How did Breathing Space start? - A personal note by Norman Lamont

I have been practising meditation for 23 years, almost entirely in a Buddhist context. At the same time, I have been working in a big financial services office and been privy to a hundred and one conversations about stress and anxiety. People’s reactions when they know what I do have tended towards one of two positions:

‘Of course you never get upset or panicked - you’re always so laid-back - it must be nice on Planet Norman!’
or
‘All that sitting around - you must just be fooling yourself because you’re no different from anyone else - I saw you swearing at the photocopier!’

Little wonder I tended to keep my own counsel about it. The truth, I knew, was in between. Sure, my mental composure is far from perfect. I’ve always had a temper, and it still gets out at times. At the same time, I know that how many times a day the moment to moment awareness I’ve gained from meditation practice cuts in just in time to remove the fretting, the explosiveness or the grumbling. It’s been a part of my life for so long that of course I don’t know what I’d be like without it. But if it helps with a third or a half of the daily upsets that anyone is subject to - isnt’ that something worth having?

So finally in 1999, with the help of an occupational health nurse in my office, I offered "Breathing Space" a short course, running over five weeks, to test my hunch that there were a group of people who wanted this sort of thing but didn’t want to get involved in anything with an ‘-ist’ at the end. My hunch was borne out - people came back for more, and other courses filled up. Now I’m using the web to see how widespread this interest is, and how Bspace can place itself in the range of movements, schools and teachers offering meditation for the modern world.

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© Norman Lamont 2000

Update May 2000