Present

Present

I was teaching a kundalini yoga class yesterday, on an island, to a group of women, on the full moon, on Friday the 13th, with Mercury in retrograde, during a thunderstorm.

If there were a more perfect way for me to describe my inner state than this, I don't know what it would be.

Warrior 2 is this splendidly overused pose that I deeply despise (is it ok to say that as a yoga teacher?). My dislike isn't from the ancient story of decapitation (google it) or the compression in my front hip, or the tightness in my front patellar tendon. My distaste roots from the forward/backward leaning. Most of us pull forwards into the future and burn the past, many of us lean back afraid to take the next step, and none of us lands squarely in the only place we need to be: the present.

The present is hard, because it demands that we land in the animal space of breath rather than the sinister human place of planning and memory. I'm a planner. And a Story Fondler (as Martha Beck would say).  Like a jackrabbit, I bounce back and forth between where I'll be in five years and how far I've come in the last two.

Now I'm on an island in a space beyond time. There are no clocks, no business hours, no schedules. And as easy as it would be to get lost in lists or someone else's skin, I'm just here, stewing. Processing. Caught somewhere between the sand and the sky with nothing but my breath and the surf: the constant reminder that breath is all there is.

Perhaps the present is a gift that comes without wrapping paper (which, let's face it, is just to place a physical barrier between that a gift and the present moment... to mask it away). Somewhere between warrior one and warrior three, the rage and the reparation, is warrior two. The cutting away.

Peace

Since high school, every time I get onto a plane, go for a medical test, or narrowly avoid a traffic accident, I say the poem I had to memorize in Spanish 5: En Paz*. It calms me down, reminds me that I'm not in control, and sets the tone that each day is a gift and has the truest potential to be the last.

It reminds me that peace is waiting for me.

I've come to many realizations in the past few years as I've wandered down the rabbit hole of fertility planning. The vast majority of these are private, but the biggest and most resounding lesson is that I'm not in control. When talking with my partner of the last nine years, this fact surfaced and resurfaced.

So many things have to go right for you to get pregnant, and 90% doesn't cut it. My focus has been on the parts that are easiest to address, like my diet and the alignment of my energy channels (or whatever it is that acupuncture does).

The 10% is the piece (the peace) that spirit couldn't get past.

So without opening the window into the heart of our relationship and airing our laundry for you to see, I'm writing to tell you that our marriage is over. Our relationship is solid - strong - in many ways cleaner and brighter for having seen the sun. And while my heart feels open and true and sad, I'm overcome with a sense of peace.

Divorce is hard. I think it gets harder with every unspoken resentment, and I'm so grateful that we don't appear to have any. We both love one another enough that we are willing to let the other person pursue their interests and chase their highest calling without the weight of resentment or compromise.

I believe I have now completed the list of things I could possibly do to disappoint my parents. That's hard, too. How do you tell the two people who love you the most that you'd rather give your love wings than hold him in a cage? Especially as saying this might shine a light where it isn't wanted for others who have chosen to stay married for various reasons.

I am grieving the loss of the life I had planned. I am celebrating a gift I have received and a gift I have given. I am humble and vulnerable. And though the waters are still swirling and choppy, I am at peace.

"...Amé, fui amado, el sol acarició mi faz. Vida, nada me debes. Vida, estamos en paz." En Paz, por Amado Nervo

The End

I'm fascinated by endings, lately. They're a Western concept that seems otherwise so arbitrary. Sitcoms end with everything wrapped up in a neat package. TV dramas end with a teaser of what will come next. But every story has a definite beginning and a finite ending.

Relationships are different. They don't end; they just change.

We love (I love) the neatness, the completeness of a tidy ending. I love flirting with a frozen moment in time and savoring it as though that is how it will always be. We hate (I hate) change. Change is the thaw in the spring that destroys the perfect winter landscape.

Change also paves the way for whatever must come next: growth.

I'm dancing with endings and change right now. It's an awkward, sometimes sad, sometimes delicious song, and I'm grateful for the lessons I'm learning in the process. Themes of judgement and karma and fate keep bouncing around in my head, and I'm at the place where I now must go on and discover what I'm really made of. Face the music, as they say.

I hold a special fondness and kinship with Gandhi, as I'm sure you do, too. He didn't say delay the change, or avoid the change, or change the change. He didn't tell us to fear change or relish change. Gandhi asked us to be the change.

It's a tall order, but to keep running or hiding from this change is a disgrace to those I love. There aren't tools for change, or a special outfit, or partners along the way. Change is like giving birth; others can prepare you, support you, walk next to you, but you must push through it alone, with your just heart, soul, body, and spirit.

And in truth, those are always the only things you ever need.

Things I Learned In A Hammock

I just got back from leading a retreat at Ojo Caliente in New Mexico last weekend. If you missed it, I'm sorry. It was pretty awesome.


The first time I went to Ojo Caliente was my 30th birthday. My husband was nearing the end of nursing school, and I was in the middle of the longest, worst string of illnesses of my life. I won't recount the full list of horrors for you, but one highlight was on a flight from Chicago to Colorado Springs, where I turned to my intern and said, "Excuse me, do you have any air sick bags? I appear to have used all of those provided for my row."

(This is not how you convince someone that they should follow your career footsteps).

My brilliant husband decided I could use some respite and some healing waters, and promptly booked us two nights at the hotel near these "legendary waters." By some fluke of luck, the hotel renovation was behind schedule and we were double upgraded to an exquisite room with heated floors and a hammock out back.

Between our ritual sleep - soak - eat - repeat, I spent some time hanging (and possibly snoozing) in the hammock. This wasn't relaxation. I was cocooning. Falling apart. Disintegrating into a very womb-like cradle.

I don't remember thinking much during that time, just drifting between states of consciousness and conceptualizing much the way I'm sure I did prior to learning language this time around. These are the things that came to me in that primordial afternoon:
1. If I work this hard for someone else, why don't I work for myself?
2. I need a hammock.
3. I should lead retreats.
4. I should lead retreats here.

The rest of the story between that moment and now is basically that I have done all of these things (except purchase a hammock). I work harder for myself than I've ever worked for anyone else, and I can choose to do what I want to do, to react how I want to, and to ask for what I need. Let go of the life I thought was right to pursue something that didn't sound right, but felt right.

You can to.

Whenever I feel lost, I head back to the hammock.

Come with me sometime?

I Just Want

I hear myself say this phrase a lot these days, do you? It makes it easy to think there is just one thing that I want. Like when I say, "I just want five more minutes of sleep," or, "I just want my doctor to call me back," or, "I just want to watch one more episode of Grey's Anatomy before I go to sleep," what I'm really saying is, "the thing I want most right this instant is _____."

I think this is both good and bad, right?

The benefit of this little mantra, is that it keeps me in the moment. Within the span of one day, I can "just want" more sleep, more time, more snuggles, more coffee. Clearly, each time I utter it I've forgotten that an hour ago I "just wanted" something else. Sometimes it makes sense that this little want passes, because maybe I do sleep another five minutes, or do refill my coffee cup. Other times, I forget about it. And other times it joins up with some other insidious mental baggage and ends up on repeat.

This is one possible downside.

Often, I don't actually want another cup of coffee, I'm just in the habit of getting another cup. This happened with the "I just want another hour of sleep" mantra. I was perpetually tired not because I hadn't had enough sleep, but because I kept hearing, "I just want another hour of sleep."

More frequently, something becomes a perma-mantra that sounds like, "I just want one more episode" but really is, "For some reason I think one more episode will make me happy."

Does this happen to you?

I'm in this process right now of journaling. It's been awhile. I have project-oriented journals and to-do lists, but I haven't kept an honest-to-God JOURNAL in a long, long time. The trouble with journaling is that your mental patterns and writing patterns become painfully obvious.

This is how I know I say "I just want" when I really mean to say that I'm tired, hungry, lonely, or bored. I say it rather than thinking. I attribute this false happiness to all sorts of things I think I want that do not make me happy.

Now I feel compelled to ask myself various questions like:
1. Is this statement true? (Thanks, Byron Katie)
2. Is this the most accurate way of describing this experience?
3. Why am I limiting my wanting?

My "want" button was broken for a very long time, and I think this is a symptom of continued malfunctioning want. When my income was very limited, I never went to a restaurant and asked myself what I wanted to eat, I was always looking for the cheapest option. When I was vegan, I always looked for the vegan option. I never asked myself, "what seems most delicious?"

I think the "just" was the next phase of patching up my want, and now I need to get more specific.

I want to be happy. And free from suffering. So I'm getting specific.

And letting the rest of the chatter go.

Jesus and the Saints

It's that time of year again, kittens. The eve of my birthday, when I get all soulful and reflective. I think this night is the anniversary of the closest I've been to that tenuous line between life and death. My mother went into labor on this night, and so this is when I suppose I decided to cross into this world and blink among the living.

There is something monumental, magical, ephemeral about 33. For one, three has always been my favorite number, and for two, despite my thoughtful nutrition, sleep, and exercise patterns, I know I'm unlikely to make it to 333, so this is as good as it will get for me (numerically speaking). There has never been a more perfect age or number (which I'm sure I'll address as I begin to approach 34). Even Jesus decided that 33 was all he had in him.

My BFF likes to remind me of this fact. Jesus died at 33. It's not the most welcoming thought for an age, but since I made a commitment several years ago that every birthday is a good birthday, I'm approaching with open arms and open eyes. That's what I did 33 years ago, too. I was born silent, with eyes wide open. Seeking.

And I'm not finished yet! I don't know that I have goals for myself this year, but I do have dreams and ambitions. I'd love to finally get that passport and sink my toes into the soil or sands of another country. I'd like to get to the bottom of this motherhood inclination that I have and understand more about what that means for me in this life. And I'd like to finish writing a book. Any book. Really. Someone give me a topic and a deadline (and maybe an advance)!

There are things I'd like to leave behind in 32, like anger and animosity and jealousy. Tax season. Allergies. But I know now, as I have known a bit more each passing year, that these annoyances are part of life and that they will always be close behind me, waiting. My personality wouldn't exist without them. My life would be far worse if my nemesis were more ominous than tax & allergy season.

With 32 I leave the false, self-imposed deadline of my mother's journey to motherhood. It was the bar I didn't reach, and now I'm somewhat relieved that it has passed. I imagine this is how children of olympians feel when they themselves make it all the way to the race and then finish umpteenth, a distant and embarrassing shadow of their parent's accomplishments. I sense that they go home with a tearful heart and eventually wake up saying, "Well, at least I tried."

And then, they find their own path.

Tomorrow is the first day of mine.

When I was 13 I received a book about birthdays. Mine is titled, "The Day of Heroic Inevitability" because it is purportedly the same date that Martin Luther King Jr. and Joan of Arc crossed that ethereal plane. This is serious s#it, people, to share your birthday with saints, particularly revolutionary saints who were executed. (While I'm not sure he's technically considered a saint in the Papal sense, I imagine that if we were giving sainthood to African American leaders of peaceful movements, that MLKJ would be first in line). And while no one actually knows when St. Joan was actually born, it doesn't matter as much as that dangerous seed planted 20 years ago in my naive mind.

"What will you do with your one wild and precious life?" - Mary Oliver

I suppose if I had to answer Ms. Oliver, I would say: I will show up, eyes open, and walk steadily into uncharted territory.

I will make my own way.

Be my own hero. Write my own story.

Thirty-three? Bring it on.

Good Guilt, Good Grief

If you've been reading my blog at all this year (and bless you if you're still here), you know that I learned about the death of my former friend/boyfriend in June. He passed away in January of 2009 under "suspicious circumstances." And when I found out - in June of 2013 - I lost my proverbial shit in more ways than one.

Because I was raised Catholic, or perhaps because I share so many neurological similarities to the alpaca, I spent a good portion of the summer wallowing in guilt. Whether or not anyone else knew, his death was clearly my fault. For one, I wasn't there. For two, most things that happen on Earth are my fault. It takes quite a lot of worry and effort to make the sun rise every morning, my darling friends.

I did some internet sleuthing, which offered little solace and less credible information. My unhealthy obsession with Florence + The Machine grew steadily less rational as I teetered on the brink of middle school level angst. Despite my intense meditation and wallowing, I could not remember the last time we spoke.

Because of my extensive list making and highly effective calendaring, I was able to determine that I was watching my hubbster perform in The Full Monty the night Jon died. I spent months in anguish about whether or not Jon was psychically calling to me for help while I was at the theatre.

Excessive Self Importance, see above.

One of my tremendous students happens to know a thing or two about Air Force legal matters and suggested that I file a Freedom of Information Act request to learn more about his death. Maybe nothing would turn up, but maybe I would get a hint or two.

Today was the day, my dear friends, when my guilt has transformed fully into grief. The FOIA informed me that his death was most certainly an accident and that he'd been out having a good time the night he died. He wasn't contemplating life and death and the great hereafter, he simply made a bad judgement in a place that was too cold.

It is terrible. Yes. A life that ended too soon. But he wasn't running from demons in flesh or mind. He died immediately after singing some karaoke. He drifted into the great dreamless sleep.

Tomorrow would have been his 33rd birthday, the day before Christmas. And as macabre as it sounds, this resolution is the best Christmas gift I've ever received.

This day has been an excellent lesson for me. Again, I constantly need reminding that I'm not responsible for the actions of everyone I've ever loved. I needn't be available around the clock to reach out over the ledge and pull friends out of the canyons by the ankles. My only job here is to grieve. To appreciate the life that graced mine, to mourn whatever futures I could have dreamed possible, and to move on.

Rest in Peace, dear Jon.

And happy birthday.

Yoga Sutras 2.16: heyam duhkhamanaagatam (The pain which has not yet come can be avoided)