Charterhouse Chronicle

Quentin de la BAdoyAre
New Year Resolution Number One: embarrass your children less. It's not a question of whether we embarrass our children, but just how much we embarrass them. Our 11-year-old granddaughter came to supper and mentioned how embarrassed she was because her mother would wave a greeting to other parents she knew. That surprised us, so we asked whether we had ever caused her embarrassment. She immediately instanced an occasion when a male class mate of hers (to whom I once taught reading) came up and gave me a hug at the school gates (I was very politically incorrect with my reading groups). That caused her great grief.
My wife then told her how, in younger and hippier days, she used to visit our boys' senior school wearing chains and a bra-less Ossie Clark number of extreme brevity. Abigail had some difficulty in getting her mind around Granny in this garb, and her squirm of embarrassment at even the thought nearly put her under the table.
We asked her how a parent should behave to minimise embarrassment. No embraces apparently, and avoid contact with other parents and other children. Dress like all the other Mums (forbid the thought!). And just be casual. But you must be casual about being casual — you mustn't actually try to act casual. Pretty demanding, I think.
New Year Resolution Number Two: master meditation. Transcendental meditation is associated in many people's minds with Maharishis, Yogic Flying and esoteric techniques. But I was surprised, talking with a group of diverse people last week, that none of them had ever tried it. There is nothing weird about it, and I have found it a great aid to Christian prayer and a source of other benefits.
It is easier to think of it in two stages. The first is the development of deep relaxation. This is a simple biological process — and any well-stocked bookshop will provide a choice of manuals. But developing deep relaxation (which is very different from ordinary relaxation) does take practice. I usually find that people need about a week of twice-daily practice to begin to see the difference. And the learning and deepening continue indefinitely. I now find it easy to trigger the response almost instantaneously — very useful at the dentist.
There are measurable changes which take place such as the lowering of the metabolic rate and oxygen intake, as well as quite substantial alterations in brain wave patterns. These changes are of a different order from those which occur in sleep. There are benefits such as the release of stress, the lowering of blood pressure in cases of hypertension, and even the possibility of self hypnosis. My wife has often used it as a way of quietening the mind before sleep, When I was marriage counselling I found that some clients were so tense that I had to teach them deep relaxation before we could start any work. Many other benefits are claimed, with studies to back them. but 1 confine myself to those of which I have had experience.
The mind is emptied of extraneous thoughts, and this, for me, is where meditative prayer comes in. There is now room to put oneself in the presence of God. There is no need, and in fact undesirable, to say prayers of praise or petition or anything else, just to be there. If anyone were to accuse me of self-delusion my only defence would be that this is what I experience — take it or leave it.
I have sometimes found a mantra useful; this is a simple, repetitive phrase which helps to exclude extraneous thoughts and distractions. Take your choice: I find "God is love" works for me. No doubt more advanced meditators do not need even this. However, Dr Herbert Benson, who is eminent in this field, tells us that "the relaxation response can be deepened when the meditative phrase used has some personal, religious significance".
This chimes with a small study, reported last year, that the reciting of the Rosary car) achieve similar states of relaxation, opening the way to meditation. The recently extended Mysteries of the Rosary therefore give us all, in this New Year, a greater opportunity to help mind, body and soul. I would be interested to
hear from anyone who has progressed further down this path than I have.
New Year Resolution Number Three: learn to listen. I feel, though you may not, that readers of The Catholic Herald are privileged to have the first public opportunity to read selections from my maxims — which I inflict on you from time to time And you may be the last. So how about improving your listening skills in 2003?
True listening requires us to absorb what the speaker is saying from his perspective, and not from ours.
It is only when we have absorbed what another is trying to say from his perspective that we are entitled to expect him to listen to us.
Until a man knows that we have seen circumstances from his point of view, his mind will not be open to change or modification.
True listening does not come easily to us; it involves accepting that another 's view may be more important than expressing our own.
True listening is a skill only acquired with much practice, and only maintained with much perseverance.
Sometimes the best present we can give someone is to listen to what he has to say. It will come as a surprise because you may be the first person who has ever given it.
Intelligence and knowledge are the enemies of good listening. The quicker and the more well-stocked the mind the harder it is for the listener to avoid anticipating the speaker and formulating premature solutions.
Most conversations are like tennis marches. We only listen so that we can position ourselves to make the best return.
I am only a good listener malgr6 moi — which is why I prefer to write maxims. ([email protected])