On January 11th, 2016, I started a daily practice of writing a joke meditation of the day called Cracked Pot Meditations. I was still recovering from the treatment of cancer, and I was having very challenging cognitive issues, so I chose just to put something simple and easy to write every day. Posting it to the blog allowed me to have some accountability. Some of those meditations were poorly written and unedited. I have gone back and begun editing these and adding an illustration, starting with the April 27th meditation. I hope you enjoy.
Meditation for July 16th
Your Mala Beads
Mala beads are the small, stone beads found draped around the necks of yoga practitioners, Buddhists, and aficionados of Asian culture everywhere. They are used to keep count of mantras and prayers, much like the Rosary beads of the Catholics. The usual count is 108, but mala beads come in different numbers and sizes.
If you’re going for the new-age hippie yoga bike look, then a mala bead is a must-have accessory. This will let people know that you have a reason to wear a top knot or yoga pants. People will see this and won’t confuse you for just a person who boringly works out all the time. Now that smug little smile you wear all day can be answered that you are smug about being so fucking in-tuned with your silly vibrations, and people won’t think you need to be punched – maybe.
Selecting the right stones for your mala is an entirely different challenge. Luckily for me, I have a spiritual guide to help me pick the right one.
ADD or a tweaker
Whoa, Speed Racer, slow down. You have a lot of energy. You work out five times a day, and you are talking faster than the speed of sound. It sounds like Alvin of the Chipmunks on helium, cranked up and played back at 45 speed. You need some soothing aquamarine or amazonite. You also might need to purify yourself with amethyst. It’s okay to chill.
A Jibber Jabber
You have to process everything, from relationship breakups to how the drive-through at the bank went. You need to express yourself at all times. However, when you’re trying to help someone by sharing your experiences, you often turn every conversation into your own problems and struggles. Maybe some tanzanite will help you be clearer, at least.
Freak-out
Nothing is going to work out. You can’t see a positive possibility on your horizon at all. You will never feel safe. You live in anxiety. You almost can’t picture your life without anxiety, nor do you want to. You’d be a big fat nothing if you didn’t have your neurosis. Get some smoky quartz to ground you back to earth and then moonstone can help see things a different way. You also might choke on the mala in your sleep.
I’m an artist
So you’re an artist. You do creative things when no one is looking. You are an artist, yet you are always hanging out at bars and coffee shops bumming cigarettes, but you are an artist! You may need some rose quartz to think more fondly of the projects you claim to be working on. You probably won’t make this mala anyway. No, I don’t smoke.
If you’re always up in other people’s shit all the goddamned time
You need to be in the action. You are a drama junky, but you prefer it from the sidelines, or better yet, as a coach. You love to fix other people and give them great advice on what they can do to better themselves, while you lead a boring, meaningless life. Tourmaline will protect you from being a character in the drama itself, and clear quartz will clean you of all that filthy, shitty energy you just swallowed being a nosy looky-lou.
Money, money, money
You care about nothing but money. Gotta sell that house. Gotta get paid. Gotta get more money. Gotta be rich. You don’t care about the spiritual journey unless it helps you make more money, which is evident in the numerous crossovers between new age and sales culture. Sales thrive in the new age world, and new age concepts are highly effective in the sales world. Think about that. Wanna make some cash? Citrine is the stone that makes you a closer. You want to be a closer? A-B-C. A-always, B-be, C-closing. Always be closing! Always be closing! A-I-D-A. Attention, interest, decision, action. Attention: do I have your attention? Interest: Are you interested? I know you are ’cause it’s fuck or walk. You close or you hit the bricks! Decision: Have you made your decision for Christ?! And Action. A-I-D-A. Get out there! You got the prospects comin’ in. You think they came in to get out of the rain? A person doesn’t walk on the lot unless they want to buy. They’re sitting out there waiting to give you their money! Are you gonna take it? Are you man enough to take it?
You want to meditate all the time
Either I’m lying to you because I know what you’re doing, or you could try amethyst to bolster your meditation practice.
You also want a good color or combination of colors.
Blue: Chill out, crakster gangster
Green: Get rich or die trying
Yellow: Mania
Red: Lust
Pink: Make money without working
White: Return to innocence.
Black: Stay away from me, I’m a spiritual ninja!
How to use a mala
Sit cross-legged. Do it somewhere where people can see you.
You will have a first bead, a “guru” bead blessed by someone who took all your money to tell you something that Wikipedia could have told you.
Start with that one.
Pick a mantra. “I will get a girlfriend by the end of this year” “I will stop buying punk records because I don’t like punk and I don’t have anymore friends to impress” “I will stop dating boys just because they show me affection” “I will stop investing money in printers, they aren’t the next big thing” or something else you want to change about yourself.
Say the mantra as you touch each bead. Screaming is the best way. Screaming desperately, like this, will actually bring some sort of mystical change or psychic rearrangement.
Sit there catching your breath from screaming. Look around the room as you pant and make eye contact with people.
Pray and thank the universe for listening to your pitiful entreaties.