Friday, May 14, 2010
I £o¥e my students!
They brought me chocolate. Lots of it! I made more Yogi Tea, and we giggled and did the Apple Kriya. Bound Lotus is getting easier in the sense that I can sit in Full Lotus on each side for 3 minutes each...the rest of the time in Half Bound Lotus.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
I've experienced Satori before, many times...
...and many times I have come back down and found my old habits waiting for me, like the 'dirty laundry'. The messiness of my life. I didn't go to India. I stood stranded in Hot Springs, Arkansas, left by a friend of a friend, who was drunk, and when I walked into the Best Western, there was a huge statue of Ganesha. I fell immediately at his feet and prayed for a safe trip back to St. Louis. As I left the same building, I turned a corner, and there, 20 feet high, was a sparkling mosaic of Jesus. Jesus and Ganesha. I felt loved. I felt safe in my uncertainty. I spent the day in the park sitting in deep meditation, and when I went to get a bite to eat, the waitress looked at me like I was the sun. That was in 2007.
I've stood outside Whole Foods Grocery on Brentwood Blvd. in St. Louis, feeling unable to speak or even attempt a thought, after barely making it out of my car, because, while driving the experience of 'No Self' began. I disappeared. I was nowhere and everywhere. I was filled with immense grief and boundless joy at once. My face felt as if it would break from tears and smiles. I could not remember how to speak, when I called my father, afraid I would collapse right there on the sidewalk in ecstasy. The fear of finding myself rushed to a hospital, instead of allowed to exist in that beautiful space was so valid, I dared not go farther than to stand at the edge of the vastness, gazing out with a mixture of fear and wonder... That was in 2008.
I've walked in the park, gazing up at the moon, looking down at the bones of mice dropped by owls, and felt an indescribable peace. I've passed by the spot where a dead tree I dearly loved to sit under had finally been uprooted, and collapsed on the spot in grief. Only to be laughed at by a passing bycyclist, and realize, in that split second, how there was no seperation between her inability to feel the loss of wonder and mine to feel it.
I've walked underneath a huge Pin Oak, to see a tiny baby squirrel, foaming in agony with rabies, drop from the tree branch above, right in front of me. Missing my face by inches, as I stooped to cry with him, and hover my hands over his body, sending him Reiki, because I dare not touch him. I sat there, suffering with the squirrel, tears streaming down my face, as a carload of kids drove by and laughed at me. Then something miraculous happened: the foam on the squirrel's mouth dried up, and he rolled around and away for a bit. Then he began to clean himself. The palsied frenzy was over. Was it the Reiki I wondered? My then boyfriend showed up to tell me, in all selfishness, that we needed to get going, and it was, after all, just a squirrel. I felt compassion for him in his inability to feel oneness with the squirrel, just as I had been able to with the squirrel. I felt a quiet grace descend.
I was in Negril, Jamaica once, back on the cliffs, after having eaten a plate of scrambled eggs and mushrooms, and I saw at once how everything was divine, all illumined by grace. The plants and trees had luminous halos and auras. The roach on the wall became as beautiful as an irridescent beetle. All black and red with the intricate angles of its body. The waves of the ocean were me, and I had to restrain myself from diving into them from the 40 foot cliff wall, just because I wanted to merge back into the ocean. An sole almond fell from the tree above me, drawing me even deeper into the awareness that the sky was the ocean. That I was the ocean, and it was all 'The Same Sea', like the title of Amos Oz' book.
I fell asleep once on my living room floor, sick with salmonella poisoning, to awaken as my body became ablaze with light and sound, my internal eye focused on a wash of kaleidoscopic colors opening into the tunnel of my own spine. I felt carried on waves of bliss so far beyond any orgasm I've ever experienced, and then was heartbroken when the experience vanished. That was in 1996.
In 1996 as well, I experienced my mother's death as if I were with her, while I sat miles away on the toilet, crying with grief. I knew someone close to me was dying, as I cried in agony and fear. Then an immense peace came over me, and I went back to bed to rest in it.
I've had these experiences, and many others, only to come back to this life and it's mundanity, slipping back into old habits and ways of being. It isn't about spiritual attainment of a goal, or about enlightenment. I've had many moments of enlightenment where the presence of my divine nature and the world's was imminent. It is about not that, but holding the space for those moments as well as the ones where I and others have crashed and burned, where we want to cling so madly to the belief that somehow, soon, we will reach the top of some ladder's rungs and stay forever exalted, where we run so hard and fast from our shadows, and the darkness that we must necessarily contain with the light, that we think, conversely, any fall from grace is not just part of the cycle, but death.
It isn't death, it is the process of living. Like the opening and closing of butterflies' wings, like breath breathed and released and let go, if we are to truly be alive, we must let go, let the beautiful moment pass...enjoy it, then exhale it. And then rather than chide ourselves for not having become perfect, or not being able to keep the bliss, allow for these other moments of grief, anger, sadness, rage and anxiety to pass through. Not clinging to them either. Just being ready for joy AND sorrow. Breath and no breath. Delight and no light. It is this fear of exhaling completely and letting go into every single moment, whether painful or peaceful, that keeps the heart from opening. In order to truly breathe another breath into the heart, the last breath must be released. Like the monkey who grabs for candy in a jar, we can't get our fist back out until we let go.
I've stood outside Whole Foods Grocery on Brentwood Blvd. in St. Louis, feeling unable to speak or even attempt a thought, after barely making it out of my car, because, while driving the experience of 'No Self' began. I disappeared. I was nowhere and everywhere. I was filled with immense grief and boundless joy at once. My face felt as if it would break from tears and smiles. I could not remember how to speak, when I called my father, afraid I would collapse right there on the sidewalk in ecstasy. The fear of finding myself rushed to a hospital, instead of allowed to exist in that beautiful space was so valid, I dared not go farther than to stand at the edge of the vastness, gazing out with a mixture of fear and wonder... That was in 2008.
I've walked in the park, gazing up at the moon, looking down at the bones of mice dropped by owls, and felt an indescribable peace. I've passed by the spot where a dead tree I dearly loved to sit under had finally been uprooted, and collapsed on the spot in grief. Only to be laughed at by a passing bycyclist, and realize, in that split second, how there was no seperation between her inability to feel the loss of wonder and mine to feel it.
I've walked underneath a huge Pin Oak, to see a tiny baby squirrel, foaming in agony with rabies, drop from the tree branch above, right in front of me. Missing my face by inches, as I stooped to cry with him, and hover my hands over his body, sending him Reiki, because I dare not touch him. I sat there, suffering with the squirrel, tears streaming down my face, as a carload of kids drove by and laughed at me. Then something miraculous happened: the foam on the squirrel's mouth dried up, and he rolled around and away for a bit. Then he began to clean himself. The palsied frenzy was over. Was it the Reiki I wondered? My then boyfriend showed up to tell me, in all selfishness, that we needed to get going, and it was, after all, just a squirrel. I felt compassion for him in his inability to feel oneness with the squirrel, just as I had been able to with the squirrel. I felt a quiet grace descend.
I was in Negril, Jamaica once, back on the cliffs, after having eaten a plate of scrambled eggs and mushrooms, and I saw at once how everything was divine, all illumined by grace. The plants and trees had luminous halos and auras. The roach on the wall became as beautiful as an irridescent beetle. All black and red with the intricate angles of its body. The waves of the ocean were me, and I had to restrain myself from diving into them from the 40 foot cliff wall, just because I wanted to merge back into the ocean. An sole almond fell from the tree above me, drawing me even deeper into the awareness that the sky was the ocean. That I was the ocean, and it was all 'The Same Sea', like the title of Amos Oz' book.
I fell asleep once on my living room floor, sick with salmonella poisoning, to awaken as my body became ablaze with light and sound, my internal eye focused on a wash of kaleidoscopic colors opening into the tunnel of my own spine. I felt carried on waves of bliss so far beyond any orgasm I've ever experienced, and then was heartbroken when the experience vanished. That was in 1996.
In 1996 as well, I experienced my mother's death as if I were with her, while I sat miles away on the toilet, crying with grief. I knew someone close to me was dying, as I cried in agony and fear. Then an immense peace came over me, and I went back to bed to rest in it.
I've had these experiences, and many others, only to come back to this life and it's mundanity, slipping back into old habits and ways of being. It isn't about spiritual attainment of a goal, or about enlightenment. I've had many moments of enlightenment where the presence of my divine nature and the world's was imminent. It is about not that, but holding the space for those moments as well as the ones where I and others have crashed and burned, where we want to cling so madly to the belief that somehow, soon, we will reach the top of some ladder's rungs and stay forever exalted, where we run so hard and fast from our shadows, and the darkness that we must necessarily contain with the light, that we think, conversely, any fall from grace is not just part of the cycle, but death.
It isn't death, it is the process of living. Like the opening and closing of butterflies' wings, like breath breathed and released and let go, if we are to truly be alive, we must let go, let the beautiful moment pass...enjoy it, then exhale it. And then rather than chide ourselves for not having become perfect, or not being able to keep the bliss, allow for these other moments of grief, anger, sadness, rage and anxiety to pass through. Not clinging to them either. Just being ready for joy AND sorrow. Breath and no breath. Delight and no light. It is this fear of exhaling completely and letting go into every single moment, whether painful or peaceful, that keeps the heart from opening. In order to truly breathe another breath into the heart, the last breath must be released. Like the monkey who grabs for candy in a jar, we can't get our fist back out until we let go.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
The Mercurial Mother
I'm up early. I slept so much yesterday, that now I am up in time to do Morning Sadhana when it is supposed to be done, between the hours of 4 and 6 am. The Amrit Vela. The Ambrosial Hours. The time of day when the sweet morning dew, that alchemical mixture which falls on the grass, and impregnates the flowers and leaves with healing energy, also hovers in the air to settle on those who are up at this hour to imbibe it through their conscious breath. It is breathtaking to do this practice again at this hour! I feel, after having lost my breath during the pollen season, how wierdly I have an increased lung capacity as compared to before the pollen season. Miracle or hidden strength? I sing and rejoice that I am on day 189 of Bound Lotus. The Grace of God and Guru have brought me here...
Last night when I awoke with a start, and scrambled to do Bound Lotus, I felt sick. When I finished, I did not. As I sit this morning to sing the Aquarian Sadhana mantras, I feel tired, but strangely uplifted. Last night I felt like Cinderella, watching the finery of my practice fade to show the rags of my former poor health peeking through. After Bound Lotus I felt renewed. It is as if Spirit were showing me how very important it is to do this practice every day..."Keep up and you will be kept up."
I want to cry at the realization of the blessing I have received with both this practice and the gift of my name, Amrita. A drop of dew in the ocean. Divine nectar. Deathlessness. Timelessness. This morning, in Bound Lotus, at 5:10 am, I am ecstatic, and riding a wave of Bliss! As I tell those whom I attune to the Reiki energy, you must put the oxygen mask on yourself first. This Bound Lotus is a divine gift! No longer rotely done. No longer a chore. It was a gift when I began it...and it is again now. Another Dark Night of the Soul is past, and I can see the beauty and intricacy of this pose entwining itself with me. I feel like I am growing roots into the earth as I sit. My head feels like a rose or a lotus blossoming forth. I WILL keep up! I WILL honor God and Guru and myself, for this blessed gift of being able to DO Bound Lotus. This heals me. Even more to do it first thing in the morning just as I did at Winter Solstice. A gift of Yogi Bhajan's Grace. The Guru's Grace. Grace of the Divine. The Mercurial Mother...and the Cosmic Father.
Last night when I awoke with a start, and scrambled to do Bound Lotus, I felt sick. When I finished, I did not. As I sit this morning to sing the Aquarian Sadhana mantras, I feel tired, but strangely uplifted. Last night I felt like Cinderella, watching the finery of my practice fade to show the rags of my former poor health peeking through. After Bound Lotus I felt renewed. It is as if Spirit were showing me how very important it is to do this practice every day..."Keep up and you will be kept up."
I want to cry at the realization of the blessing I have received with both this practice and the gift of my name, Amrita. A drop of dew in the ocean. Divine nectar. Deathlessness. Timelessness. This morning, in Bound Lotus, at 5:10 am, I am ecstatic, and riding a wave of Bliss! As I tell those whom I attune to the Reiki energy, you must put the oxygen mask on yourself first. This Bound Lotus is a divine gift! No longer rotely done. No longer a chore. It was a gift when I began it...and it is again now. Another Dark Night of the Soul is past, and I can see the beauty and intricacy of this pose entwining itself with me. I feel like I am growing roots into the earth as I sit. My head feels like a rose or a lotus blossoming forth. I WILL keep up! I WILL honor God and Guru and myself, for this blessed gift of being able to DO Bound Lotus. This heals me. Even more to do it first thing in the morning just as I did at Winter Solstice. A gift of Yogi Bhajan's Grace. The Guru's Grace. Grace of the Divine. The Mercurial Mother...and the Cosmic Father.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Some days I fall short...
Yesterday I woke up blissful on Mother's Day, for the first time in more than a decade...today I am crabby and tired. I teach to 1, again, for the 6:15 am. One student whom I dearly love for her kindness and enthusiasm, but it is harder to teach one. It takes 10 times more energy, and the monetary exchange is not there to make up for it. I've looked for the 'silver lining' in all this 'practice' and learning from teaching such an unpredictable class, and have told my employer at that studio that I want a break. I can't get subs for a class that the teacher might not even get paid for, because there might not be students. I can't pay someone $20 to teach it, when I barely make $9 sometimes. Can't afford it. So, on June 1st the class goes on 'hiatus'. But basically, I'm done.
Then I go to sub a Gentle Yoga class where I know I will be compensated for my time. I feel free to enjoy teaching without the financial concerns. The students, one of whom has MS, are a joy to teach! Smiles, gratitude for the sheer joy of movement! I'm not just 'service personnel' up there giving them their 'workout'. I've got a student who routinely shows up late for class, and seems to have subconsciously surmised that if she shows up late enough, she can justify skipping shavasana and meditation, which is really important not to miss. But these students in this Gentle Yoga class are here to feed their bodies AND their souls. This is why I teach. For this love.
The movements from Saul David Raye's Ritam Yoga make them smile. Movement comes at a premium for them, and they are not worried about working up a sweat and getting a workout. They want to FEEL. They want to be at home in their bodies. They're done with beating their bodies up. They've learned the hard way to be kinder to their bodies, and not run them to death.
One student needs help from the floor, and we laugh about it. We walk out together, chatting about the trials and tribulations of MS, how it came about, and how she keeps smiling. She cracks me up. I know it can't be fun, but she laughs anyway. This is someone I want to know...
I go to meet a friend for Mass at the Cathedral. It's beautiful. We talk after. I end up attuning him to Level 1 Reiki outside the Cathedral. In the rain. He says he sees pink and green light coming from my hands. He's high from the energy, but doesn't know it. For some reason, this particular attunement takes a lot out of me...he has a high level of anxiety, higher than mine. Anxiety is draining for others, especially for me, because I am 'high-anxiety' myself, and also very empathic, and it doesn't take much for me to entrain with the vibe, or to want to fix it, which drains. I need to get away from him, but don't. It's a great conversation, but it is wiping me out. Is this what I do to others with my anxiety? I don't like seeing it mirrored back at me, and I am exhausted, just as I was the day I first met him the Monday before last.
I get home and do most of my Kundalini meditations. I lay down to take a nap and set the alarm, but never hear it. I'm fast asleep. When I awake, I barely have time to do Bound Lotus! With the Grace of God and Guru, I finish...and it is by pure Grace that I do. I am ever so grateful!!!! No more leaving Bound Lotus till later in the day to be done...from now on, I will do it first thing in the morning.
Then I go to sub a Gentle Yoga class where I know I will be compensated for my time. I feel free to enjoy teaching without the financial concerns. The students, one of whom has MS, are a joy to teach! Smiles, gratitude for the sheer joy of movement! I'm not just 'service personnel' up there giving them their 'workout'. I've got a student who routinely shows up late for class, and seems to have subconsciously surmised that if she shows up late enough, she can justify skipping shavasana and meditation, which is really important not to miss. But these students in this Gentle Yoga class are here to feed their bodies AND their souls. This is why I teach. For this love.
The movements from Saul David Raye's Ritam Yoga make them smile. Movement comes at a premium for them, and they are not worried about working up a sweat and getting a workout. They want to FEEL. They want to be at home in their bodies. They're done with beating their bodies up. They've learned the hard way to be kinder to their bodies, and not run them to death.
One student needs help from the floor, and we laugh about it. We walk out together, chatting about the trials and tribulations of MS, how it came about, and how she keeps smiling. She cracks me up. I know it can't be fun, but she laughs anyway. This is someone I want to know...
I go to meet a friend for Mass at the Cathedral. It's beautiful. We talk after. I end up attuning him to Level 1 Reiki outside the Cathedral. In the rain. He says he sees pink and green light coming from my hands. He's high from the energy, but doesn't know it. For some reason, this particular attunement takes a lot out of me...he has a high level of anxiety, higher than mine. Anxiety is draining for others, especially for me, because I am 'high-anxiety' myself, and also very empathic, and it doesn't take much for me to entrain with the vibe, or to want to fix it, which drains. I need to get away from him, but don't. It's a great conversation, but it is wiping me out. Is this what I do to others with my anxiety? I don't like seeing it mirrored back at me, and I am exhausted, just as I was the day I first met him the Monday before last.
I get home and do most of my Kundalini meditations. I lay down to take a nap and set the alarm, but never hear it. I'm fast asleep. When I awake, I barely have time to do Bound Lotus! With the Grace of God and Guru, I finish...and it is by pure Grace that I do. I am ever so grateful!!!! No more leaving Bound Lotus till later in the day to be done...from now on, I will do it first thing in the morning.
Sunday, May 9, 2010
"The Silver Desert" of Ecstasy
Gabrielle Roth, in her book "Maps to Ecstasy", describes a state of ecstasy that is deathless, beyond death, which she calls 'The Silver Desert'. It's just a name for it, her name for it, but one which opens a door for me on this day. Mother's Day. A day which I have quietly tried to ignore for 14 years...this year, I feel the presence of ALL mothers. A friend and employer who is pregnant, a student coming to my Sunday class who is pregnant, Erykah Badu's Live Album with the picture of herself pregnant with her boy 'Fly'. Erykah Badu is in concert tonight at The Fabulous Fox. I notice this at breakfast at Einstein's. I put my hair up in a turban, put an Indian print dress over my yogawear, and head out to teach my class to the music of Erykah Badu. Something I've wanted to do for a long, long time.
The students joke about me not stripping naked like Erykah did once at the Dallas courthouse, I think? No worries... The pregnant student I watch to learn from as she modifies poses to suit her and her baby's needs. She is fabulous! I love it! I love mothers! All mothers! And I miss mine, but with a joy tinging the longing for her presence.
At home, I make potato salad and do all my Kundalini meditations, including Bound Lotus. The room is luminous, though I am tired. Then I curl up and read Gabrielle Roth's words about death, and deathlessness, and The Silver Desert:
"The first time I glimpsed the Silver Desert, I was nine years old. Eva took me there. She was my first spiritual teacher, though of course I didn't realize it until long after. I was living with my parents near Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.
I'm playing with some friends in the street. We're throwing ourselves recklessly into a large hedge on the side of the house. Suddenly an elderly woman bolts out of the house and scares away my friends, I stay, as my friends run off, mesmerized by her energy and...
The students joke about me not stripping naked like Erykah did once at the Dallas courthouse, I think? No worries... The pregnant student I watch to learn from as she modifies poses to suit her and her baby's needs. She is fabulous! I love it! I love mothers! All mothers! And I miss mine, but with a joy tinging the longing for her presence.
At home, I make potato salad and do all my Kundalini meditations, including Bound Lotus. The room is luminous, though I am tired. Then I curl up and read Gabrielle Roth's words about death, and deathlessness, and The Silver Desert:
"The first time I glimpsed the Silver Desert, I was nine years old. Eva took me there. She was my first spiritual teacher, though of course I didn't realize it until long after. I was living with my parents near Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.
I'm playing with some friends in the street. We're throwing ourselves recklessly into a large hedge on the side of the house. Suddenly an elderly woman bolts out of the house and scares away my friends, I stay, as my friends run off, mesmerized by her energy and...
Saturday, May 8, 2010
My 'new name' is Amrita Kaur! :-)
Today is Day 187 of Bound Lotus. Today is also the completion of 120 Days of 'Releasing Fear' meditation. An auspicious day to be dawning. Last night, at 9:06 pm, I checked my e-mail on my iPhone. Earlier, at 8:49 pm, I had received an e-mail from 3HO with my new name. I had not expected it so soon. I sat in my meditation room to read it, and when I saw the name 'Amrita', I knew it was right. I felt the emotion rumbling in my belly, and the tears of joy beginning to bubble up like a deep artesian well. This name, is what I "heard" back in 2006 that I thought was 'Amora' or 'Amira', that I more recently thought was 'Akal Moorat', meaning "deathless". This name, AMRITA, is part of the honored name of my beloved Ammachi (Sri Amritanandamayi Devi), whose picture resides on my altar with that of Yogi Bhajan and the murtis of Krishna, Kali, Saraswati and Lakshmi. This name is in the mantra I took from Ammachi in 2006, and that I try to say at least one round of on a mala (108 times) every day, if not more. This name is, I am given to understand, very auspicious. It appears I have great numerology? I don't know about that, but I do know the name means 'divine nectar', the ambrosial liquid akin to cerebrospinal fluid that travels through CNS and PNS when the Kundalini energy is moving. This name also means "strong, strength and deathless". Sounds like a Phoenix from the flame to me...
This name was also on the cover of a book I bought in late 1996. It was the novel "Amrita" by the Japanese magickal realism writer Banana Yoshimoto. I showed it to the creep I was dating then, and showed him the cover picture of a girl with tears falling from her eyes down the page, that looked like the picture I drew for my sister while she was at summer camp when I was 5 and could not write, and I missed her. The book is about a young woman who loses a family member to suicide, falls on her head (like me), gets amnesia (kind of like me), goes through grief, dark nights of the soul, and the shadows of her soul, to find her soul again. I've never actually and completely read the book, but I've meant to for years. Now I will. I've read the last page which I love and will quote here because it pretty much sums up how I feel right now:
"It had always been out there, shining brightly. I just hadn't reached out to touch it. But every now and then I felt surrounded by its presence. From right to left, from here to there, like water flowing downstream. Limitless amount of sweet oxygen. The more I took in, the greater the supply.
"Like a saint in the legends who reached out and took jewels from the sky, I had the same kind of talent for gathering miracles in my life. There was no doubt about it. Those feelings had always been with me.
"You know, banging my head on the stairway wasn't such a bad thing after all...
"And that's how I see it."
And that is how I see it. I see myself as Amrita, having falling on her head BECAUSE she forgot who she was, and needed to be reminded. In the worn out words from years ago...This is who I AM: I AM Amrita.
This name was also on the cover of a book I bought in late 1996. It was the novel "Amrita" by the Japanese magickal realism writer Banana Yoshimoto. I showed it to the creep I was dating then, and showed him the cover picture of a girl with tears falling from her eyes down the page, that looked like the picture I drew for my sister while she was at summer camp when I was 5 and could not write, and I missed her. The book is about a young woman who loses a family member to suicide, falls on her head (like me), gets amnesia (kind of like me), goes through grief, dark nights of the soul, and the shadows of her soul, to find her soul again. I've never actually and completely read the book, but I've meant to for years. Now I will. I've read the last page which I love and will quote here because it pretty much sums up how I feel right now:
"It had always been out there, shining brightly. I just hadn't reached out to touch it. But every now and then I felt surrounded by its presence. From right to left, from here to there, like water flowing downstream. Limitless amount of sweet oxygen. The more I took in, the greater the supply.
"Like a saint in the legends who reached out and took jewels from the sky, I had the same kind of talent for gathering miracles in my life. There was no doubt about it. Those feelings had always been with me.
"You know, banging my head on the stairway wasn't such a bad thing after all...
"And that's how I see it."
And that is how I see it. I see myself as Amrita, having falling on her head BECAUSE she forgot who she was, and needed to be reminded. In the worn out words from years ago...This is who I AM: I AM Amrita.
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