Hate sitting like a monk? Sweat like a jock!

ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- Endless bad news: Economy, debt, markets, business, wars, oil, politics. Yes, we're all stressed out! Have you tried to meditate? No? Why? You hate sitting! Well, join the club.

The big secret: Sitting meditation doesn't work for 80% of today's busy Americans. Maybe it works for monks in monasteries. But a naïve media focuses too much on monks sitting, eyes closed, chanting mantras. Don't be misled. There are millions like you who "hate sitting like a monk, prefer sweating like a jock."

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Odds are that sitting's not the best way for you either -- not if you want the benefits of stress reduction, physical health, increased energy, higher productivity and success on the bottom line.

Something Pimco's Bill Gross said several years ago really got me thinking outside the sitting box about meditation: "Yoga is great physical training, not something spiritual or religious. I want to be as effective as I can be in my job. It's results-driven. And the results are remarkable." Quite remarkable, Pimco now manages assets of $1 trillion.

Passive meditation developed over thousand of years by spiritual masters who believed stress is a mental problem, who thought our "monkey brain" must be silenced, controlled. But new scientific research by modern sports psychologists is discovering just the opposite: Stress is actually natural and healthy.

So rather than eliminate stress, like the monks, the jocks begin with the premise that stress is positive, healthy, natural. And under pressure, stress challenges us to build inner strength, hone character, handle more pressure, and reach new levels of performance. In short, monks fight stress, jocks work with it.

Short Course: 'The New Meditation for People Who Can't Sit Still'

So here's "The Only Guide to Meditation & Stress Management You'll Ever Need," four simple rules proven to work in all meditation systems, ancient and modern, personal and institutional, secular and spiritual. And you don't need a guru. This "Short Course" works for anyone, anywhere, any activity, any time:

1. Focus on what you're doing in this moment -- and nothing else!

2. Anything you're doing can become a meditation -- anything!

3. Trust yourself, the results are within you -- discover your way!

4. Keep it real simple, everybody meditates -- it's natural!

Study the new research and you'll be amazed to see how many Americans are doing things they love and in the process meditating without even knowing it. America already has 30 million runners, 72 million hikers, 50 million fishing, 25 million golfers, 85 million cycling, 25 million in tennis, tens of millions of active folks like you all meditating naturally, "focusing on what they're doing in this moment." Listen to a few examples:

Marjorie Adams, publisher, 'Bottom Line Personal' newsletter

"Truthfully, I hate to meditate ... Sitting still is not the only way to meditate. It's simply the best known ... You can meditate while exercising ... pursuing a hobby ... or playing a game ... anything can be a meditation."

Sam Keen, philosopher, in 'Hymns to an Unknown God'

"Sitting meditation, like repentance, is work ... Walking, by contrast, is pure grace, an effortless art that produces surprising moments of spontaneous self-transcendence. When I walk, my mind leaps ahead, skips steps, and presents me with images and ideas out of nowhere. With surprising regularity the thoughts that come to me when I am on a long hike in the hills contain the breakthrough insights I have been unable to reach after weeks of hard intellectual or emotional work."

Andy O'Keefe, Wall Street broker, in 'Real Men Do Yoga'

"I'm married with seven kids. Been on Wall Street for 20 years. I'm the owner of a brokerage firm: 110 employees. I'm 6'4", 225 pounds. I've lifted weights for years and I run. I played lacrosse at college, and basketball, football in high school. So I love sports. ... I just thought yoga was ... a weird Eastern thing. But that's not true at all. ... I feel stronger, more flexible. And it's helped me with my golf ... Mentally it kind of clears your head. You can't think about anything, but what you're doing while you're in there. It's a good escape for me."

Deepak Chopra, M.D. in 'The A.I.M. of Golf'

"When Mitchell (Spearman, golf instructor) and I first spoke, he remarked, 'The spiritual stuff you think about is something I frequently experience on the golf course. I wish I could experience it when I'm not playing golf.' I responded, 'That's how I feel most of the time, but I lose it when I play golf.' We made a deal. I would teach Mitchell the rules that make the game of life a joyful, ecstatic expression. Mitchell would teach me the rules that make the game of golf a joyful, ecstatic experience. Guess what. They are the same rules."

Ryel Kestenbaun, in 'The Ultralight Backpacker'

"In daily life, there is precious little time to let our minds rest quietly. Our brains are so used to being fed a constant diet of stimulation ... You can practice meditation anywhere, at any time -- sitting in your car at a red light, eating dinner at a restaurant, and, yes, backpacking along a trail. The most profound meditative states I've ever reached came while walking by myself along a trail deep in the backcountry, immersed completely in the world around me and within my own self. ... Nature is one giant meditation room ... provides us with an opportunity to turn down the volume of our everyday lives and become utterly connected with who we truly are."

Martha Clopfer, in 'Positive Addictions' by William Glasser, M.D.

"Meditative is probably the best single word but it is different from Quaker meeting type meditation. ... The rhythm of running is a strong element. Sometimes problems get solved while I am running or I think of things to say to people but it is not a figuring out process. More of a sudden flash of insight that comes when you are least trying to find an answer."

Chuck Norris, martial arts champion, 'The Secret Power Within'

"Your mind is not here," he said. I made no effort to deny he was right; students of martial arts soon learn that their teachers can see right through them. Standing there on the hard ground in Korea, I just bowed my head slightly and waited for Mr. Shin to continue. 'What you are doing at the moment must be exactly what you are doing at the moment -- and nothing else.' ... There's a certain impatience about Zen, an unwillingness to get lost in meandering arguments, a desire to cut quickly to the essential, or to get to the bottom line."

Robert Pirsig, in 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance'

"Just to sit with the line in the water" fishing "not moving, not really thinking about anything, not really caring about anything either seems to draw out the inner tensions and frustrations that have prevented you from solving problems you couldn't solve before." Which oddly reminds me of a police commander friend who said when that his wife went to church he meditated while gardening in their back yard.

Ian Thompson, world champion marathoner

"There is a part of every marathon where something does take over.... the sensation of movement ... You lose a sense of identity in yourself, you become running itself ... get a feeling of euphoria, almost real happiness... It is the platonic idea of knowing thyself. Running is getting to know yourself to an extreme degree." As in cycling, tai chi, tennis.

Clark Strand, former monk, in 'The Wooden Bowl'

"Meditation ought to decrease the drivenness of our lives, not make it worse. That is why I say meditate for its own sake, as a hobby ... a time when you can occupy your mind with something for its own sake, without getting caught up in any of your usual occupations."

Norman Fischer, music lover, poet, Zen Abbot

"I'm in my car, on the highway. I turn off the news and the baseball game I've been listening to and switch to a Beethoven violin sonata that's loaded in the CD player. Listening to the music, my mind gradually starts to release, like a hand that had been grasping something tightly and is beginning to let go. Another mind appears, a mind completely engaged with the pattern the music weaves. A moment before I had been frozen into the shape of a self in a world. Now, the music has thawed me out."

Jean-Etienne Poirier, in 'Dancing the Wave'

"The path of surfing, presents similarities with the paths of all people who have sought meaning and found their essence, whether through surfing, practicing zazen or studying the Tao." Surfing as dance? Reminds us St. Augustine once said: "O' humans, learn to dance, otherwise the angels of Heaven won't know what to do with you."

Julia Cameron, on journal writing in 'The Artist's Way'

"Morning Pages are my way of meditating ... three pages a day ... they work for anyone, for painters, for sculptors, for poets, for actors, for lawyers, for housewives, for anyone who wants to try anything creative ... Lawyers who use them swear they make them more effective in court. ... They are a potent form of meditation for hyperactive Westerners."

Bottom line: Meditation's not what you think. No big secrets. No mantras, incense, bells, strange music. No sitting and no gurus. Think outside the box: Meditation is as simple, natural as breathing.

Yes, most gurus, clinicians and experts will still defend sitting as the only way. That's wrong. Sitting meditation works for maybe 20%. The other 80% meditate in action. And they do it without thinking they're meditating, without even calling it meditation. You do what you love, and whatever you're doing at the moment is exactly what you are doing at the moment -- and nothing else. You are at peace, you are alive.

If there is a secret, the secret is that you can't "not meditate," that's impossible. We all do it, naturally. It just happens. We do it often during the day, breathing, reading, rocking to music, walking, praying, exercising, sports, affirming goals, working on a positive mental attitude.

The psychology of ideology

The Democrats actually started to hit back at the Republicans two days ago on the Christmas bombing matter. The Politico story that I flagged the other morning, about the difference in the way the Democrats and the media treated Bush after the shoe-bomber incident and the way the GOP went after Obama and got the media to follow its lead over these last few days, seems to have had a pretty major impact.

One GOP member of Congress, Mike Conaway of Texas, was asked on MSNBC yesterday whether he was equally critical of Bush when Bush took six days – far more than Obama – to speak publicly about Richard Reid, the shoe bomber. And about whether he was critical of the fact that Reid was tried in a civilian court (some Republicans are demanding a military tribunal for Umar Abdulmutallab). This Conaway, whoever he is, bumbled his way through the interview.

Steve Benen had a good piece noting that since Obama became president, US forces have taken out or apprehended several key terrorist leaders, but that the White House hasn't called celebratory press conferences to draw conspicuous attention to them. Bush and Cheney, he avers, would make sure everyone knew about it.

I think this is true. And if true, why? Well, the obvious explanation that would occur to people is that the Republicans are more willing to use terrorism to score political points. I think this is true, too. But then we must ask in turn: why is this true?

I don't think it's merely that Republicans are more aggressively willing to politicize stuff, although they are that. But there's more. This is a layer of analysis we don't usually get to in politics, but this is really the heart of the matter, to me.

I believe it has to do with the governing psychologies of liberals and conservatives. The two groups have completely different moral systems – read this article, for example. It describes five foundational moral impulses found in all humans, in all societies, in different combinations:

• Harm/care. It is wrong to hurt people; it is good to relieve suffering.
• Fairness/reciprocity. Justice and fairness are good; people have certain rights that need to be upheld in social interactions.
• In-group loyalty. People should be true to their group and be wary of threats from the outside. Allegiance, loyalty and patriotism are virtues; betrayal is bad.
• Authority/respect. People should respect social hierarchy; social order is necessary for
human life.
• Purity/sanctity. The body and certain aspects of life are sacred. Cleanliness and health, as well as their derivatives of chastity and piety, are all good. Pollution, contamination and the associated character traits of lust and greed are all bad.

Liberals care most about the first two, conservatives about the last three – I'd say especially the fourth. And terrorism is a mortal and existential threat to social order and human life. So conservatives are going to be more worked up about it. They're going to see the world – well, more like Dick Cheney sees the world.

And if that's how you see the world, then an incident like Christmas Day's freaks you out. And an incident like the capture or killing of a leading terrorist is a huge deal – one you are likely to trumpet. So it isn't just cynical political manipulation that makes conservative governments more likely to trumpet victories over terrorists. It's their moral world view.

And that's all fine. But here's where I believe the conservative view gets darker and destructive and anti-democratic.

In valuing social order during a historical moment of extreme (as they see it) social disorder, conservatives are willing to assert an unusual degree of control over the people. In such a circumstance, they don't want reasoning citizens. They want children-citizens, wards of the state, who look to the daddy-state for protection and preservation of the social order.

I am not saying this is necessarily cynical or malevolent on their part. It simply fits with the extremely high value they place on hierarchy and order, and with their idea of how to maintain both in society.

But, as we saw over the past eight years, it clashes mightily with democratic principles. In many ways the hardest job Obama and his people face is to discard the Cheney idea of order (which they undoubtedly reject morally) but still maintain enough order that America is not attacked.

That's a hard needle to thread, especially with our political system and culture stacked the way it is – it's much more amenable to the conservative interpretation of these matters, because it's easier to understand and communicate to others. So it's really no wonder that Obama's most disappointing area to liberals has been civil liberties. It's going to take him and his people some time to figure this balance out.

In the meantime, he should not be alarmist or try to play sheriff just because it looks better on cable. The Boston Globe put it well in an editorial yesterday:

[bq] President Obama's manner in responding to the attack on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 was a statement in itself. He was unruffled, focused strictly on the facts, and conveyed his commitment to locating the plotters in clear, unmistakable language…

…Obama chose to concentrate on explaining exactly why the United States was using "every element of our national power'' to disrupt terrorists, rather than engage in largely symbolic vows of vengeance.

Americans may feel that anger, and some would opt for a president who channels their feelings more directly. But they're safer with Obama, who keeps the attention of the world where it should be: on rooting out Al Qaeda. [end bq]

Actually, we can't know if we're safer with Obama. Our safety has to do with a million factors, among which presidential decisions probably rank fairly low. What we do know is that he wants us to be grown-up citizens who aren't tugging at daddy's pant-leg whenever danger approaches. I notice his poll numbers haven't dipped in the wake of the GOP onslaught. Maybe America is ready for a different approach than Cheney's.