Joseph Goldstein and the Cat

Here's a nice little story about meditation (and so true) from one of my favorite meditation teachers, Joseph Goldstein, who I've still never seen in person although I've read a number of his books and listened to many of his talks on CD and tape. He is on a year-long sabbatical at the moment and teaches regularly at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA.

"In India, I was living in a little hut, about six feet by seven feet. It had a canvas flap instead of a door. I was sitting on my bed meditating, and a cat wandered in and plopped down on my lap. I took the cat and tossed it out the door. Ten seconds later it was back on my lap. We got into a sort of dance, this cat and I. I would toss it out, and it would come back. I tossed it out because I was trying to meditate, to get enlightened. But the cat kept returning. I was getting more and more irritated, more and more annoyed with the persistence of the cat. Finally, after about a half-hour of this coming in and tossing out, I had to surrender. There was nothing else to do. There was no way to block off the door. I sat there, the cat came back in, and it got on my lap. But I did not do anything. I just let go. Thirty seconds later the cat got up and walked out. So you see, our teachers come in many forms."

-Joseph Goldstein in "Transforming the Mind, Healing the World
from Everyday Mind" edited by Jean Smith, a Tricycle book

P.S.- I did watch the second half and all of the OT action for the World Cup Finals at a "closed" French restaurant in downtown Portland with some of the staff there who were kind/cool enough to let me hang out with them at the bar. Craig Ferguson made two funny points on his late show last night about Zidane's infamous head-butt to the chest of the Italian player. Craig said (roughly), "There are two things wrong with that. First, only an Italian soccer player would fall down from a head-butt to the chest. And second, you don't head-butt anybody in the chest, you get them right here (pointing to the place at the bridge of the nose and right between the eyes)." He said that's how they did it in Scotland, anyway.

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