📿 Perfect Just as You Are

How do you measure spiritual progress?

Years ago I was attending a meditation retreat. I had grown disheartened by what I perceived to be the neurotic behavior of some senior students who were teaching there. I complained to my meditation instructor at the time. She replied, “You should have seen them when they first started meditating decades ago.”

At the time I was annoyed by this response. Today, I find it almost comforting. 

What I wanted to see in every meditation teacher I encountered was a perfect role model for who I could become…and who I wanted to become was someone completely free of confusion, who never said or did the wrong thing or who never fell into a negative thought. That’s a lot to ask of any given human being, no matter how long they have been meditating.

Thirty plus years into my meditation practice, I realize that I can hold two seemingly contradictory things in my mind: