in and get anything from regular meditation.

This year, I cracked the code.

Now when I sit down to meditate, I have no goals. There is literally no way me for me to fail, because I’m not trying to accomplish anything other than sitting still for 15 minutes and seeing what happens. Shockingly, I’ve been able to do this 4-5 times per week for some time now.

And that’s good, because the vibes aren’t good lately. The news is a lot of chaos and uncertainty, and I’m sure I’m not the only one anxious about what’s coming down the pike. One of my favorite sayings from 12-step work is, “Don’t get tangled in the wreckage of the future.” And the wreckage seems to be piling up.

I have a cushion in my living room where I sit. I play 15 minutes of the hokiest pseudo-spiritual music I can find. 432Mhz Vibrations for Bad Energy Removal. Deep Om Chanting for Chakra Clearance. Infinite Calm: Buddha’s Flute for the Soul | Soothing Flute. I s&$% you not. This stuff is absolutely polluting my feed, and I keep going.

This summer, at my house, is a little hectic. My older son is home from college. My younger son is getting ready to graduate and going to class much less than he was before he was accepted to college himself. We have a new dog (who thinks my meditation cushion is a dog bed). All in all, it’s not very conducive to sitting quietly for any length of time, but it IS conducive to climbing on the bike, settling myself in the saddle, and seeing where I end up.

I know a lot of people find riding, especially solo riding, meditative, and I suppose I’ve always been sympathetic to that viewpoint without really ever feeling like I was doing it. But with a few months of non-riding meditation behind me now, I can see that the experience isn’t very different. Sure, there’s more sensory input when you’re riding. You’ve got to pay some level of attention. But just like I have been in seated meditation, I have regularly been surprised at what occurs to me when I’m out on the bike, and that for some reason, I always feel better afterwards.