Nirvana or bust

[Puddled]

It was one Saturday morning in the autumn of 2005 that I decided to seek inner peace. Heavy and constant drug use for over a decade had failed to provide me with any clear spiritual direction (not that it promised this on the packet). In addition, rather than transforming my mind into a well-honed, multi-purpose life tool (again not promised), they had melted said mind, which now sloshed from side to side inside my cranium like a tired gelatinous puddle. Yet this puddle made the decision to seek a higher consciousness and who was I to stand in its way. I quickly Googled ‘how to find inner peace’ and discovered after a couple of hits that the Buddhists had this all but sewn up. They use meditation to still the mind which in turn opens up a spiritual plane containing enlightenment. I’m paraphrasing somewhat but this was my interpretation of the limited research.

So, what is meditation? It turns out it’s concentrating on a single thing like breathing or a sound under the premise that if you can focus the mind on a single thing like your breath then you can do anything (again paraphrasing). I Googled ‘Buddhist meditation classes in Manchester’ and found the Manchester Buddhist Centre in the city centre. There were others, but my puddle wanted the best so the choice was made.

Half an hour and one dab of speed later and I was chatting to a pony-tailed guy in sandals at the Manchester Buddhist Centre, an unassuming building nestled between a vegetarian cafe and some offices behind Piccadilly. Within no time at all I was booked on the next beginners’ meditation course starting a fortnight on Tuesday. It ran for six consecutive Tuesdays 6-8pm and cost £65.00. I paid up front and left tingling with excitement and a course leaflet to read. Job done, Nirvana here I come.

The next couple of weeks, I seem to remember, were particularly heavy in the speed department and relatively light in the sleeping and eating departments. Nonetheless, Tuesday number one arrived and I was ready. I checked my socks for holes, ensured I had loose clothing on and bid a final farewell to the world I was leaving behind. This consisted of a dab of the white stuff as a pick me up after a sleepless 72 hours and a quick, ‘See ya later mate,’ to my brother working behind the bar of The White Horse where we lived.

‘Yeah laterz,’ he replied, not looking up from the bitter he was pulling.

How little he knew of the momentous journey upon which I was embarking.

I arrived early and waited with the others on the ground floor which was a sort of bookshop-reception type affair. They seemed a mixed bunch but all looked fairly normal and a bit spiritual. With a few minutes before the start I decided to nip to the toilet. I emptied my bladder and checked myself in the mirror. In my other world I looked quite acceptable but in this place with normal, healthy people I figured I seemed a bit out of place. My face was a cross between an anorexic’s, someone with liver failure and the animated Crazy Frog having just rubbed raw chillies in his eyes. The speed kicked in and I now also had a dry mouth with cracked lips and a compulsion to talk gibberish. Not ideal preparation, I thought.

A bearded smiling bloke appeared and led us all up a very narrow winding wooden staircase. The place smelt of joss sticks and I thought there must be some enlightened people knocking about somewhere. I wondered if the bearded bloke was enlightened. On the second floor we were led single file down a short corridor to a wooden door. The bearded bloke instructed us to remove our shoes and we all placed them on some racking in the corridor.

‘Now once we get inside I’d like you all to grab a mat and cushions and find a space on the floor. Jeff will be with you shortly. If anybody needs anything or has any questions while we’re waiting I’ll be just at the back of the room.’ Then he opened the door and we all paraded in.

I would say the room was about the size of two tennis courts side by side. Everything was wooden: the floor; the walls; the ceiling; the small stage at the front; stands for statues of Buddha and plants. It was a calm room and smelt of incense. Stacks of thin blue mats and round cushions lined one of the walls and we all grabbed one of each and sat on them. I felt like I was in a school gym class. My brain had begun racing at a million miles an hour and my heart was pounding in my chest – the speed was doing its job. I suddenly felt like a fraud, like I didn’t belong - the frenetic activity beneath my skin at total odds with the serenity of this environment, this situation. I couldn’t look anyone in the eye. I thought they would know what I had done, what I had taken.

Jeff appeared on the stage and began his introduction of himself and to the course. He was in his 40s, glasses, jeans, a shirt and barefoot. No distinguishing features to speak of but he seemed like he was in a good place, content. My brain fixed on him, absorbing every word then, needing more input, I scanned the room. There was quite a mix of ages and shapes, more women than men with a noticeable lack of trendy clothes and make up. Spiritual, earthy types I thought. One woman was sat on a normal chair. I guessed she mustn’t have been able to do the sitting on the floor thing. Nor could I really. After five minutes my knees and ankles were already beginning to ache. As I was worrying about my knees I realised that everyone was getting into a kneeling or cross-legged position so I knelt up on my mat with my cushion under my bum. This made my ankles worse.

Jeff was talking us through our first meditation.

‘Now close your eyes and relax the top of your head, then your face, next your neck ... bring your attention to your breathing ..... count each breath ..... one, two ..... if the mind wanders just gently bring it back to the breath ...... one, two,’ he continued in a hypnotically soothing voice.

I now had the swallows, which is a side effect of the rapid dehydration I was undergoing. Every few seconds, in that room full of silent, concentrating meditators there was an audible ‘gulp’. The more I tried not to swallow, the more frequent and loud I was compelled to gulp. For ten minutes my gulps echoed round the wooden walls until Jeff gently brought everyone out of the meditation. I was horrified. Embarrassment set in which turned to paranoia. Now they all knew, they must’ve known. Three more meditations followed interspersed with instruction and group chats. When I spoke I mumbled as my lips had stuck together and I looked at the floor so they couldn’t see my red eyes. I had an urge to flee, flee, flee. I stuck it out until the end before heading home to my other world.

I made it to week two where, without a pre-class dab, I nodded off during each meditation. Week three saw me turn up at the wrong time and completely miss the class (it had been a heavy weekend and my puddle brain was especially sloshy). I never made weeks four, five and six. My first attempt at enlightenment was not a resounding success.

[Lagrange]

I like it.
It's refreshingly unambitious. With any story involving drug use/abuse there's a temptation to go over the top..to be too graphic and over-dramatic.
You avoided doing that. You simply recounted the events and that worked. It was made more interesting by its authenticity.

[Puddled]

Thanks Lagrange.
The situation was so surreal it needed no embellishment on my part. I just wrote what happened.

[Casper]

Meditation on speed. This is like an episode of Peep Show. Don't know if you've ever seen that show, but I can imagine Jeremy doing this. Very funny.

[Puddled]

This was one of many ridiculous episodes during that period of my life, most of them resembling comedy sketches.