I’m out to dinner and someone I’ve never met before has just found out I teach meditation.

“That’s nice,” she says. “I tried that once but couldn’t do it. I was no good at it.”

I’ve heard this before. A lot. Here we go again.

Part of me is frustrated with this person in front of me, but I know it wasn’t her fault. She doesn’t know I’ve heard this about a hundred times. She doesn’t know that what I’m about to say to her I’ve said about a hundred times before.

“I expect you did it perfectly.” I say.

Disbelief and hope seem to cross her face momentarily, before she realises I have no idea just how ‘bad’ she was at meditating.

“No, my mind was all over the place.” She explains.

“And you think that everyone else’s mind was calm and relaxed?” I ask.

“Yes. They were all sat there peacefully, completely relaxed.” She asserts.

I pause. I don’t feel quite ready to try to convince her she should give it another go.

“You know, no matter how crazy you think your mind is, I promise you it’s probably exactly the same as everyone else’s.”

I don’t know where this came from and feels a bit risky. Maybe she really is nuts, or maybe she’s going to take exception to the idea that I’ve suggested she’s crazy.

But she doesn’t. She looks hopeful.

“Really?”

“Yes. Everyone’s mind is the same. We’re all getting distracted relentlessly. If you could see inside, or hear everyone’s thoughts it would be complete chaos. They just look relaxed. Your experience was what it was supposed to be. I just wish someone had explained to you what was going to happen before you started so that you’d not have been so judgmental of yourself.”

We talked a bit more about it and she said she would give it another go sometime. This is one of the most common types of conversations I have when someone asks me about meditation. They think they’re bad at it because they get distracted when they ‘think’ they’re supposed to be perfectly still, focused, or at peace. The truth is they’re not bad at it. They’re doing it right. The only thing they’re doing wrong is judging themselves for getting distracted. That’s unhelpful.

One type of awareness meditation, or what is sometimes referred to as mindfulness meditation, involves trying to hold your attention on the breath.

But this is difficult to do because the mind wanders.

Relatively quickly you start wondering about all sorts of things until at some point you notice that you’re no longer focused on your breathing.

The classic instruction is to then gently return your focus back to the breathing, without judgment.

That’s not quite as easy as it sounds. None of it.

In order to go back to focussing on breathing we have to let go of whatever we are thinking about. We aren’t used to that. We tend to think that if a random thought appears in our consciousness it must be for a good reason. We need to listen to it. We need to think about this thing right now. Except we don’t. It appeared out of nowhere, without you wanting it to. What we are going to start to do is to practice NOT listening to every random thought that appears in your consciousness. See the thought. Let go of the thought. Right now … we’re practicing meditation, so let’s practice meditation and go back to the breath.

The other part that’s really difficult is the ‘without judgment’ part. There’s such deep seated misunderstanding that we’re not supposed to lose concentration. Therefore when we do lose concentration we’re being bad, or it’s a sign we’re bad at meditation. Rubbish. At least in the early stages of meditation you have zero control over getting distracted. That’s fine. All part of the process. So, see if you can instead be a bit kinder to yourself, more understanding, and just start to accept that distraction is part of the game. Then start again. Repeat, over, and over, and over, and over …

My goal in these blogs is going to be to try to de-mystify meditation and to show you that what you’re experiencing in meditation is normal. It actually doesn’t make you a bad meditator, even if you think you are. You’re doing it exactly right. Just do it. The only really bad meditation is the non-meditation. Sit down. Take a breath. Take another breath. Try to hold your focus. When you notice you’ve got distracted, take another breath. Return your focus. Try not to judge yourself.