stop the mind? or just see it for what it is

Meditating with 4 young girls this morning in a school where there is a rising tide of excitement, of communication, of people working and general noise, this analogy suddenly helped.  We imagined a river in flow and then imagined taking a glass of water out of the river to drink.  The water in the glass is immediately quite still and thirst quenching.  To sit with the whirling sound of life round you, the only effort we had to make was to concentrate on our own centre, and let the whirl and flow go on around.  They found it easy and we all found it made us feel better.