Marking Transition with Vision Fast

In May of this year I embarked on a six day road trip to New Mexico where I would join a group of women to co-create a Vision Fast experience. For me, I was looking for a way to mark the end of a 2.5 year hiatus from the worldly material life of employment... a hiatus spent in trips to India and internal exploration and realization of my past trauma.

A hiatus spent questioning work life, who I choose for friends, why I fall in love, my need for validation, how to cultivate self-love, how my house can consume my attention, why I eat when I'm not hungry, my fear of what others think, my aging body, why I deny myself time for creativity, how to care for my mother, how I want to connect to myself and to God, what Christianity, Vedic philosophy, Buddhism, and Krishna consciousness have to teach about those things, practicing life coaching, and mostly, how I am being called to be in service. 

I still hadn't made a plan or any major decisions. I wanted some direction and some confidence about at least a few areas of life. In my previous explorations of shamanic traditions I had heard about Vision Fast tradition and had wanted to do it. So in Spring of this year I found the Women's Vision Fast organized by the School of Lost Borders. When I read the online description I knew that these people were the real deal. Sincere honest spiritually connected people that were in service to people's process, not posturing or marketing to garner the most participants. Their fees were reasonable, and their website was basic, with emphasis on the verbal content, not design or purchase process. I felt connected and confident enough to sign up. 

I allowed myself 6 days to drive the 24 hours to the Santa Fe area, stopping to camp alone by the coast in Florida, spending 2 days in rural quiet gracious historic St. Francisville, Louisiana, spending 2 days in a canyon of West Texas, and then arriving the night before at a campground in Cochiti Lake, NM. I allowed myself this time to be with myself. I enjoyed my own company as I explored a historic cemetery and some sleepy sprawling plantations. 

I enjoyed the books on CD during the 5 to 6 hours of driving each day. Between the trip out and the one back, I listened to: 1) "7 Habits of Highly Effective People" by Stephen R. Covey; 2) I tried "Care of the Soul" by Thomas Moore but stopped halfway through the first CD very uninspired after listening to S. Covey; 3) The Power of Vulnerability by Brene Brown; and 4) Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda. Listening to these 3 books was in itself a valuable experience as I drove down highways in some of the most beautiful places I have ever been, having a lot of realizations about myself and about life!

The morning after I arrived at Cochiti Lake campground overlooking the largest blackest berm wall I have ever seen (retaining a giant reservoir), I gathered with the ladies in our first circle to share about why we were here; to share our individual reasons for wanting to be alone on the land. We were five participant women, ages 25 to 50, with two elder guides, Emerald North and Margaret Thompson, and two assistants, Galaxy and Kim Allen. 

The elder guides spoke about accessing our own deep internal wisdom and being on the land to connect with it. They shared about the medicine wheel of the 4 shields. The south shield is the childhood, based in the body, discovering the self (red). The west shield is the adolescence, going inside where it is dark to choose what from childhood we want to keep and what we want to leave behind (black). The north shield is the adulthood, where we are in action in the world (white). The east shield is elderhood, or spiritual life, where we connect it all and realize the higher purpose of being (yellow). Emerald then went through the aspects of living in an exaggerated way in any shield. Being depressed is exaggerated west shield. Being a workaholic is exaggerated north shield, etc. 

This framing helped me realize that perhaps my 2.5 years of hiatus had been a period of west shield reflection time for me where I sorted through what I have, what I have done, what I want to keep and what I want to shed... and my time alone in Vision Fast would be a time to claim what I want, and to my full adulthood. Moving out of the dark internal stage I would move forward, however slowly, in this spiral of expansion and development. 

The next few days were an exploration with the group guided by Emerald and Margaret, to reflect on what self-generated ceremony we could create on the Land. They talked about The Land and it's lessons for each of us, if we were present to receive. We were invited to ask the land for the gift of a message of how we can take our gifts to the people. It was made clear that this journey was one that was for the world, not for my own self. This spoke to me and I was moved. Yes, I want to serve with my highest gifts.

So what is stopping me? What is the roughness that seems to be providing resistance? Is it my perfectionism? I heard a snippet of public radio today that mentioned the conditioning of men to be courageous, and the conditioning of women to be perfect. Ouch! I resonated with that a lot! And I am gun-shy to move into a new area of vocation as I have changed careers once already and want to make the perfect choice this time.

I also suffer from wanting approval. And this is very painful and sticky for me because I do not wear the same shoes or pants or skirts that my parents wear. My clothes are very different, and my vehicle for life is very different, and much of how I live is a bit of a secret and hidden from many because I will be seen as different and then un-welcomed. A shaman once encouraged me to have spiritual confidence. This means to me to be confident with whatever spiritual practice that serves me, and not have fear about others' judgments. But I experience others as so intensely judgmental. Many friends in the science community might think me a cook if I mention my connection to God not to mention any devotional activities to God.

Emerald really challenged me that this desire for approval is rock sitting on my wings (my words). That it can cripple me and that my spirit is here to serve the world, and it WILL be different from what my mother or father or school friends expect of me. 

After sweet guidance, reflection and exploring questions, we each created an intention. I created "I am a full adult healer-teacher and edgy elder." 

I spent four days alone with the wild place of Ghost Ranch. I added up the hours of non-eating which was 108. I wonder if Emerald knew about this number. Hunger was with me every day until the last day.

Each day was it's own journey. One day was about creating an altar that was my own with mixed traditions, writing a song, and getting a very intimate visit from a very large snake that gave me permission to be different, be diligent and focused. One day was about an excursion into low-lying sculpted river arroyos with surprises of life, shape and depth where I experienced my confidence and strength. One was a day of rocks when I rinsed my shame into them and owned my real desires with the full moon. When I celebrated and ritualized this a band of coyotes reflected my intentions with such clear acknowledgement, I was intensely moved and validated. I experienced nature as a reflective listener many times. In the yowl of the coyotes, in the echos of the rocks, in the warmth of juniper's shelter, in the sound of rocks falling down with my heart, in the energy of my arms throwing them with the anger that they took to the river.

I can recall the juniper, the special rocks, the edge of the river, the swallows keeping watch over me... and I reconnect to that place of self-acceptance and self-attention that was the biggest act of love I have created for myself.

After the fast, I shared about it with my therapist in Gainesville. I talked about getting the message to live more vibrantly. Be with people more. Be in some action. Like watching a tennis match is good for some learning, but playing tennis you learn more. So I want to be in action, host sharing circles, host events and facilitate book discussions.

I told her about my experience on the last night of the fast connecting to big deep grief about my previous boss at the university; how I spent 7 years with her, and our relationship ended. I felt discarded after all that energy I put into the organization she and I jumpstarted together. All our time together culminated in a bad taste in her mouth and her not answering my emails, and no remnant of me on their website. My ego was crushed that there was no evidence that I had ever been there. My heart was hurt that I didn't feel any compassion or care from her. I cried for 2 hours grieving those things. I also grieved the realization that I hadn’t known myself enough to know that I wasn’t in service there; that I was not using my best skills while not giving her what she really needed. But I stayed anyway... I stayed even though I was not happy there, and she wasn't happy with me there. I didn't recognize when my energy had run it's course, and my lesson there was finished.

I spent two hours at 1 a.m. crying about this loss. About losing the relationship with my boss. Why was it so painful? What importance was I assigning to that person and that relationship? The power dynamic and my boss's personality were reminiscent of my relationship with my father I guess.

My internal little girl was waiting and yearning for approval and belonging with that boss and that organization... I didn't recognize that I was barking up the wrong tree, and my little girl was recreating the abandonment experience she had when she was 3. At that age, my father had a debilitating head injury from a car accident, and my parents both went to NYC for his hospitalization for 5 months. My three sisters and I all had different experiences of confusion, terror and abandonment, not having had it explained to us why the parents left or when they would return. I felt discarded in both of these cases.

The Vision Fast provided me with some cleansing of some weight of emotions... it provided me with clear space to express myself and yell, cry and be with myself without interruption or needing to clean things up. I could express fully with no timeline. I splayed out my body and heart on big rocks that were sun-baked and moon-bathed. I allowed my own body to be sun-baked and moon-bathed. And I felt transformed and cleansed and open for new possibilities for myself coming back home. It was not the transition I was expecting, but it was the transition I needed to experience... the letting go of past attachments to approval so I could move forward in my more authentic self.

#visionfast #visionquest #fasting #ceremony #ritual #selflove #selfgeneratedceremony #lostborders #ecotherapy #

Dragon Slaying at Mother Teresa's in Kolkata, India

This is about my experience with Mother Teresa’s mission at Prem Dan, where I volunteered for just one day in December, 2015.

After 6am mass at Mother House and a breakfast of Indian tea, white bread and banana, I walked for 20 minutes with a group of 10 or so volunteers (mostly from Europe and Latin America) through some gritty, poor neighborhoods. When we arrived, I walked past a van where they were loading a very skinny dead body wrapped in a white sheet, with a small flower arrangement laid on the abdomen of the covered body (wrapped like a package). I appreciated the clean whiteness, and the beautiful simple flowers on this body being carefully placed alone in the van. I said a prayer for the recently departed soul, still floating around, perhaps.

We went towards the women's dorm, as the men in our group went to the men's area. There was a covered area with a long concrete slab with 4 sinks and concrete slab in between. Two sinks were for washing and two were for rinsing with slab space for sliding laundry to the next stage. At the last stage, three resident ladies and a young volunteer was doing the wringing by hand of the sheets, towels, washrags and smocks. The older ladies were a bit tired, sitting, not able to wring too well… I was wringing strongly, gotta get more water out! I and a girl from Argentina worked the stairs to get buckets of wringed laundry up 3 flights to the roof where it would get hung to dry on the 100 clothes lines.

One young volunteer from China who was so beautiful to me, had bought jasmine flower garlands in a market on the way to the place, and gifted them to two ladies by putting them around their neck. One lady was very out of it and doing repetitive actions near the staircase where I was transferring laundry buckets. She kept opening a metal gate that was behind her as she sat in a wheelchair. She wanted to reach back and close it, or open it... or close it. Then she discovered this garland. As I brought buckets of laundry to the staircase for my Argentinian friend to haul to the roof, I saw the process of her inspection and dissection of this foreign and interesting object someone had placed upon her. She wasn't seeing beautiful flowers, but interesting shapes and textures, I think. She dropped the garland, I gave it back to her. A few times... There were lots of buckets going to the staircase...

After all laundry was done (40 or 50 metal buckets worth), we went up to hang… I loved this part, up on the roof, able to see out to the neighborhood. We looked at the other rooftops where there is quite a bit of life in India... Many people sleep, visit and hang laundry on rooftop terracess. Cats hang on rooftops to be safe from all the dogs. There could have been some great pics but no pics were allowed. Alis from Mexico said she would send me pics, but I have yet to email her to ask!

We then went to the ladies sitting at tables in their little cotton smocks with a random flower print. All but a few had shorn hair and no jewelry. They were sitting dutifully at the tables… maybe they had metal cups of water. Now it was time to be with these Bengali-speaking ladies. How to spend time with them?

There was a little toiletry bucket of nail polishes, combs, brushes and oils. We could paint their nails, comb/brush their hair, or massage them. Massage seemed the most therapeutic and intimate, so I decided to take the glycerine and offer massages. I massaged about 12 ladies… first arms and shoulders. Then decided to do full arms, hands and shoulders. One lady asked for leg massage after, so I did her legs and feet after arms, hands and shoulders.

One lady spoke to me in Bengali for 10 minutes before I started any massages, and she was telling me her dramatic story, of some injustice, I think… maybe how her family left her there… because Alis told me later that day that she saw a horrible thing when she arrived that morning. A man with a cane asked where is the exit, “I can’t find the door, where is the door?” and a pair of younger men came at him and pulled him away from the entrance while he protested, “No, I am not supposed to be here! Where is my family! I need to find my family, we just came here to go to mass! They will wonder where I am, I have to find my family!” They dragged him toward a building and obviously the family had abandoned him there without telling him. Will they ever visit him? Will they explain later, why he could not live with them anymore?

How many of these women I was with, were abandoned by their families at the stage of life where they are supposed to be relaxing after all the work of their lives, enjoying their grandchildren, and enjoying the labors of the children who would not cook and clean for them as they enjoy their elderhood. But now they are stuck in a Catholic home stripped of their Indian clothes, their long hair, their jewelry, their deities, and even of their pranams and “Namaskar.” I was told by a volunteer that the sisters do not like it when people pranam or say Namaste, or Namaskar. These women I massaged had interesting tattoos on their forearms, a relic of their past devotion and it was clear to me that many of them must be Hindus, and many probably are not Catholic converts in this Bengali city where women are extra proud of their extra shiny red and white sarees and Durga and Laxmi festivals.

I could not get a good sense of the mental capacities of these women that mostly didn’t speak. Some did speak to each other but without knowing the language, I could not tell how lucid and in reality they were. The hired staff were super efficient and logistical, not giving much loving empathy to residents in the tiny short time I was around them. After massages, the lunch was served onto plates and the ladies were given plates of rice with a rice/chicken/potato stew which looked pretty good.

One lady needed to be fed, as her hands were folded in and useless. She hardly had teeth, but was a vigorous eater. I would bring a spoon of food to her mouth and she would help me guide it in. She successfully communicated that she wanted more food on each spoon. She ravished the food. Not sure why... She was happy to be eating. She smiled at me after many of the bites. Maybe those were the bites that had the best amount of food and went into her mouth at the right angle. In a place like this, those little things make a person happy. I worked the side of the spoon to cut the chicken hearts into bitesize pieces... I think she liked getting little pieces of chicken heart in each bite like that. This was the highlight of my day. Helping a woman eat and catching the food not making it into her mouth with my other hand, and seeing her smile with a lot of the bites.

It was time to help some of the ladies to the dormitory now. Everyone moved with the routine and were tuned in to the timing of it all. I think they depended on teh timing of it all, like babies love the security of feeding, bathing and nap times. It was time to nap. I wheeled a few ladies to the dormitory. The beds are covered with clean sheets. The beds are about 2 and a half feet apart from each other. Set up in 4 rows with one aisle down the middle. There are beds in the breezeway area. It looks like an overflow, they couldn't fit more beds into the proper dorm hall. Soon there were traffic jams of wheelchairs as volunteers and staff were delivering their charges to their respective beds. One lady needed to use the bathroom. It's times like these that having a physically handicapped father who was unashamed of his limitations and asking for help comes in handy in my life. I didn't bat an eye going into the shared toilet area with water running constantly into a trash can for I have no idea what purpose so that the floor had a 1/4 inch of water on it... but when I wheeled my lady towards a toilet, she eased off her wheelchair, I struggled to help her to the seat, but she grunted that she would do her thing which was to move slightly away from the chair to pee right on the floor that had that constant flushing of 1/4 inch of water. OK, I see why the water is running over the edge of that container. Another woman was naked sitting on a toilet facing away from the door, hoping for something to happen. It looked like some level of struggle, but she was balanced and stable as far as I could tell. We were standing in the water she just peed in, but oh well, here we go back to the dormitory (attached by the door) tracking in the pee-water. But this place is clean. It looks and smells clean and the huge quantity of laundry we did that morning was a profession of the cleanliness. The ladies were all accumulating on their beds... sitting, lying. If they were sitting, I thought, "they must get so bored," but if they were lying I thought "it's nice they have a clean place to rest their body."

This is not the home for the dying, this is a nursing home for ladies that are not all there mentally, many probably rejected by their families... I wish I knew that their families visited them. I wish I felt that my visit had helped them some how. They seem unphased. Maybe I was just one of many new strangers that looks strange and speaks a strange tongue that comes to do something interesting overseas. I am not their daughter or husband. But I hope the human touch and gentle regard does support them somehow at some level they may not even be too aware of. The most important thing is for us to have an intention to help and give.

In India, Christians love St. George, the dragon slayer. A statue was installed here on an exterior wall. You can pick which dragon you are slaying in any particular time of your life - it seems we always have to be slaying one. Maybe anyone who needs to (me or some of the ladies) can slay the dragon of attachment to holding on to life as it likely was for many of these ladies in their rich Hindu Bengali culture living with their immediate families, all factors which are gone in this place. But who am I to say these ladies are sad for that, I am assuming... and projecting, perhaps, but it seems at the end of life people need their spiritual practice more than ever. I hope the internal practice can happen for these ladies, as their external world that I saw does not reflect the spiritual life that is practiced by most Hindu Indian people I have seen.

#motherhouse #motherteresa #kolkata #premdan #volunteering #hinduculture #missions #catholicmissions #india

Rooting out Rot

These past few months have been about rooting out molding, rotting things... literally and figuratively.

• I had a plywood wall on the back of the converted carport section of my house that had been rotting for 2 or 3 year which I replaced last week. 
• Sections of soffit and fascia on the back of the house were rotting from faulty guttering and roofing, that I had replaced. 
• A 6' by 20' section of roof was rotting that I had replaced. 
• I washed the mold and dirt from bedroom miniblinds, it's hopelessly humid in Florida, and this winter was record-setting for warmth and humidity.
• I prepped and painted the one room in the house that never got painted since I moved here in 2006.
• I spent some sweaty strenuous last week raking piles of rotting leaves and digging up two years worth of weeds and thorny vines (that Smilax seems almost evil) in the back yard.
• I finally completed my 2013 taxes and mailed them in last week!
• I am replacing old warped cheapo ceiling fans
• I am replacing a corroded hard-to-open sliding glass door and window on the house! 
• I am scrubbing and re-covering seats of the dining room set.

Why such a pile of rotting projects? I was quite sick in late 2012 when the stress of trying to perform to par at work and my propensity to be super social wore me out and my weakened immune system crashed.  A friend recommended I check for Lyme with a specialist, which I did, and they found band 23 of the Western Blot positive which indicates antibodies for Borrelia, the Lyme bacteria. They found Epstein Barr virus and hypothyroid. I took a series of herbal tinctures (it was too late to take antibiotics and have it do anything) and meds for the nervous system as well as for busting up protein matrices (which is how Lyme defends itself from the immune system). I had acupuncture, went to doctors of Lyme, functional medicine, had laser light therapy, massage. I missed weeks of work and invoked Family Medical Leave after running out of sick time.

I believe my immune system broke down because of the stress of trying to fit myself into a job I didn't like, in an environment that didn't suit me. As I became more self-aware and intentional to make my life more about being heart-centered and communicative, the cold, individualistic, competitive atmosphere of academia just clashed with my energy system and the resistance created wracked my nervous system until I ended up in bed with extreme fatigue and burning aches in my hips and legs... I watched a ton of Bollywood movies during that time, and the series White Collar, I remember...

I finally quit the job in November of 2013 and traveled to India for four months from January to May of 2014. I went to Thailand and destinations in the US before returning to my home in Gainesville in August 2014. Then I was so focused on my internal process and experiencing some spiritual upheaval and depression. After the year of sickness, almost a year of travel, and months of focusing on my internal world, the house and paperwork had suffered some neglect and needed the attention I am giving it now, with a spirit of airing out, uncovering, being honest, cleaning and opening. I feel I can breathe better!

Journey with Codependence

Ahh, what a time I have had in these last 7-8 years, heightening my awareness, through multiple friendships and romances, how my immature adult is wanting the things I didn't get as a child in a behavior pattern known to some, but a term shunned by many, as codependence. I have read 4 or 5 books about codependence, love addiction, the wounded heart, and women who love too much. They all have a common theme, that as children we were not wholly accepted exactly how we were and our parents wanted us to be a bit different, or just didn't see us and appreciate us as we already were.

According to Pia Mellody (a recognized expert at the phenomenon and treatment of it with an energy of positive acceptance and love) the signs of codependence in immature adult are:

1. Trouble valuing the self from within. Needing to get self-value from being wanted by others.
2. Personal boundary problems. Put up walls, or the opposite.
3. Difficulty being authentic about our feelings, needs and wants.
4. Difficulty attending to our own personal needs and wants, and having difficulty with interdependence.
5. Lacks an attitude of ‘moderation in all things.’ We may over- (or under-) indulge in eating, drinking, socializing, working, exercising etc.

and here is my understanding of what creates codependence patterns:

1. child was not treated as precious - child was ignored or abused
2. child was not treated as perfect as she is now- but expected to act certain way according to social norms, parental molding etc. 
3. child was not treated as dependent - her needs were not recognized, or were not important, and was expected to take care of herself or her parents either emotionally or physically. 
4. child was not treated as immature - was expected to do things inappropriate to her age, or was punished for acting her immature self
5. child was not treated as vulnerable - she wasn't protected, or certain healthy emotional boundaries were not created

I am starting to connect the dots between some fears and beliefs I have about myself, and what I experienced in childhood. I defintely experience all of the adult behaviors listed above, and can say that I also experienced all of the childhood experiences listed in the second list.  I don't want to go through my childhood experiences and traumas here now, but I listed out about 19 of them for a therapist I found a month ago, that specializes in helping clients using Pia Mellody's approach with practices, processes and work for recovery. 

Today I am feeling more connected to this awareness and process for myself after feeling some rejection by a friend whose family I know very well and had welcomed me to participate in their dynamics, which were very codependent so I felt super comfortable, happy and anxious at the same time. But lately I have felt that friend and the family being very distant and it's triggering some very big feelings of being unimportant and inconsequential. So my motivation in life drops when this happens and it turns into powerlessness. I feel powerless and go into a mode of doing things around the house to keep active at a level that is familiar and just like my mother who is a cleaning addict.

I notice I am having negative thoughts. I had a session with a therapist about managing Automatic Negative Thoughts... One of mine comes up after some romantic failures. I go to a place thinking that I am worthless. I finally realized, this is not healthy or normal, where did this come from?? I don't want to feel this way, and it doesn't really make sense that I feel this way when one man decides not to communicate with me anymore. 

I want to move beyond the stories of childhood and be in my adult self. The 5-step process is to 1. Grow up, 2. Face reality, 3. Grieve what I didn't have growing up, 4. Learn to parent myself, and 5. Learn to forgive. 

I have been doing a lot of #3 and #4 these last few months... I will look more at what the others are about. Pia Mellody's books are smart, relatable, not negative, and have useful tools. I don't feel broken or less than others. I feel happy to know what is happening and how to really feel into what is happening so I can more deeply heal and be happier in my life with positive thinking that is genuine. I feel more connected to the Divine, God, feeling the unconditional acceptance of that big huge force that is total love for all of us beings human or not!  

Vippassana, 10 days of Quiet

I just finished a 10-day meditation retreat in Jesup, Georgia, in total silence; no talking with, or looking at, anyone else except the teacher and "the management."  Two meals a day, at 6:30am and 11am with fruit and tea at 5. Dorm-room residence on a woodsy piece of land with walking trails. All was separated for men and women, each having their own dining, sleeping, walking areas, and the meditation hall was divided down the middle with men and women on each side with separate entrances and separate management staff to talk to if any need arose. It was beautifully managed for our comfort and concentration on what we were there to do.

And what was that? We were there to look at our minds. Sort of.

We had evening lectures by S.N. Goenka (video recordings from a course he taught in 1991 since he left his body in 2013) a teacher of this style of Vipassana from Burma, which he says is the unpolluted original form of the teaching of mind-purification that Siddhartha Gautama Buddha taught. After 500 years in India, he said, it became mixed with other rituals, and changed, so wasn't effective and was thus abandoned there. In Burma it was preserved by a line of teachers, and it moved to Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and other eastern countries.

The first three days of the retreat we focused on our breath to enhance the ability of the mind to detect subtleties of breath sensations in our nose, on the edges of the nostrils and on the upper lip. This he called Anapana meditation.

We took 5 precepts on the 1st evening, observing "Sila" - abstaining from killing, lying, stealing, sex and intoxicants. Was black tea or coffee an intoxicant? I guess not since they stocked it in the dining area. Cool. And sexual fantasizing couldn't be either, since, I figured, most people here would have some sexual thoughts coming up, right? It was easy not to lie, since we were speaking only to the assistant teacher and lady manager.

I was getting terribly bored by day 3, still meditating on our nostrils and upper lip, wondering why I had to keep doing this same thing for 3 days, and I wasn't detecting much additional sensation. Maybe because I was so distracted by my thoughts of sex! I was fantasizing of a beautiful unavailable man that I had liked, and how we would meet, and what we would do. Many ideas were formulated, I felt very creative.

I also formulated the most amazingly worded monologues I would tell to this man I had liked but was never able to say just how I felt about myself or about him. So perfectly worded and slowly stated, and I felt that my truth was finally coming to the surface. All the confusion of feelings I had before blocked my access to my boundaries, my true desires, and what was right for me and for him. The confusion seemed to fall away, and my stillness of mind allowed me to get to the intellect and clarity to interpret my feelings and what I wanted to create with this person which went on changing over the days I was there, until I stopped thinking about it, or putting much importance on it.

I also generated wonderful ideas for writings, and activities back in Gainesville, and I kept thinking of many witty Facebook posts.

Day 4 we learned the art of Vipassana meditation, scanning the body for sensations such as the touch of fabric or air, tingling, numbness, pain, heaviness, lightness, vibration, tightness... You scan down from head to toe, then back up from toe to head... later he told us to sweep 'en masse', sweep 'en masse' which was very confusing coming from an older guy with an indian accent so I had no clue he was saying the french term until I asked the assistant teacher a few days later.  There were no subtitles on these videos of him that we watched every night.

I scanned myself. I felt fleece jacket on neck; pants on waist; pants on legs; pressure on feet; moisture on hands; after 30 minutes, there was tingling, some numbness coming up. Some coolness in some areas from the air. Many areas were 'blind,' with not much sensation, especially forearms, lower back and cheeks.

Day 5 I was getting a little calmer, and scanning over and over... but Day 6 I was irritated at this teacher. He kept saying these are not "useless rites or rituals." He criticized other religions for the devotional practices, and the empty activities by people who were still angry, fearful, and egotistical, not having any control of their own minds, and doing things for show, or our of fear, or because it was tradition... which, yes some of that could be true, but his attitude seemed to be making fun of other people, and I didn't think that was they style of a very enlightened egoless person. Not that he claimed to be...

On Day 6 I wanted to go home, and leave the lectures of this old Indian guy, talking stories about anger and greed on the most gross rudimentary levels with examples of slapping a secretary in anger, or kicking a man on the street out of disgust, or taking a brother's inheritance of land. When was he going to talk to us about all the emotions I was feeling in my heart and my stomach? He did not talk about emotions coming up in meditation. He seemed to have zero emotional intelligence and I was not getting the link between the feeling of fleece on my neck and my attachments and aversions to so many things in life. Hello? He was speaking a lot of theoretical things, and how we would get rid of all our aversions, attachments and miseries by observing all sensations of the body.

There were 2 assistant teachers sitting on daises, and they were not ever speaking except to tell us when the breaks were. Why weren't they using their intelligence to bridge the gap between these general gross emotions examples Goenka was speaking of and the subtle emotion challenges that a modern western person might be more likely to be dealing with? Or why weren't they answering any questions to the whole audience?

I went to the female teacher 5 times to ask the questions. It helped a lot. It was beyond what Goenka was saying. Hm, confusing.

Okay, Day 7 I was finally having a quiet mind and trusting that some good things were happening for me. I felt it, as my attachment to that attractive man seemed to be reducing, and my internal dialogues with him were changing to less attachment and more compassion.

Day 8 it finally clicked! As I create equanimity with pain in my body, I can create a habit of the mind that has equanimity with things that happen in my life. Oh, ok! So if a mosquito bites me in meditation, I can practice on that training ground to be equanimous with the sting and the itch that is there... so when someone says something quite rude to me in future, I will have a mind trained to not react, but to consider and process and think before responding.

I was feeling more sensations, and by now had experienced a few surprising things.

After a few days of Vipassana I realized I was sensing my left side as blue, darker, like in the shadow, and the right side as orangey active yellow. Then I realized that these correspond to my yin side (dark, night, passivity, moon) and my yang side (daytime, active, sun). Wow, so I had firsthand experience at the feng shui idea of yin and yang qualities - I actually experienced those qualities and colors on my left and right sides! During one sit, I experienced my right side as tingly and vibrating in it's totality, while my left side remained largely un-sensing. Wow, the right felt alive, and the left felt half-asleep. The right is the masculine side, the left the feminine side... For years I have noticed more injuries to my left side than to my right and wondered about it.

It was revealed to us during one of the later lectures that we will end up getting a sensation of vibration and tingling throughout the body at some point, and it will very feel pleasant... but we should not get attached to this, just as we should be equanimous with pain we might feel, and this sensation is a good training ground to create equanimity with this nice sensations.

So the idea is: that our cravings relate to a negative body sensation that happens, and we want to react to alleviate it. As we practice not reacting to body sensations in meditation, our mind gets calmer about wanting satisfaction of craving, or to get away from things we have aversion to... and those cravings and aversions calm and balance out over time... then, we stop being reactive in situations and with people. We begin to get more accpeting of what is.

I can say that I had some amazing internal experiences (a few mentioned here), and am grateful for the seachange in my attachment that I had coming in to this retreat that has now been minimized to something very small.

There is more to the story of Vipassana that I did not discuss here (accumulating merit, karma, sankaras, etc) and that I have not learned about yet... but I think this has a great potential to help me with anxiety and worry that I have and for connecting me to what is true for me at a deeper level that I miss as I tend to keep myself pretty busy in action - that active yang side!

Homecoming

August 2014

I landed back home after 8 months of traveling. It started with quitting my job and then driving to St. Louis for 2013 Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays... then to Costa Rica for 10 days over New Year's with my beautiful niece, Andrea. Then I went to India at the end of January for 4 amazing months, I topped this off with a 2-week trip to Thailand. I made a plan far ahead of time to visit friends and family on US east (New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Virginia) coast for three weeks when I returned. I figured, since I have time and will be coming into the east coast from Asia, I could reconnect to them on my way home.

But I was in a mental state that was unlike I had experienced before... I had not been working, not driving, not cooking, not shopping... just being and exploring. I was alone a lot traveling in Asia, and now being with people constantly since arriving in the US was a challenge, as I was visiting old friends, cousins, aunt, sister and niephews. I was going cuckoo not having time and space to integrate my experiences from the India journey while visiting people who were going at full speed in their own lives, happy to have a visitor to bring into their own world... but I wasn't ready to go into others' worlds. I wanted to talk about my experiences, and I wanted to write. I wanted to go into my cave, or share with a person who was really curious about what happened for me on my journey.

I was still living out of the backpack and now suddenly in high-drive visiting-mode with people I had not seen in some years, I was so happy to see these people who care for me so much, but I was having a hard time taking care of myself, and under the happiness to connect with my loved ones, I felt a measure of grief, confusion, withdrawal, and loneliness.

A beautiful moment happened when I went home to St. Louis after all that traveling... Mother was so ecstatic to see me. I felt like a 4-year old again, feeling her love, relief, and adoration when she picked me up at the airport. She was beside herself with excitement and hugs, like a child herself, letting her emotions totally show. She took me home and offered me food, candies, drinks and comfy places to sit. She was dying to hear all about my trip and see all the pictures. She was so happy to have me home, safe and sound. Then my sister Margaret came home and she squealed and hugged me so hard. She was equally excited to see me, and to learn of my experiences, she couldn't wait! I felt so loved and adored, it was such a sweet homecoming!

I was so surprised that I really wanted and needed this. I needed to feel welcomed home and, I guess, to be celebrated? Margaret mentioned that maybe I felt celebrated when I told her how it felt...

I watched Kanika's family welcome her home when she went to her parents' house in Panchkula near Chandigargh. They had everything ready for the important guests! Kanika, her husband Patrick, son Watson, and me, friend Kathleen. Bedrooms were perfectly prepared, and amazing foods cooked to welcome hungry travelers. All attentions and affections were poured on Kanika and her family. There was no mistake she was the most important person in this moment, having been gone, and now welcomed back to the nest. She was celebrated and loved! They all wanted to know about her life and how she was doing. I so admired and enjoyed this adoring, welcoming energy. And she poured gifts upon her parents, brother, sister-in-law and niece. What a great time they were having in their reunion, like Christmas.

It is such a beautiful thing to celebrate a person. I think this is one reason I do love birthdays. I like to sing to people on their birthdays, on the phone or in person. I want to be more conscious of celebrating others. It is a beautiful thing, to celebrate each other!

I want to celebrate people when they make big life decisions, when they return home after a long or intense absence, when they go through a big life change. We used to have more ceremony in our lives, to mark these important moments of change, return, and departure. I believe we can re-integrate those traditions, or make new traditions to be conscious of each other's growth and process with love and attention!