Vipassana helps me connect with my personal path. In addition to clarity between right and wrong, when I’m connected to my practice and the sensations in my body it feels like I can feel God’s plan for me. Logic is an attractive tool because it provides rules and guidelines to follow. I can determine a destination, construct a plan according to the appropriate rules, then set course for the life of my dreams. I can plan out the next 40 years, but life has a way to twisting and turning in unpredictable ways. When I hold on to my logical rules too tightly, these twists and turns seem unfair, and if I surrender to them without hope I can feel depressed and defeated, but if I can surrender with faith and hope, life can become a wonderful unpredictable adventure.

When I connect with the sensations in my body and feel God’s plan for me, I can surrender with faith and hope, but feeling alone can be uncomfortable and unpredictable. Intuition only allows me to see about 10 steps in front of me, and the clarity of my intuition is inconsistent. I may feel that I need an answer now, but it may take weeks or months to gain clarity on a specific issue through meditation. Early in my practice, if I didn’t have clarity I would simply passively wait. This lead me to inaction at times and an inability to connect with other people in my life navigating the same challenges. While promoting my Vipassana intuition, I had made the mistake of undervaluing my brain.

Thinking and feeling are two powerful tools at my disposal. Thinking can provide quick answers to immediate problems and articulating my thoughts allows me to work with other people to find solutions to complex community level problems. Meditation can help me maintain a clear mind and provide long term intuition to determine if I’m heading in the right direction, but my brain helps me put all the pieces together and keep things moving in the right direction. To support the world growing in the right direction, I need to continue learning how to integrate my thoughts and my intuition. I need to continue learning both on the cushion and in the world to discover the best ways I can serve society and help create a loving world. Time to meditate.