I’ve come to really dislike television. I haven’t owned one for about seven years now, and other than a few hours spent watching it with friends or family, I simply don’t have any interest.
Given that, I’ve found it especially funny, and difficult at times, to have moved into a building with a neighbor who watches her television very loudly all day and often late into the night.
I spoke in person with her about a dozen times before finally asking the landlord to do something about it, which he did. And yet, maybe once a week or every two weeks, I end up pounding on ceiling to get her to turn it down.
Once, it was driving me to look for a new apartment; now, it’s a source for looking at myself and how I react to life’s unfolding.
This evening, I was doing an immunity sequence from an issue of Yoga Journal. There I was, just beginning my warm-up salutations, when the sound of — you guessed it — TV commercial dialogue and music crept into my ears.
Now, I’ve practiced compassion meditation for this woman, have tried to be friendly when I see her, have even returned her mailbox key to her when she left it in the mailbox — yet, it’s amazing how quickly my mind can return to nasty thoughts about her and the waste of time that TV is, etc, etc.
So there I was in prasarita padottanasana (a yoga pose), feeling my legs stretching and having this dialogue/argument in my head about the sound of the TV. It was kind of embarrassing, and yet fascinating because I remembered a basic teaching which goes something like if you can do something about it, do it and if you can’t, let it go.
And so, I went into the next pose, standing forward bend, and watched my mind and also listened as the TV volume seemed to creep up a little more (I sometimes wonder if I’m imagining it getting louder, or if it’s really all about the volume fluctuation for the commercials).
Anyway, at the end of the pose, I decided it had gotten too loud, and I hit the wall a single time. She turned it down, as she pretty much always does, but I then worked into the next pose, and watched as a rush of irritation and adrenaline filled me and then passed through.
It’s amazing how much I crave silence sometimes, and struggle when I can’t get it. I know partly this has to do with working at an overly-cramped little school, where my attention in constantly challenged. And also living in the middle of the city, which I love, but sometimes probably need a break from.
Maybe you, too, have similar cravings you struggle with? Whatever they are, I keep finding myself coming back to another question: how can we learn to stop dividing the world into what we want and what we don’t want?
Photo Credit
“TV Noise 3” danagraves @ flickr.com. Creative Commons. Some Rights Reserved.
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