Happiness and wellbeing are all the go here at work. On Friday mornings Maureen and I attend a meditation class. It’s part of the staff wellness package in the latest round of restructuring. Maureen and I ticked the box for the free massage sessions but for some reason we’ve been directed here.
Our meditation instructor is young. His voice is slow and calm. Your feet are the best place to start, he says, a way to ground yourself. Focus your attention on your toes, the balls of your feet, your insteps, your heels. Maureen has bunions from years of wearing high heels and doesn’t particularly want to focus on her feet. She told me after our first session that when he mentions feet she imagines someone painting her toenails bright red. I focus on the brushstrokes, she says, the gloss of the enamel, the transformation of each nail. And red’s such a positive colour. I admire Maureen – she makes the best of her bunions, she’s determined to be cheerful, and she mentions transformation – a buzzword round here – even though she really wanted the massage sessions.
Today we practise being aware of sound. We close our eyes and breathe and listen. Through the opened windows we hear traffic and birds, children shouting and laughing in the playground below us. Our instructor tells us not to hold onto the sounds or try to name them, just hear them and let them go, like watching waves wash against the shore. This is a useful skill, he says, and can be applied to other situations as well, especially ones when there’s lots of change. He says we should just experience change and not try to analyse or criticize, we should just watch it come and go like waves, rising and falling, rising and falling.
My attention starts to drift. I find myself thinking of the singing in the community centre down the road from my place every Sunday afternoon. People sing in three and four- part harmony; they clap, hoot, holler and speak in tongues. Their voices sound full of homesickness – they long for another place, one where joy outweighs sorrow and justice reigns. Their longing reminds me of waves, rising and falling on the shore.
I drag my attention back to the meditation room. Our instructor is telling us to imagine a series of inner and outer circles. The innermost circle is the sound of our own breathing. Then we need to move out, circle by circle, step by step, and listen to all the other sounds in the world.
I focus on my breathing. I step away from myself, and the room, and wander through the rest of my workplace, listening. Staff gather in small groups. They speak in whispers. They’re mindful of what they say – they don’t want to be overheard. I step the next circle out and hear the CEO address his advisory group. It’s going well he says: 5M, our wellbeing initiative, is a masterstroke – massage to relieve pressure in the young, guided meditation to re-educate older staff, free medication for troublemakers, and money, lots of money, for instant transformation. We understand the future, he says, we facilitate opportunities for change and growth. We have everyone’s best interests at heart.
Listening’s exhausting. I want to leave, but we’ve got ten minutes left. So I step the next circle out and listen to the future. Motivational speakers’ voices whine at us like chainsaws; managers, hired to inspire, mangle the discourse and delegate their work. And there’s that sinkhole sound money makes as it’s redirected from taxpayers into private enterprise.
I reach over and touch Maureen’s hand. She opens her eyes.
God, she whispers, that was awful; my ears are ringing.
What did you hear?
The workplace transformation choir, she says: they were singing that song from The Life of Brian – you know, Always Look on the Bright Side of Life. It was horrible. Every time I tried to listen for something else they just drowned it out. They were clapping, hooting and hollering; they might as well have been talking in tongues. Maureen shudders: they must have accepted the free medication.
We shuffle out of the meditation room. I can’t go back to work, Maureen says, I’m too upset. I’m getting a migraine. I need to go home and listen to Leonard Cohen: something slow and dark and meaningful, something that makes sense of misery. I’ve had enough of these classes, she says, I’m not coming back – they’re having a negative effect on my wellbeing.
I take Maureen home. She puts Leonard on. His voice rises and falls like waves on the shoreline. We paint each other’s toenails. Hallelujah. Transformed at last.