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I'm too high-strung. My brain never shuts off. Trust me, meditation is not for people like me.

People say that with total confidence, as if calm were an entry requirement. It's like saying the gym is only for people already in shape.

Episode Two clears away the things meditation isn't. Nobody handed you these on purpose. They came from pictures: the monk on the mountainside, the woman on the magazine cover with nothing in her head. You absorbed them without deciding to, and when your experience didn't match, you concluded the problem was you.

We take them one at a time. That you have to empty your mind, which nobody has ever done, including me, including this morning. That you need an hour a day. That it's religious, which you might not expect a man with Swami in front of his name to argue against. That it's escape, when most of what fills a day already is.

Your thoughts are leaves on a stream. The practice was never about stopping them.

If your mind is loud, you're not disqualified. You're who this is for.

Join me next time for Episode Three, What's Actually Happening When You Meditate?

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Reading Your Own Life With Swami Larry is written and hosted by Larry Lee. Season One is based on a manuscript written by Swami Larry with Faith Bleasdale.

New episodes every Monday and Thursday.

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