I've been getting a little too cozy in my life, I have to admit. I work relatively few hours, even by the more civilized standards of countries like France and Sweden. I have all the food and shelter and clothing and organic bath products that I need. People show up for my birthday party. I make people happy just by walking in the room with my dog, although it doesn't work so well when I'm alone.
I keep reading Pema Chodron, and she keeps saying run into the fear, get comfortable with the grief, know your nervous habits. Basically, make friends with yourself, not just the happy, day-at-the-park self eating veggie burgers and basking in a warm Saturday afternoon. Those moments happen, of course, but if all moments are those types, I'm missing out on all my hidden nooks and dusty corners. I actually have been wanting a little angst, and of course, I haven't had to wait long.
This isn't a dating blog. I'm not going to write about dating. Except that actually I am. Sorry. I haven't been in a romantic relationship for the better part of a decade. Yes, you read it right. The smaller side of the better part of a decade, but just that I'm using the word "decade" to describe my lack of love life is saying something.
I've been asked why a few times in the last couple of weeks. My therapist asked, of course, and so has a man that I've been on a couple dates with. One answer is that I have been magnificently successful at avoiding certain types of pain. But Pema says run toward what you fear. Get to know your neuroses. Make friends with your discomfort. Maitri. Know that you are not alone. What better way than to face what I have been avoiding? Thanks, Pema. Thanks, Universe.
I often find myself doing one of two things. I spend a lot of time either fantasizing about the future or dreading the fact that I've already ruined my chances with someone I'm sort of into. (Maybe a little more than sort of.) I've already fucked it all up. I'm living, in other words, in what isn't happening.
What is happening is kind of interesting. I can see myself, for the first time, doing this, and I know now that it's not real. What is real are all of the emotions that I get to experience. Fear. Dread. Excitement. Curiousity. Nervousness. A little wariness. They're really, really interesting, and I get to just sit in my body and feel them. They're not killing me, y'all. Seriously. It's okay. I feel them AND I get asked out again. Weird.
And I get to play around with living in the unknown. Groundlessness. I don't know what will happen. I can experience this knowing that no matter what I think or fear or fantasize about, life is actually happening right now. Life is the uncertainity, the not knowing. The fantasies and the fears are still around, but they've lost a little of their edge. They're kind of cute. They're not unique to me. It's just part of being human and looking for ground. It's part of hope, which I'm learning to abandon.
So the coziness of the last several weeks didn't last long. Good. The business start-up is over, and I need some more excitement in my life. Until I find my silent, angel investor and start again, maybe I can just enjoy this for a little while and not freak out too much about all the different ways it can go wrong. It's not wrong yet, and I'm actually having a little fun.
Plus, as you all know, more pain means more blog entries. You'll be hearing from me.
Yoga is all about being unattached to results. We do our duty, that’s it. If we’re truly connected, then we are at peace no matter what happens, no matter how many people come to our class, or whether our business fails or succeeds... Then why am I always such a mess?
Monday, August 9, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
abandon hope!
If you still haven't read or listened to Pema Chodron, go right now and order something or reserve it at the library or visit your local independent bookstore. Do what you have to do. Everyone should be reading and listening to this woman.
I was sitting in the bathtub this morning with her book, When Things Fall Apart. She's really into getting friendly with being uncomfortable, with being fearful, nervous, angry, agitated, whatever it is. It was in yoga that I first learned to be uncomfortable in my body. I went to these Iyengar classes at the Buddhist Center in Mexico City. I won't go into a lot of detail right here, but is was probably the most collapsed, defeated time of my life. I was lost. I had no bearing. Looking back, I realize that was the best possible state for me to be in, but at the time it just felt overwhelmingly difficult and hopeless.
The teacher was really strict and direct, but in an amused, slightly smiling way. She was always pushing us to be even more uncomfortable than we already were. It was fun for me, for whatever masochistic reason, and I realized in her class that I could be very uncomfortable in my body without fidgeting or running away. I had never done that before. Really, never. Then what began to happen, again and again, is that she would put us in savasana, and I would also feel enormous amounts of emotional pain. She would chant "Om mani padme hum" in this incredibly strong, ethereal voice. I was just there, still, with tears and snot running down my face. For the first time ever, I just felt it, whatever it was, and it was revolutionary in my life.
So I have learned a little about being present and awake in my discomfort. But I read something different this morning, something that takes it even one step further. Pema Chodron instructs us to "abandon hope." She says that hope and fear are two sides of the same coin, that hope is yet another way of wanting things to be different. We are going to feel lots of pain and groundlessness and insecurity. We are even going to die. She says we have to give up hope that it will ever be any different. The word in Tibetan is ye tang che. Absolutely exhausted. Complete surrender. That is the beginning.
I just read it and laughed. Of course. It's hopeless, y'all. We're on a speedboat that is definitely going to sink. We might as well get used to the idea. Pema says don't practice because you're looking for ground or for security or for a safe haven. The practice is realizing that none of that exists.
It's my birthday today. More evidence that indeed the speedboat is sinking. It's also Barack Obama's birthday, and I'm a little worried that it's not fashionable to say this anymore, but I still love Barack Obama. He provided hope in a political landscape that felt completely hopeless. So there's some dissonance there. Maybe we have to have a little hope to keep making progress. If I hadn't hoped that the studio would work, I never would have built it. If I hadn't hoped that Obama would be our president, I never would have campaigned for him, which I loved doing, and because so many of us did it, he won.
Maybe Pema will address that apparent contradiction. I'm not sure I want to be so Buddhist that I never do anything. But in my personal life, I'm becoming a little friendlier with my edginess all the time. I still have addictions, things that I grasp and cling and turn to for solace. One is shopping for clothes. I'm going to do that today. But I'm going to do it knowing that it won't help. I'm still nearer to my death than I ever have been before. I'm still nervous that my business might fail, scared that I will end up old and alone and broke, uncertain about the future of my relationships and concerned about what people think of me. It's a good thing. I need things to practice with. Enlightenment might end up being kind of boring.
I was sitting in the bathtub this morning with her book, When Things Fall Apart. She's really into getting friendly with being uncomfortable, with being fearful, nervous, angry, agitated, whatever it is. It was in yoga that I first learned to be uncomfortable in my body. I went to these Iyengar classes at the Buddhist Center in Mexico City. I won't go into a lot of detail right here, but is was probably the most collapsed, defeated time of my life. I was lost. I had no bearing. Looking back, I realize that was the best possible state for me to be in, but at the time it just felt overwhelmingly difficult and hopeless.
The teacher was really strict and direct, but in an amused, slightly smiling way. She was always pushing us to be even more uncomfortable than we already were. It was fun for me, for whatever masochistic reason, and I realized in her class that I could be very uncomfortable in my body without fidgeting or running away. I had never done that before. Really, never. Then what began to happen, again and again, is that she would put us in savasana, and I would also feel enormous amounts of emotional pain. She would chant "Om mani padme hum" in this incredibly strong, ethereal voice. I was just there, still, with tears and snot running down my face. For the first time ever, I just felt it, whatever it was, and it was revolutionary in my life.
So I have learned a little about being present and awake in my discomfort. But I read something different this morning, something that takes it even one step further. Pema Chodron instructs us to "abandon hope." She says that hope and fear are two sides of the same coin, that hope is yet another way of wanting things to be different. We are going to feel lots of pain and groundlessness and insecurity. We are even going to die. She says we have to give up hope that it will ever be any different. The word in Tibetan is ye tang che. Absolutely exhausted. Complete surrender. That is the beginning.
I just read it and laughed. Of course. It's hopeless, y'all. We're on a speedboat that is definitely going to sink. We might as well get used to the idea. Pema says don't practice because you're looking for ground or for security or for a safe haven. The practice is realizing that none of that exists.
It's my birthday today. More evidence that indeed the speedboat is sinking. It's also Barack Obama's birthday, and I'm a little worried that it's not fashionable to say this anymore, but I still love Barack Obama. He provided hope in a political landscape that felt completely hopeless. So there's some dissonance there. Maybe we have to have a little hope to keep making progress. If I hadn't hoped that the studio would work, I never would have built it. If I hadn't hoped that Obama would be our president, I never would have campaigned for him, which I loved doing, and because so many of us did it, he won.
Maybe Pema will address that apparent contradiction. I'm not sure I want to be so Buddhist that I never do anything. But in my personal life, I'm becoming a little friendlier with my edginess all the time. I still have addictions, things that I grasp and cling and turn to for solace. One is shopping for clothes. I'm going to do that today. But I'm going to do it knowing that it won't help. I'm still nearer to my death than I ever have been before. I'm still nervous that my business might fail, scared that I will end up old and alone and broke, uncertain about the future of my relationships and concerned about what people think of me. It's a good thing. I need things to practice with. Enlightenment might end up being kind of boring.
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