Page 144 - The Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin_Neat plip book

wandering, he just released the tho ught like a cloud gl idi ng by and retur ne d to
his breath. For beginners, this meditation may seem frus trating be caus e the y

notice their minds racing all over the place and feel that they are do ing ba dl y;
but that is not the case. The retur n to br eath is the key to thi s form of
meditation. There is no doing bad ly or well, jus t being with your br eath,
releasing your thoughts when you notice them , and coming back to br eath. I

highly recommend such techniques. Not onl y is the retur n to breath a gl immer
of the zone—a moment of undistracted presence—but the ebb and fl w of the
experience is another form of stress and recovery training. Fi nal ly, if the re is
nothing in your life that feels serene, meditation is the perfect ho bby to he lp

you discover a launching point in your search for a personal ized rout ine .
Dennis has had a light snack and done some breathi ng exercises. After the se
twenty-five minutes, the next step woul d be a ten-minut e stretchi ng rout ine
from his high school football days. I asked Denni s what ki nd of mus ic he

listened to. He had eclectic taste, everythi ng from Metallica to Bob Dylan to
classical. I told him that I loved Bob Dylan as well. We decided on “Sad- Eyed
Lady of the Lowlands,” a beautiful , mellow, long Dylan song; but really any
music would have worked, dependi ng on the indi vidual ’s preferenc e. After

listening to the song, Dennis would get his son, and they would go outside and
toss around the baseball as they di d every day. I told Denni s to treat the catch
like any other catch, j ust to have fun.
So we created the following routine:

1. at a light consistent snack for 10 mi nut es
2. 5 minutes of meditation
3. 0 minutes of stretching
4. 0 minutes of listening to Bob Dylan
5. lay ball

For about a month, Dennis went thr ough hi s rout ine every da y be fore
playing catch with his son. Each step of the rout ine was nat ur al for hi m, and
playing ball was always a joy, s o there was no strain to the ex per ience.
The next step in the process is the critical one: after he had ful ly

internalized his routine, I suggested that he do it the morni ng bef ore go ing to
an important meeting. So Dennis transpl anted his rout ine from a pr elude to
playing catch with his son to a pr elude to work. He did so and came ba ck