Please, Don't Hit the Pillows

I'm in Hobart at the moment. Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. It's lovely. Cool, not cold, somewhat of a frontier feel to it. I like it. I'm here to study with Judith Lasater, who I only just recently encountered thanks to the Anusara required reading list (Relax & Renew), and a recent email exchange with fellow yogin BJ Galvan and Clare Raffety. 

So I'm here, I've completed my first day, and I'm stunned. Not so much by what she is teaching (the content is superb of course) but how she is teaching it. A stronger "seat of the teacher" I've never seen. She is firm, but kind. She is strong, yet soft. She is clearly the teacher, but I'm not less because I'm the student. She is here to serve, and I am uplifted. She is of such quality that I'm deeply honored to be at her feet. I am blessed.

Her husband Ike is teaching a course on nonviolent communication. Sort of an extra scoop (or cherry) on top of the yoga. Judith employs this communication technique in her instruction and I can attest that it is what makes her such a powerful and efficacious teacher. However, I'm attending Ike's course not because of Judith's example, but rather because shortly after I heard about it (last night) I had an acute experience of why I needed it.

Lynda, one of my classmates shared the airport shuttle with me. We were both exhausted from a long day's travel, and were musing over the smallness of Hobart. She mentioned Ike's course and I said, "I should attend. I have a tendency to use violent metaphors, and language, not because I want to inflict violence, but because I'm using the extreme for an effect or I think it is funny to do so. It works alright for people who know me, who understand my sense of humor, but for people who don't, for example my yoga students, I'm concerned it may be off putting." 

Not 10 minutes after I said this, as I got out of the shuttle and waved goodnight to Lynda who shouted "Have a nice rest!" I said, "Oh I will, I'm going to hit the pillow hard."

No sooner had the words left my mouth then I felt the impact of what I had said. It was exactly the type of violent statement I wanted to be rid of. And for the first time I understood why. It left a feeling I couldn't describe.  

Judith described the feeling very accurately in class this morning. She told us that the things we say leave a residue. A signature of sorts that hangs about. The residue I created by saying "hit the pillow hard" was sadness. I knew I didn't really want to hit anything, and could have created a very different residue by saying, "Oh I will, I will lay my head sweetly on my pillow in gratitude." What a palpable difference! I injured myself by expressing my need for softness by pummeling it! Hard!

OK! I'm learning! I realized through this experience that my violent language isn't only painful to people who don't know me well, or even those who do. It is painful to myself.

In two words: Lemony Snicket

R + I, out of boredom and lack of selection at the Nhulunbuy Video 2000, rented "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events." We were touched. 

Since the book is always better than the movie I decided to imbibe the Series, and have just finished this afternoon. Man. The author really captures in his series what my teacher DB is saying in other words. The reality of life isn't that mysteries get solved. It's that mysteries only get more mysterious. They deepen.

The Series is not for readers looking for tidy plots and answers. It will leave you with more questions than you started with, and in that sense isn't very satisfying. You know, sort of like life can be. If your preference is questions answered, plot solved, clear villains and heros, you will be disappointed. As Lemony warns, if you want a book like that the best thing you can do is put his book down. Go find a story about giggling elves. I thought he was kidding, how could a story, a children's story no less, not have a tidy plot line and still sell copies? Oh right. I got mine from the library.

Are young children ready to deal with this uncertainty? Am I  ready to deal with this?

I realize I read fiction to escape life or to think, damn, I'm glad that isn't me. I read it for the satisfaction of the resolution. I admit that I read philosophy to find an efficient way around or through life with as little complication as possible until I 'm out of it. But now even my fiction and my philosophy are telling me the same thing. There is no tidy resolution. There is no around, through, or out. This is it. 

This is it.

This is it.

This is it.

The reality is life is complex. And no amount of around, through, or out, is going to change this truth. Even when I think I've finally organized myself into stability and efficiency, eventually complication slides in. Oozes in. Gums up the works. Fills in the cracks, and there I am, plot unraveled, looking life in the face and asking "How did it get so complex?"

I think I finally get it. Life didn't become complex. It always was complex. I wanted reality to be a simple plot with a beginning, a middle, and an end. But reality doesn't have a beginning. It did not start with my character. My experience of it can not possibly include all the facts. My understanding of the plot is based on snippets, clippings, snapshots, and memories gathered from hurried conversations.  Some helpful, but painful things are left out all together to protect me and those I love.

I'm willing to accept this at last: I never will know the whole story. I'll never see the end. A villain is just another character with a part of the story I've never seen.

With a deep inhalation I settle myself right in the middle of it all. Rather than await the resolution, I'll experience every snippet, every clipping and snapshot. I'll do the best I can with the information I've got, and with compassion remember that's the best any of us can do.

Thanks Lemony. May you remain an enigma, always.

Ex-change

I have endured my first ever boil. Where is it? Why, it's right on my face! Convenient place. I'm sure not to miss it there.

Living in Arnhem Land, I've seen and doctored many boils. They are gross, hard, puss-filled, weeping sores that are the stuff of old-testament fire and brimstone punishment. They are as bad as all that. If anyone should accidentally bump your boil, get ready for a shock wave of pain that will move through your body head to toe. When my boil finally burst, I enjoyed 30 hours of drainage (read: blood and puss dripping from the sore). And now, well, there's the gaping hole in my face. My ego says, "Ow!"

I've had a horrible time with my skin since adulthood. Or I've believed. Being a Chase entails poor circulation and hence slow healing. Blemishes often infect, and take weeks to heal. The fact that I'm impatient (a perfectionist) and try to help them along by squeezing or whatever, rarely helps. When I look in the mirror and see a blemish, I see imperfection. I feel dirty, ugly, old. I'm looking very closely.

How did I get this boil? Well. Naturally it started as a blemish that I kept touching, trying to hurry along towards perfection.

I had to go to town with my swollen face, at it's peak and oozing. I had been hiding myself all week. Seriously. When I heard a knock on the door I went to my bedroom to hide and let Randy handle it. But, I couldn't avoid this trip, and decided to bandage the boil and face it.

As I went about bandaging my face I saw something in the mirror I hadn't noticed in a long time: my eyes. They were deep blue. Soft. Compassionate. Forgiving. They told me I was hurting, but beautiful. I fell into them and felt a whisper in my heart: Back off. Slow down. Demand Less. Accept all, especially imperfection.

I am not the same.

We change, things change. Change is the only constant is it said. But change is only part of the story. In between every change is an exchange: a transformation. Things change, that's for certain. But change into what?

We decide, moment by moment.

Break a bottle of anything but champagne

I'm giving the blog a go. Its a means of publishing that I hope will take less time than my regular website. A few words, a photo, and all nicely reliably formatted without any effort from me. Dreamy. Feels tidy!