I got distracted for a few minutes yesterday during Mass, as everyone does at times. Meanwhile the Mass kept going along without my inner participation; it does keep flowing along and if we ”check out” by being distracted, we can always “return” when aware of the distraction. Just let it be, let it flow through you without getting stuck in you (or you getting stuck in it). If and when that happens no matter how often it happens, we are each welcomed back and can take up our places anew. IMHO, there is no need for reproach or self-reproach, no need for any guilt or blame or discouraging scrupulosity. We simply come back with a new awareness, a return to mindfulness, a return to the Now. We simply return and are blessed. It’s that simple.
More about distractions: there are several activities of the mind that serve to keep us distracted, off track, out of balance with the inner peace we are meant to have, that elusive state-of-being which a Taoist would call harmony with the universe or harmony with Tao. These are some of those activities which keep us off balance: interests, habits, excuses, worry, stress, intellectualism, scheming and desires. Deng Ming-Dao notes that “it is inevitable that one will fall in and out of Tao.” I respect that realism, and it is what prompted my thoughts about distractions at Mass.
