I'm just back from a work trip to The Anusara Grand Circle at Wanderlust. The best thing about my work is that it feels like play, so I'm feeling pretty good. Well, actually I have a searing headache and physically feel crappy today but emotionally and spiritually--good. Very, very good.
John worked his mojo, of course. He makes me believe that I can ground myself in my highest vision of myself, and inspires me to want to do that more often, and better. He reminds me--and thousands like me--that I have choice, and power.
The elective breakout sessions with the certified presenters were rockin'. My friends--who just happen to be therapeutic geniuses--gave me so much generous hands-on help with a couple of stubborn injuries I've been nursing that I was teary with gratitude.
There was an impromptu late night kirtan to stumble upon, run by the local iskcon kids who were running The Krishna Cafe. John was playing drum. Standing outside, who could resist being drawn in? Not me. When the kirtan wallah caught my eye, and pointed at me, I even sang a verse. Why not? When everyone was whipped up into a frenzy, wallah and company abruptly threw down their instruments and ran out into the night, leaving me wondering where they'd gone. Maybe they had a rendezvous with Krishna. I'd like to think so.
A particular image of Kali immediately called out to me from the murti shop. I wanted to bring her home but was hesitant. I mean, what person in their right mind willfully brings Kali home? Why can't it ever be Lakshmi who wants to come home with me? Am I always going to be the girl who makes a beeline straight for Kali? Home in CT, I'm still thinking about her. I might as well muster up the courage because I already know that I'm not going to be happy until I track her down. Pray for me.
On a lighter note, I had fun hula hooping. I wouldn't say I've mastered lifting the hoop up overhead but I'm pulling it off enough of the time, without giving myself a black eye, to feel accomplished and pleased with myself.
Okay, it's past time to shower, and teach. I'm off to the Handel Crash Course in Boston later today.
Lucky me.
PS: Thanks to you folks who introduced yourself, and told me you read this blog. It made me feel really, really good.
The latest dialogue between me and my bestie, Certified Anusara teacher Emma Magenta.
Em: Hey Bern, our anniversary is coming up.
Bern: What anniversary? The anniversary of me injuring myself, and several innocent bystanders, while hula hooping last year?
Em: No, the anniversary of our first meeting! We should get together this summer and renew our vows at Wanderlust.
Bern: Oh, I love it! In the interest of demystifying Wanderlust for our readers, can we talk about the fact that this summer there are two Anusara events coordinated around Wanderlust? Are you as exuberantly dorked out as I am?
Em: Yeah, that is pretty exciting. Why don’t you explain what Wanderlust is, in case any of our readers have been doing prolonged stints in ashrams, or living under rocks?
Bern: Ha! Good idea. Wanderlust is a festival bringing some of the world’s best yoga together with some of the world’s best musicians in crazy, breathtakingly beautiful natural settings. This year there are two dedicated Anusara events built around Wanderlust. One is for licensed teachers in Tahoe at the end of July, and one is for EVERYONE in Vermont coming up soon at the end of June.
Bern: I’m over the moon to have John Friend on the East Coast. I’ll travel to see him any day, but it feels downright luxurious to have him on both coasts this summer. I love the thought of not having to get on a plane, and just being able to hop in the car. How delicious is it to drive to the mountains, spend Summer Solstice at The Grand Circle, practicing yoga outdoors, and hanging out around the campfire?
Em: It’s going to be such a massive love-fest in Vermont. Some of my very best memories in Anusara yoga are from big communal gatherings like the Grand Circle. It’s so, so sweet to be with our teacher AND our students.
Bern: Agreed. I also love that we’ll be outside, and not in some convention center. That makes it magical.
Em: Yeah, usually we spend the day together practicing and then everyone goes separate ways in the evening. The cool thing about The Grand Circle is that it’s a festival, so we’ll still be together at night, enjoying great music, dancing, and breaking bread with students and teachers we love.
Bern: I’ll pass on the bread; I don’t do gluten. Poolside cocktails, however, have my name written all over them.
Em: I don’t doubt it. You gotta bring your hula hoop—hooping goes great with cocktails!
Em: Well, I think it is FABULOUS that there’s going to be a Gathering focused on Anusara Inspired teachers, because I was one for many years. There are way more Inspired teachers than Certified teachers. They do so, so much to bring Anusara yoga to people all over the world, often teaching in communities or settings where there are no other Anusara teachers. They need to be celebrated!
Bern: They sure do. Also, I consider these gatherings to be staff meetings for Anusara yoga ® teachers; John really wants us there, so I make it a point to try to go. This year’s intermingling of Certified and Inspired Teachers will be especially fabulous. Do you know that when I got Certified, one of the things I was most excited about was to finally find out for myself what happened at the Certified Teacher’s Gatherings? I thought maybe I would learn a secret loop or spiral!
Em: No way, so did I! I always fantasized that it would be midnight revels and campfire singalongs, and this year it actually is.
Bern: You’re so funny. Remember, we first met and fell in love at one of those teacher gatherings.
Em: How could I forget? It’s one of the very best things about Anusara events—you find out there’s a whole world of kindred spirits out there.
Bern: Yup. Sometimes you just gotta wander a little bit to find them.
The Mayan Riviera was incredible. We mostly hung out, practiced, went to the beach, mealed, and drank margaritas. There were breakthroughs on the mat--firsts in handstand, bakasana and urdhva dhanurasa. There's nothing quite like the sheer astonished delight when someone surprises herself, or himself, on the mat. It's so infectious that everyone present feels it, and shared delight has a special kind of magic that transforms a group of strangers into shyly new friends.
What I really want to tell you about is the temazcal but I already know I won't find the right words. A tezmacal is a sweat ritual, a kind of ritual rebirth guided by a shaman. It's intended to purify and heal the body, and to strengthen the spirit.
The temazcal at Ceiba is a low, circular domed structure right on the beach. After yoga, at sunset, we stripped down to bathing suits, and chose a pebble from the shaman's open hand to represent a heart's desire, a prayer, or a wish. One by one, we stretched our arms out at our sides while he swept a bundle of fragrant herbs over our bodies--rue, I think--from head to toe. One by one we knelt before the door of the temazcal, folded our palms and spoke the words he'd told us to say, "for all my relationships," before stooping to enter.
We filed in to the right, sitting in a circle on palm leaves upon the sand. Four times, the door was opened and then closed. Each time, nine lava rocks, glowing orange, were shoveled to the center. Dashed with water and herbs, they created fragrant steam that smelled like heaven.
When the door closed it was dark.
Joel, the shaman, told us that our bodies would resist, and that we would want to give up. He told us that his goal was to guide us through the ritual, and to help us complete it. He said that, in the beginning, the steam would scratch our throats, and make us cough.
He was right.
The group disappeared into the darkness. We recognized each other only by voice. Right away, I heard coughs in the dark. I wanted to cough too but tried to hold back, fearing that if I started I wouldn't be able to stop. It crossed my mind that I might not be able to see this through.
Four times the door opened and then shut. Four times new rocks were shoveled in. Each door signified an element, and a particular kind of wisdom: earth, wind, water and fire. Every time the rocks arrived, we were to shout, "Ahoo!" I'm pretty sure that's Mayan for "bring it, bitch!"
Joel spoke to humankind's innate instinct to climb the rungs of the evolutionary ladder. Since we first crawled up out of the ocean, developed lungs, and opposable thumbs, and learned to shoot each other, humankind has strived to climb. I had the deep recognition, then, that the urge I feel to reach, and to grow, is bigger than just myself; it's programed in. Even while I marveled at the resourceful insistence of life to evolve itself, it made me weary.
He spoke of our conflicting urges, of the spiritual urge to change, and the opposing emotional one to not let go. He spoke of the possibility of reconciling experiences that challenge us. He called us to courage and to action. The words he spoke are fuzzy, which is odd for me. Words tend to stay with me but when I reach for his they elude me. I guess that's what happens in extremely altered states of consciousness.
The rocks sparked and blazed. I saw jaguar eyes in them.
It got hot. Really hot. Toward the end of the third door I lay down, but even when my heart started to pound I felt supervised, and safe. Still, when the door was opened to receive the final influx of glowing lava rocks, I began to seriously doubt that I could make it through. Joel had said the temperature would reach 170 degrees. Maybe I didn't have it in me.
I poured water from a bucket, via coconut shell, over my head. For a moment it was ecstasy but the water heated on my skin almost immediately, making me hotter. I lay down again, breathing in and out through softly pursed lips. It was tolerable for only a single breath at a time. Soften into it; soften into it, I told myself like a mantra. Resistance would make it worse. Resistance would defeat me. The only way to make it through was to entirely surrender to the heat.
"Sitali breath," I wanted to tell the group. "Do sitali breath. It's cooling," but I couldn't speak. My pounding heart became harder to ignore. I thought about leaving but standing up was out of the question. I already knew I wouldn't be able to safely navigate the close quarters around the molten rocks but it was beyond what I could endure. The tezmacal had defeated me.
Then the door opened. It was over.
I stumbled out and spilled beneath the starlit sky. Dizzy and heart racing, I couldn't walk straight. I thought I might pass out.
Joel had said,"When you come to the ocean, come exactly as you are. Take your pebble and fling it in. Dive."
I waded, disoriented and still off balance. The water was warm. Ultramarine by daylight, now it was dark. Placid waves rolled in to greet me. I plunged in. The ocean opened up its arms and embraced me.
I'd gone through trial by fire, hoping to gain courage for transformation, but instead had been released and held exactly as I was.
I wanted to weep.
In a good way.
I sat down on the shore, right at the water's edge. I sat there a long time. When I could move, I lay on my back, looking at the stars, communing with the wind. When I started getting cold, I laughed. After the temazcal, it seemed absurd to be cold.
I gratefully wrapped myself in the enormous white towel that had been held out, and went back to my room, skipping dinner. I couldn't speak. I wasn't back yet.
What I want to know is: when do we grant ourselves permission to be as we are, to come to ourselves as we are, and to embrace ourselves as we are?
I’ve decided to allow myself coffee this week. I am, after all, on vacation. Well, okay, it’s a working vacation but still.
Awake at 5am, I lie in the dark. My body needs more rest but I am too impatient to sleep. The wind is rustling palm fronds, and knocking at the balcony doors. The ocean is calling my name. I throw off the covers, throw on a bathing suit, brush my teeth in a rush, and take the few short steps to the beach at an almost run. The resort is not yet awake. I am alone in the place where elements collide. The ocean is a sultry lover, caressing the sultry curves of the shore.
The wind is a living thing and I am in its belly; the sand soft and white. I put my feet in the sea. It is warm but not so warm as I’d expected. The sea nibbles and sucks at my toes.
I eye the long pier that juts into the ocean's mouth where, yesterday evening, a couple exchanged wedding vows. Entirely disregarding the sign reading Privado, I easily step right over the chain fence. I travel the length, and stand at the edge, turning my back on the land. The sun is new in the sky and the tide is coming in. Sun, wind and water move toward me, extending their welcome. "Where have you been?" they ask me. "What took you so long? We've been waiting for you."
I thought I would close my eyes and meditate but my stubborn eyes remain open. The elements look me in the eye and I look back. I meet their gaze.
Sharing the pier with me is a black and white crab. He fixes a cautious eye on me, scuttling away sideways when I get too close. He navigates around to the underside of the weathered slats, and believes his is hiding. Funny little crab--we all try to hide sometimes. How ridiculous. Still, he is good company. I want to take his picture so I'll remember him but he's too skittish.
Life here is slower but there's an urgency screaming at me: hurry up! Unpack, and get down to the ocean! Linger over coffee, and then go for a run on the beach! Practice. Book a massage! Curl up in the hammock on my balcony to read. Write something down! Don’t forget to sit down and document the moment of transition between two worlds, two selves, and the way it feels to begin to settle into the pulse and rhythm of this sleepy, alive place, and to keep time with it! Don’t miss a minute! Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!
I am only just arriving.
Silly me. Why the rush? The land is not in a rush. The land opens its arms up and welcomes me into them. Mayan magic thrums like a palpable heartbeat. It feels good to strip off layers and feel the salt air against my skin. It feels good to begin to feel the place pull, and to yield to it. Along with my clothing, will I slough off layers of self that have become too tight a fit?
Somehow I understand that this place has magic to work upon on me. Can I be receptive to it? Can I lay down my weapons and unfasten my armor and say yes with every fiber of my being?
I'm just back from a week with my teacher, meaning I'm happy, sated, mosquito bitten, and have some big ideas to chew upon. It also means things like emails and voicemails have piled high while I was away. Such is the mingled blessing of retreat, and let's face it, I'm not great at emails or voicemails during the rest of the year, anyway.
For me, and a handful of close friends, it has become tradition to make the 6 hour drive north every July. We come to study but also to play. We go to the most ginormous supermarket ever. We do handstands in the grass. We laugh at familiar jokes. Harrison says smart things. Vish makes lunch. Scott makes chai. I sit next to Douglas and badger him for more, more, more answers and directives and instruction manuals. He explains, for the millionth time, that's simply not how we do it. We drink too many watermelon something-or-others. (Oh, wait, that might just be me.)
These are our rituals. Time has smoothed them into familiarity and they're near to heart.
For most of us, maybe even all of us, these teachings are at the center of our lives, and over time, because of our shared love for them, we've become central to each other, too, although we may only see each other these few times a year. Spread over the country as we are, we bask in the opportunity to just hang out and to reconnect.
My husband wishes I would stay home on the 4th of July, so we could eat corn on the cob and sheet-cake with red and blue berries, and see fireworks, and do those 4th of July kinds of things but I have to go. It's essential. I'm not sure we'll ever see eye to eye on it but maybe someday I'll be better at explaining that without this time away there wouldn't be enough me in our us.
Anyway.
Somewhere along the way, very likely one of those long ago Julys, I learned that the Sanskrit word for heart and for mind are one and the same: they are both manas. When manas combines with the root 'tRR,' which hopefully I've spelled correctly, and which means, 'to traverse,' you get the word mantra.
So, mantra is that which traverses heart and mind. A simple way of thinking about it is that mantra makes connections between thoughts and feelings. The mind reaches down to reflect upon the heart's hidden desires, and the heart reaches up to reveal itself to the clarity of an open mind. That may sound a bit academic but all you have to do to experience this phenomenon physically is close your eyes, sit still and follow the passage of your own breath as it rises and falls.
For every descent of your breath there must be an ascent, too, that gives rise to the next breath; every trough must have a peak; every inhale must have its exhale. So long as we live, every breath completes its circuit, traversing as it does between heart and mind. (Yes, obviously we breathe into our lungs and not directly into our hearts but they're in the same vicinity, and anyway it's a metaphor, people.)
In-between places are potent places. It's in the places in-between me and you, in-between now and then, and in-between here and there where power resides. So, what lies in-between heart and mind? The ancients tell us it's the palate. In fact, the Sanskrit alphabet maps the universe right across the roof of your mouth. In your mouth you hold the ability to give voice to your breath, which is that current that's ever flowing between heart and mind.
In your mouth thoughts and feelings become words that may be shared. Fueled by breath, words create the capacity to speak your mind and share your heart with others. Thus, connections are made between one heart and another. Maybe that's why I've always loved words so much. Maybe it's my love of words that makes me love the teaching so. Who can ever say what comes first?
We make circuits of connection all the time. When we reach out to someone it's only natural to hope they'll respond in kind, thereby completing a circuit of connectivity that creates intimacy. (Contemplate for a moment, if you will, the act of physical intimacy, which is full of rising and falling connectivity.) We say the mantra, "I love you," and hope the circuit will be completed with "I love you, too."
In any relationship of intimacy, though, of any and every kind, we just don't know what will happen when we reach out. The other may reciprocate and reach back toward us, completing the circuit, in which case we feel more loving, more connected, closer, and more deeply bonded. Or, they may not, in which case the circuit remains open and unfinished, and we feel more distant and disconnected, which may result in frustration, sadness or anger, among other emotions.
Opening your heart to someone leaves you vulnerable; offering your heart leaves you unprotected. You don't know how it will be received. You may not be met halfway. You may not be met at all. You just don't know. You won't know. You can't know.
It might hurt.
Ultimately, it doesn't really matter. The secret is that the further we reach outwardly, the further we may reach inwardly. Opening your heart to somebody else provides you with deeper access to it yourself.
Giving your heart away teaches you your own boundless capacity to love. The more freely you give your heart, the more you will know your heart.
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