Hello, and welcome back to practicing human, the podcast where every day we're getting

a little better at life.

I'm your host, Cory Muscara.

In today's episode, we're going to talk about the paradox of meditation.

More to come on this in a moment.

First, let's settle in together with the sound of the bells.

I'd like to read you a quote by Pemma Chodron.

She says, when we meditate, we often think that somehow we're going to improve, which

is a subtle aggression against who we really are.

We can still be timid or jealous or full of feelings of unworthiness.

Meditation practice isn't about trying to throw ourselves away and become something

better.

It's about befriending who we are already.

The ground of practice is you or me, or whoever we are right now, just as we are.

That's what we come to know with tremendous curiosity and interest.

This quote kind of reminds me of the poem I shared by Bob Sharples a while back, where

you talked about the subtle aggression of self-improvement, and so here Pemma is talking

about something similar, this idea of trying to improve.

We often think that in the practice we sit down trying to become some better version

of ourselves, and how this is a subtle aggression against who we really are.

I know I've talked about this throughout this podcast many times, but it's something

that I think we need to hear multiple times and in many different ways, because it's

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