small change

of flights

A curious thing happens to me between going through security and boarding a plane. No longer home and not yet at my destination, I become slightly unhinged. Not in my mind, mind you, but in habits of thinking about who I might be. In practical (and plain) terms, this means that I will buy magazines and books (and at a premium price imposed by the last bookstands before take-off too) I wouldn't allow myself to even look at on account of the image of myself as “serious” – reader or writer. And so it was on my last foray into the wider world, some 10 days ago when I went off to see my older son in Washington, DC. Which means that I finally got to read Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love.

Sure, I raced through it, and without carrying the excess baggage of my reader's guilt over following Gilbert on a journey of self discovery made so public (not to mention handsomely profitable). Her style is deceptively breezy and balmy, making the read a pleasure of its own. Her prose sparkles and is soft and comfortable, like the leather seat in first class, making for a cushy journey into the exotic, but still pleasant, landscapes of worlds that are likely to be a lot more unglamorous, unconformable, and even inhospitable to travelers who lack the ease of making friends, with people or words. But I don't mean to belittle Gilbert's book. Below that ease and comfort she seems to possess with words, I see the mastery, the greasy, sweaty, and decidedly unglamorous work, of the writer who had to tame the amorphous (and, at times, dangerous) beast of the subject with the expert whip of language. While others reading this book may be dreaming of tracing Gilbert's spiritual unfolding in spaces that lure one with as much of the scared as they do with the sensual, I find myself more in the category of the pigs trained to sniff for truffles. Only what I am after is the morsel of morel that pushes through the loam of language. And which can make the meal of memoir, well (sorry for the string of alliterations) memorable.

While I trusted Gilbert as a writer, and gave myself readily over for transport by her language, I had a harder time with the spiritual landscapes of the journey. Gilbert, though she makes the point that the better part of spiritual enlightenment, like writing, is about showing up for the work, and then getting down to it, makes of transcendence (or even its attempt) into a chat over a perfectly brewed venti with God in the latest bucolic spiritual Starbucks outpost. Like a friend said in a recent tweet over the subject, there something too facile about Gilbert's spiritual experiences, at least as she presents them, because they tend to come across as “how EG got her groove back.” And, the way I see it, even if this has never been Gilbert's intention – not to mention, her actual spiritual experience – there is something of the aura of glib reproducibility of her experience by every earnest reader of this book, who, means permitting, could retrace Gilbert's steps, much like an fitness routine, to get the same glowing results.

In my spiritual evolution, such as it is, language is the weakest link, fraying and breaking apart the strands that weave the heart of Yoga: the settling of the mind into silence. I did try to write about my spiritual explorations before, but I soon realized that my mind was a blunt tool, lacking not only the finesse to recognize the indescribable in the depths of silence, but also in its brute force to hammer away until it could provoke an echo, not realizing that this sound is of its own making.

A for traveling far to find oneself at home in the universe, I have my doubts. Coincidentally (OK, may be not so coincidentally, if you happen to subscribe to the idea that there are no accidents in the universe), as I took a break from writing this post, I read Simon Winchester's review of Carl Hoffman's Lunatic Express in today's The Wall Street Journal. From what I gather, Hoffman's year-long journey by the nightmarish methods of travel the majority of human beings all over the world endure while they get from place to place (an imperative of the new global reality), may well be the perfect antidote to reading Gilbert's “Eat, Pray, Love,” both as a travelogue and as spiritual discovery.

Well then, maybe on Mr. Winchester's suggestion, I will pick up a copy at an airport, as I am unhoming myself in the limbo between security and boarding the plane so that I can glimpse what's it like to be at home nowhere.

mind the batter

I made pancakes this morning, with quinoa flour. I wanted to feed my family something healthy and indulgent at the same time. The pancakes were dense and rubbery. Not to mention without much taste, except for the slosh of vanilla and whatever else we put on them once they were cooked.

All the want in the world to have these pancakes turn out fluffy, airy, golden and light – ah, yes, really light – made no difference as I anxiously watched over them in the pan. Once you wreck the batter, your pancakes are done for.

I should have minded the batter. I should have measured with care all the things that went into it. I should have followed a recipe, however uninspiring that might have been.

Well, yes, my airless pancakes, while a ruinous breakfast, they are satisfying plenty as metaphors. And, there is a lesson to be had, one of mindful focus, of knowing what matters and what matter one makes:

If you want heavenly pancakes, be the air for the batter.

dusk

Since perfectionism has plagued me all my life, it would be easy to declare myself its hapless victim. The unfinished novels that were to introduce a new voice into American fiction, the skeins of wool that were meant to be knitted into dazzling sweaters, the craft supplies that … they all add up to a perfect picture of what my propensity for perfectionism has done to projects begun in the glory of great expectations.

But, there is another side to all this, as there is to everything. Though I had suffered bouts of paralysis from perfectionism, there have been times when this condition has served as a handy excuse for letting my plain old lazy side have its day in the sun. After all, saying that one can't finish something because one happens to be a perfectionist sounds so much more virtuous than admitting to being lazy.

I was reminded of this push-and pull between my vices as throughout the day I faced the blank screen on the computer monitor. Eleven days since I made a commitment, to no one in particular, that a post would go up on this blog every day. A post with text, since I knew that if I were to allow anything less than what it takes to put a paragraph together, my laziness would start to get ideas of its own and paste up a photo randomly and so call it a post and then a day.

The trick has been to keep the perfectionist in check long enough to hit the “publish” button once the post was (more or less) finished for the day. Since I was distracted today with errands, the perfectionist in me took this opportunity to set up shop and demand its share of attention in the limelight. And what a convincing performance it gave me too, almost letting me break the sunset rule. That is, the one I made about not only posting every day, but also writing the post before the sun would set.

In the grand scheme of things, and with the world being what it always is, posting to one's blog every day seems like a pointless and self-indulgent exercise. But then, the point of my blog, should it have any, was never one to change the grand scheme of things or the world, being what it is. Bearing witness to the days, in whatever form, that is what I had in mind a long time ago, and which has to be good enough as a peace offering to both the perfectionist and the lounger in me.

not quite sunday morning

It is Saturday and it is a glorious summer morning in this corner of Northern California. You would think that just about everyone around here would head for the beach to soak up the sun on the shores, or the backyard to catch up with gardening chores … but this morning's yoga class was packed to the rafters with the regulars, some new faces and some old ones from classes long past thrown in the mix. As usual, there was also the mix of levels of practice and that of age, from the old geezers and the women past their mid-seventies holding poses with strength and poise to the young people throwing their pliable limbs hither and yon, for some of them their enthusiasm sure to develop into the supple musculature it takes to practice yoga not for the physical beauty of the body or even that of the disembodied soul, but for the “light on life” of which B.K.S. Iyengar speaks.

the dumps

I am having an odd experience. Not strange, but one that is strangely absent in many discussions of parenthood.  At least in the discussions I had over the years. The closest descriptive term for the emotional aspect of my odd experience is grief. Yet no one died as such. On the contrary: the child who precipitated  this patch of dark rain in my soul has graduated, not just from college, but it seems, from his original (and perhaps habitual) attachment to home. He has stepped into a very bright, sunny clearing, the soil of which is alien to me. As it should be.

For some months now it was becoming obvious that this son will not to come home any time soon, at least not as the kid whose room I kept intact pretty much the way he left when we took that first heart-wrenching trip to Madison, Wisconsin, to drop him off at his dorm room. Not that he hasn’t been home since then. He has been home every chance he got, at least for the first three years of college. He had even spent an entire summer at home, working and adding to the chaos of electronics debris, papers galore, and other stuff in his room and closet. But I kept all of it, including the mad quilt on the walls of those almost-pornographic pictures of cars from the years of plenty not so long ago, like the gleaming silver silhouette of a Chrysler Sebring -- but I digress.

A week ago, around graduation time, when my son hesitated to commit himself to a date on which he would come home before starting work even farther from here, on the east coast, it became obvious to me that I had to break free of that room of his childhood as much as he already had.

So, for the last three days I have been hauling down boxes and boxes of dead electronics, dusty papers, broken toys, the odd adult magazine, homework from elementary school, stuffed animals, and all such stuff that has been at one time or another a very significant piece in this former child’s daily life. With each box I took down, though, I felt a rise in guilt, as if I had betrayed him in some way. Then, today, it dawned on me: the mother in me was horrified at what looked to her like a disposal of the things of a “departed” child. A child who had died.

The fact is that a “child” did die. To make room for the man.

Now it is my turn to let go. Not just of that “child,” but also of his mother. And this I do, I am realizing, with each box I take out of that room. By tomorrow, most of those things that make him persist in the different stages of a boyhood so ingrained in my experience as his mother, will be gone. Soon there will be a lot more space in the room, a patch of emptiness where, as I see it now, I can, at least, attempt to let go for the sake of both of us.

always the bridesmaid

The yoga teacher, subbing for our regular teacher, who is in India, told me that it was fun to have me in her class these weeks. She said: “You are such a good student.” I was so flattered at first – until I asked myself the proverbial one-hand clapping question:  if I am a good student, that is, good at doing student-like things, does that mean that I am also good at practicing yoga, that is that my practice of yoga is, well, yoga?

And you can see where this line of questioning goes. Certainly not straight and over the horizon, but coiling around itself in a frozen here and now, circle after circle, until the mind becomes like a stressed string, ready to bounce and swing wildly at the slightest touch. Not the mind of a yogi, or even of a good student of yoga!

mind you

This last week I faced a situation that tested my understanding of mindfulness. Not meditation as such, but an awareness of the lengths to which the ruminative mind goes to keep one a captive audience for its little melodrama. The ham in my brain, exposed to too many silly TV shows, decided to put on a play in which it was going to star as a seer of catastrophes, large and small.  As the week went by, this impostor of an inhabitant of the sensory world, slunk to new lows to demonstrate and wow me with what it can do, including damaging some of my more cared-for property. Here is how this act played out:

I was on my way to attend an artists’ reception at the gallery at the College of Marin, happily snapping pictures of the campus along the way, in spite of the literal and the more ephemeral dark clouds gathering above me, when I suddenly had this notion that my camera could fall and break on the concrete walkway. I tried to brush this thought away, but the image of the damaged camera stuck, the way static can hold random bits and pieces to each other.

That I also happened to have a case of camera envy, after having seen what Lorianne’s new toy could do, though it passed through the metal (or should I say mental?) detector of my awareness, but it obviously didn't set off any alarms.  So I went on my way to the gallery, my worries flanking me, and the mind doing it's thing -- and sure enough, as soon as I snapped the first picture of the work which drew me there and then proceeded to put the camera back in my purse for a moment to write something down, the camera fell to the floor with big thud. And yes, the bottom of the camera was damaged, but not enough to put it out of commission as far as snapping pictures was concerned.

Still, there it was, the ruminative mind, that third-rate thespian, crying out in triumph: See, see, I told you this was going to happen. Just wait now until the next bad thing happens, because it will, I tell you. And now you can trust me, really trust me, because I just proved to you that I am good at this… Well, you get the picture!

It wasn’t until the next day, and in a moment of worry of the worst kind that something made me stop, as if to look away from the stage dominated by this mind bent on drama. For that moment it was as if I could see the ruminative mind for the poor actor that it was.

And, for the same moment, I also could see that I had the power and ability to provide this actor with a new script, if what I really wanted was to see a play unfold. If I could conjure up these fearful scenarios, I could also conjure up much happier outcomes.

Or, I could leave the theater altogether. And for that one moment I did exactly that, going nowhere, which, after all is the perfect place for change!

the virtual path

UPDATE: Naturally (as my gut tried to suggest, but was blunted by the fast for a procedure) it was NOT the Dalai Lama who set up shop on Twitter. (via Gretchen Rubin)

OMG ... the Dalai Lama is on Twitter!

If you can't follow the Path, at least you can follow his updates.

shield

After yoga class today, I took a very long bath. Perhaps the combination of poses held for a long time and the long soak in hot water, left me a bit softheaded, if not exactly softhearted. I had to face some unwelcome truths about aspects of my relationship with a certain family member lately, and yesterday, it all came to a head, wounding me deeply, even as I struggled to contain not just the current emotional damage, but also cut through the fog of the past attachments that keeps (at least me) disoriented when it comes to finding a way out of this situation that has been stuck in a groove for years.

So, it was with great interest that I read Sally Kempton’s current article in this month’s Yoga Journal, called “Protective Services.” Last night, as I was devising small rituals to help me shed, and so contain, some of these ancient feelings that shut of all possibility for change and openness, little did I know that I was practicing one of the core principles of vulnerability: building boundaries in order to be more open.

The practice of opening to vulnerability is not for wimps. It’s an advanced practice, requiring strength, discernment, and boundaries – all qualities your yoga practice will give you, if you give it time.
...
The spiritual journey often looks like a dance between the two distinct poles of vulnerabilities and boundaries. It’s a continuing dialogue between the impulse to soften and open and the impulse to contain and protect.

Of course, as a recovering wimp, I remember the days when containment was as easy to be had as it was to pour a glass of wine, or ask a doctor for some pills. None which made for good dialogue. In fact, that kind of containing was an endless performance of the same monologue in an empty theatre.

I am aware that it's not going to be easy. There will be days when the performer in me will want to opt for the monologue, even in the empty theatre, rather than let either the impulse to contain or the impulse to soften have it's say and have either heard. 

There is more, of course, but it's time to go catch that light that is beckoning from the top of the stairs. It's a gorgeous January day here, and it's best to seize it before I miss it by writing about it.....

of luminous matter

On this day, and in a forum like this, custom demands some form of expressive meditation on the year that passed. If not that, at least a quick ledger of days in which the god and the bad, the memorable and the drab take their place in the credit and debit side, balancing the book of life, at least in the currency of one year. And if one is a poet, rather than an accountant, one should, of course speak of the flavor of experiences that have distilled from the cluster of days crushed and marked as 2008 vintage.

These days I am no longer a poet (since I write so little – OK, no – poetry). Neither am I an accountant, just keep some books, both of numbers and words, I suppose. A bystander in my life, and also the “author,” in as much as circumstance permit, I look back at 2008 and see, well, standing here on this day, looking – simply looking a few feet back and string at the blur that is the future for nearsighted creature.

Blame the Nova program I watched on neutrinos last night. Blame my love of physics and a corresponding inability to have mastered the math required for the study of it. Above all, blame my imagination, for here I am, on the last day of the year, wondering about the interpretive connection between “ghostly” neutrinos and the “indivisible” Self of The Upanishads. Not so much searching for religion in physics (after all, these two do have a long, long history of connection), as I am searching for the physics hidden in religion.

Here is a passage from Nickolas Solomey’s “The Elusive Neutrino”:

The neutrino is one of the most perplexing of [the] elementary particles. It is a close relative of the electron, but carries no charge and has extremely little mass, if any at all. These are some of the characteristics that make the neutrino so elusive. Neutral particles of substantial mass or charged particles of any mass interact with matter when they encounter it. But the neutrino passes through even our most sophisticated detectors as if it did not recognize that matter was present.

And here is Yama, the king of Death from the Katha Upanishad teaching Nachiketa about the ways in which the Self takes shape:

As the same fire assumes different shapes
When it consumes objects differing in shape,
So does the one Self take the shape
Of every creature in whom he is present.
As the same air assumes different shapes
When it enters objects differing in shape,
So does the one Self take the shape
Of every creature in whom he is present.

Or, more to the point of the analogy:

Above the senses is the mind, above
The mind is the intellect, above that
Is the ego, and above the ego
Is the unmanifested Cause.
And beyond is Brahman, omnipresent,
Attributeless. Realizing him one is released
From the cycle f birth and death.

He is formless, and can never be seen
With these two eyes. But he reveals himself
In the heart made pure through meditation
And sense-restraint. Realizing him, one is
Released from the cycle of birth and death.

So, there you have it, I suppose: on this last day of a year marked as 2008, I am thinking of the unmeasurable, the invisible, and the indivisible, both the smallest and the grandest, since, in physics, as in religion, size really is immaterial.