Paydirt · 9 March 2010

Injury or Opening?

              Circus Ride or Red Stupa?

                                          Rabbit Hole or Paydirt?

Don’t confuse yourself, lady: just change the ticket.

So yeah.... to my dismay, it started last week. People hitting a vein of something-I-know-not-what. Some are getting anxious and getting the hell out… others are sitting on the line to Cathay Pacific, Air Emirates and BA, paying the fee for the fickle.

I've been of one mind in each place. The heat is ridiculous and my friends are gone and I am in certain ways very done.

But there is this deep pull factor. It's not so much the seductions of the practice high and life of leisure. Those are cancelled out by the ennui and the dirty suffocating heat. Underneath those, something here seems to get in your system and make you want to keep with it. For me, it's the resonant combination of shakti and curiosity. 

Got to be back in Ann Arbor for sure in a couple of weeks. Meantime, I phoned Air France for a stay. The man on the line had definitely heard this one before.

Posted by (0v0)        
Categories: astanga yoga

Comment

1. Ahhhhh…. you. I have to admit as relieved as I was to hear my boss wants me back pronto, part of me was disappointed I have to follow through and get on that return flight. But, she “needs” me, and I love her for appreciating what I bring to the table.

   I am actually thinking that next winter I will buy a one way ticket here. Of course I’ll have a definite return date in mind, but just for once in my life, I’d like to feel free to change my plans. I have NEVER changed a ticket in my life. That might be taking follow through into the realm of rigidity!!!

   It’s a few degrees cooler today. Can you feel it?

   Posted by: boodiba · Mar 10, 12:46 AM · #

2. ennui is like a glass of water: good with almost anything else.

   the heat: could it be the agni of the umbilicus mundi is stoked…or would that metaphor leave you as mere probiotic in the gut of mother earth…

   the fuzz weather here is robbing me of my metaphor prowess— dang—

   Posted by: Sara · Mar 10, 08:37 AM · #

3. yay! stayyy!!!

   Posted by: eeyore · Mar 10, 01:13 PM · #

4. I, on the other hand, am now over the MOON at the thought of returning home to New York City. Things have worked out the way that feels right. Oddly I think my right knee will be fine when I get there…

   Posted by: boodiba · Mar 10, 10:45 PM · #

5. Good call Owl! Plus, it was mandatory anyway, right? xo moni

   Posted by: Monica Gullickson · Mar 11, 09:16 AM · #

6. should i stay or should i go
   should i shave or should i grow
   this clash of choices can be overwhelming.

   when the heat gets ridiculous then the scene may be getting truly religulous.

   Perhaps its our collective addiction to being “useful”. We are a puritanical people of purpose and our psyches have been thoroughly programmed to seek “improvement”/“accomplishment” in self or other at all times. For some of us it hard to let that go, for others there is no problem there at all and they are happy to “do nothing”. There is always the Gita for wisdom: find action in inaction and inaction in action 4:18.

   Posted by: e&sj · Mar 11, 10:00 PM · #

7. ESJ. So you remind me. I could stay to be here now, as written on someone's tatterd old tesselated T-shirt, one worn for Mysore teaching back in a different day. Not so much to get something done, but to be with experience. Makes a difference, how you cut it.

   Sara. Agni of the umbilicus mundi, yes. In other words, STOKED SOLAR PLEXUS? Fuck! Feels like a condition. An affliction of the best kind.

   Monica!!!! What an inspiration to meet you yesterday. Thank you for delurking so easily and warm welcome to practice here, and to the beginning of this hot and simply happening weekend. I will be watching for you and seeing you soon, likely all over town!

   Posted by: (0v0) · Mar 12, 01:33 AM · #

8. Again, when the Gita talks about “inaction in the midst of action” (4:18, etc.), we can call on Ruysbroeck to illumine the seeming paradox. The person who has realized God, he says, mirrors both His aspects: “tranquility according to His essence, activity according to His nature: absolute repose, absolute fecundity.” And he adds,
   The interior person lives his life according to these two ways; that is to say, in rest and in work. And in each of them he is wholly and undividedly; for he dwells wholly in God in virtue of his restful fruition and wholly in himself in virtue of his active love. . . . This is the supreme summit of the inner life.
   This is the only kind of inaction the Gita recommends. It is action of the most tireless kind; the only thing inactive is the ego. To live without the daily sacrifice (yajna) of selfless service – to work just for oneself, or worse, to do nothing at all – is simply to be a thief (3:12). It is not possible to do nothing, Krishna says; the very nature of the mind is incessant activity. The Gita’s goal is to harness this activity in selfless service, removing the poisonous agency of the ego: “As long as one has a body, one cannot renounce action altogether. True renunciation is giving up all desire for personal reward” (18:11). Meister Eckhart explains,
   To be right, a person must do one of two things: either he must learn to have God in his work and hold fast to him there, or he must give up his work altogether. Since, however, man cannot live without activities that are both human and various, we must learn to keep God in everything we do, and whatever the job or place, keep on with him, letting nothing stand in our way.
   It would be difficult to find a better summary of the Gita’s message anywhere – and this, incidentally, from someone considered to represent the path of knowledge.

   http://www.easwaran.org/page/49

   Posted by: e&sj · Mar 12, 07:24 AM · #

9. Love this.

   Posted by: (0v0) · Mar 13, 08:33 AM · #

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