【正文】
nd I started studying meditation. People often ask me what I learned from that time. Well, obviously it changed things. Letamp。t really thought that it could be sort of preventative in nature, until I was about 20, when a number of things happened in my life in quite quick succession, really serious things which just flipped my life upside down and all of a sudden I was inundated with thoughts, inundated with difficult emotions that I didnamp。d also seen a few kung fu movies, and secretly I kind of thought I might be able to learn how to fly, but I was very young at the time. Now as I was there, I guess, like a lot of people, I assumed that it was just an aspirin for the mind. You get stressed, you do some meditation. I hadnamp。s really not how it has to be. So I was about 11 when I went along to my first meditation class. And trust me, it had all the stereotypes that you can imagine, the sitting crosslegged on the floor, the incense, the herbal tea, the vegetarians, the whole deal, but my mom was going and I was intrigued, so I went along with her. Iamp。ve just kind of got to get on with it. Thatamp。s the way life is, so weamp。re no longer present in the world in which we live. We miss out on the things that are most important to us, and the crazy thing is that everybody just assumes, well, thatamp。t really know how to deal with that, and the sad fact is that we are so distracted that weamp。m going. The result, of course, is that we get stressed. You know, the mind whizzes away like a washing machine going round and round, lots of difficult, confusing emotions, and we donamp。 okay, maybe not our hair, but you see where Iamp。t take any time out to look after it. In fact, we spend more time looking after our cars, our clothes and our hair than we amp。re talking about our mind. The mind, our most valuable and precious resource, through which we experience every single moment of our life, the mind that we rely upon to be happy, content, emotionally stable as individuals, and at the same time to be kind and thoughtful and considerate in our relationships with others. This is the same mind that we depend upon to be focused, creative, spontaneous, and to perform at our very best in everything that we do. And yet, we donamp。s no ing, texting, no Internet, no TV, no chatting, no eating, no reading, not even sitting there reminiscing about th