They say it takes two or three years before you see a real change in yourself through meditation. I've only been practicing for a few months. The past few days I've gotten up before six, which seems to work out best. I'm not exactly fresh in the morning, but if I don't do it first thing, I find that I'll keep pushing it back in my day until I'm so tired I tell myself I'll do it the next day.
Problem is, I don't think I can wait another three years. I think, what am I supposed to do? Bide my time, while away for another three years, until suddenly everything clicks in for me.
I guess you could say that I'm a perfectionist. I want things a certain way. I want to be a certain kind of person. I want to live in a certain city. But none of my conditions have been met here. I'm stuck. There's nothing I want. I don't like where I live.
Years ago, twenty years ago, in fact, I was working at The New York Public Library being trained by a woman who was leaving for Arizona. I think she was going to University there. Her advice to me was, never move anywhere for a man. It's sort of a golden rule for women. And I broke it. And so, here I am, stuck, trying to figure a way out of my regret and bitterness. At times in the past ten years, many times, days and weeks and months on end, I've been so despondent, I haven't known what to do with myself. I have to accept everything. The loss of my education, alienation, everything. No matter what I've tried, I haven't been able to change these fundamental facts of my existence here. I am a prisoner in Schiedam, and no matter how much I howl, wail, scream, argue, persuade, it doesn't change a thing, because the Dutch are the clay people, unmovable, and heavy.
Buddhist advice goes: Don't do anything a wise man wouldn't regret later. Still, here I am, building up more regret by the day. Even as I sit here writing this, I am building regret for the words I write.
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