Opinion | Voboril: Mediation/meditation confusion
T.J. Voboril
Daily exposure to conflict is a weight that I usually have the strength to manage, except when my carefully constructed coping mechanisms give way and the press of everyone else’s problems buries me in a cave from which it is hard to glimpse the light. When the healthy outlets are not working and the destructive distractions have lost their allure, there is little to do but sit and breathe, remember, process, express gratitude, scream. Exorcising that bad juju, tuning into the goodness of this life, recapturing rhythms, it is a meditative state that saves me.
Meditation and mediation are neither synonyms nor homonyms, but they are frequently confused — that extra “t” can play tricks on the eyes and ears. When asked what I do for a living, I typically lead with the mediator role, because I identify more with that ethos and because the pathway after disclosing I am an attorney is often a tedious one. I can only fake laugh at lawyer jokes so many times, whereas I could talk interminably about mediation. Sadly, people rarely follow up with questions about mediation, because they often do not know what it is or else wonder how I get paid to meditate, or both.
The misunderstanding manifests even more overtly when I discuss how much I enjoy teaching mediation. With a quizzical look, people question why there are classes for meditation and then I get to explain how I am actually a mediator, although wish I had the meditation skills to attain professional status. Still, either embarrassed or perplexed, folks tend not to dig any deeper. Despite trying to engage in a discussion of the beauty of both meditation and mediation, I am frequently left with an uncomfortably blank stare and my proselytizing comes to an abrupt conclusion.
The overlap between the two words is coincidental, one’s root coming from the idea of taking/considering appropriate measures and the other originating from the concept of the middle, but there is a unifying theme that makes the confusion among meditation and mediation more understandable. Both are methods for combating the psychic onslaught of the modern, capitalistic, litigious, increasingly bonkers world in which we live. In their respective ways, meditation and mediation provide strength, nourishment and guidance when the path becomes rocky and challenging.
Meditation is typically a personal endeavor, whereas mediation is almost always a collective experience, at least in the traditional conception. And yet, at their core, both processes are about connection. Meditation connects us to our thoughts, mediation connects us to our community. Both are intended to be restorative and reparative, although mediation usually arises out of an acute conflict, while meditation, if regularly practiced, can help forestall conflict in the first place.
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Meditation and mediation are indeed complementary undertakings — the meditation practitioner possesses a calm and a self-possession which proves helpful not only in avoiding conflagrations, but in being able to navigate them with less friction than one who is wound tight, who is emotionally dysregulated. When mediating, it is glaringly obvious which of the parties are grounded in their self-awareness and which have not taken the time to discover themselves or seek to understand others. It is only through our own self-knowledge that we can truly fathom others, align with them, reconcile with them.
In the outdated macho world into which it appears we are regressing, both meditation and mediation are anathema, emblematic of perceived weakness in a time when aggression and self-aggrandizement are the worthy totems. I can happily accept being perceived as a meditator, which assigns a peacefulness not often felt, as long as I am not mistaken for a macerator or a monster.
T.J. Voboril is a founding partner at Alpenglow Law, LLC, a local law firm, and the owner/mediator at Voice of Reason Dispute Resolution. For more information, please contact Mr. Voboril at 970-306-6456, tj@alpenglowlaw.com, or visit http://www.alpenglowlaw.com.
