Wait, am I enlightened?

An "aha!" moment on my meditation journey

Over the past three years, my situationship with meditation has been on and off. My first try was with Headspace—back then it was one of the most popular apps. But as someone who’s very sensitive to voice, I wasn’t sold at all. The guide’s voice felt so AI (sorry!), like a machine babbling away, not a real, flesh-and-blood person. I quickly gave up, thinking: what’s the point of just sitting here?

Later, when life and work started to weigh on me, I came back to it. This time I switched to Peloton. Their meditations were led by influencer instructors with personality and warmth, not a cold, generic voice. I especially loved Anna Greenberg—she has this gentle yet powerful presence, and every yoga or meditation class with her left me both grounded and relaxed. The only catch was that her classes only dropped once every week or two, and I soon ran through them all. At that point I wasn’t comfortable meditating unguided yet, so my practice stayed inconsistent.

The real turning point came this year. Maybe it was the slow creep of a millennial midlife crisis, but I felt drawn to change, driven to pursue the dreams I’d kept on hold, and to see the blind spots I’d been missing—to gain a wider perspective. Every meditation or yoga guide begins with: set your intention. And for me, my intention had finally grown clearer.

Following that calling, I signed up for online meditation classes at Three Jewels, a nonprofit in New York. Each weekday night before bed, I joined a 30-minute Zoom class—ten minutes of Dharma talk and twenty minutes of guided meditation. Practicing with a teacher and others in real time made meditation feel less isolated, more like a community.

Gradually, I also began sitting by myself every morning for thirty minutes. Six months in, I suddenly noticed something had shifted. I even half-joked to myself: wait, did I just get enlightened?

Before, meditation felt fleeting. During the practice I could slow my breath, find focus, and touch calm—but it all slipped away once I stood up. Now it feels really different. It’s more like planting a seed or strength training: once the seed is planted, it keeps growing; once the muscle is built, it keeps burning calories even at rest.

So what muscle grew? It’s the one mentioned in almost every resource on meditation: respond, not react—the self-awareness, the ability to create a gap between impulse and action. In my experience, that gap is still very small—maybe one inch, or maybe five seconds if you really want to measure it—but even within that tiny space, I start to see many more choices—and then I can choose more consciously, in ways that align with my deeper, long-term values. I believe that for different people, this small gap may serve a different purpose—but for each of us, it opens the doorway to where we truly wish to arrive.

What’s even more “aha!” is: creating that gap itself just feels profoundly empowering. Do you remember the first time you learned how to swim or ride a bike? Or the moment you crossed a marathon finish line, or summited a mountain peak? It’s that same rush—a strong sense of self-agency. Only this time, it’s not in the body, but in the mind.

A small tip that helps me sustain my meditation practice is this mindset: be curious and patient, let go of expectations, enjoy the journey—and enjoy it simply for the sake of it. I think this is the recipe for anything I’ve stayed passionate about over the long run. I picked up running and kept at it for years—not because I had a specific weight-loss goal or a race time to hit, but because running makes me feel free and alive. I love making videos for the same reason. Meditation is no different. I cherish that half hour of being unplugged, peaceful, and grounded—a small sanctuary of time that belongs only to me. There’s a saying: “Let how you want to feel guide you.” That has always worked for me.

No grand plan, just an open heart: what may come next around the corner?