indeed.

With a free mind, In no debt, Enjoy what has been given to you. – Therigatha

i go crazy

oh my. im really deep in this hafiz stuff. i had an appointment today that was an hour late. so i sat and read the entire volume of Hafiz's poems I Heard God Laughing straight through, deciding this uninterrupted experience was the reason for the lateness. sitting there alone, i laughed out loud more times than i can count, with hand crossed over my chest - that unconscious mannerism i find myself doing when something touches me deeply. i bookmarked every other page. i resonated with his insights about loving and dancing madly, and about being curious if people that society deems 'crazy' are really the people who see the beauty and the love and if those of us who go about our daily business silently w/ such seriousness aren't truly the crazy ones...?

stopped at a store on my way home. came out to a furious summer thunderstorm. stuffing everything in my bag, i set out and was absolutely drenched halfway to the car. so i stopped walking. and i stood there. water streaming. thunder cracking. sky racing. oh, the power! and i started laughing. drunk on hafiz. drunk on cooling water after days of heat. drunk on feeling the moment so thoroughly instead of rushing through it. i came home, dropped my bag, walked dripping through the house, out the back door, and continued standing in the rain in the backyard til i felt all the junk was washed away.

life feeling heavy? taking yourself too seriously? feeling down on your lot? mind replaying not entirely pleasant notions? criticizing yourself too strongly? i highly recommend a rain shower as treatment. guaranteed to ease the seriousness and wash away the angst.

shifting up the normal patterns is definitely freeing.

had a good conversation with a friend. voiced: they have to check in periodically to make sure they are pushing themselves hard enough. decided i need to periodically check in to make sure that i dont push myself for the remainder of june. its time for space - and the clarity, creativity, and new experiences that arises when that is allowed to happen naturally.

and just before retiring, thoughts running through my head about an upcoming meeting, i kept reading, knowing the wisdom i sought was there, and found this (disastrously edited):
"you are most powerful, most effective, when you are completely yourself. but don't try to be yourself. that's another role. it's the wrong question, implying you have to do something to be yourself. you are yourself already. stop adding unnec'y baggage. give up defining yourself (whoa.) to yourself or to others. you are enough. in essence, you are neither inferior nor superior to anyone."

see? nothing to worry about.

arms wide,
c.

p.s. a bit of bapa-ji wisdom, from a dear friend of mine, lest i forget the jewels:

what will you do with that prana you create through your practice? learn to apply it correctly, or you will apply it incorrectly to the aspects, habits, etc. that don't need strengthened.

the first yoga pose is to sit. comfortably. if you must shift, shift. you cannot quiet the mind if the body is uncomfortable. you need not sit perfectly still. sit comfortably. (my parallel, likewise, if something isnt working in life, shift it. dont hold yourself too firm, thinking it will become a good situation.)

when the kitchen gets hot, stay in the kitchen!

keep looking up!

gentle reminder

let the beauty we love be what we do.
there are a thousand ways to kneel and kiss the earth.
~Rumi

i bow,
c.

the perfect saturday night date

paradise.

solitary practice up on the hill
watching the light fade from the day
aerodynamic dragonflies
seeking the bugs dancing above my head
hold perfectly still
barely discernible
wind from its wings
on my cheek

rooted in place

haven't done much group practice lately. mostly solitary practice, but never enough at once to feel i moved the body through the full range...

went to an ashtanga class tonite. i have generally not gelled w/ ashtanga but this teacher was fantastic. great verbal cues, amazing adjustments. she squeezed me into binds in many poses that i never wanted to leave. its funny when a teacher works you into a pose and you have this amazing, fleeting moment of clarity and ease and AHHHH! i got it! followed almost immediately by the realization that its time to release it and give it up, which i generally do with a mental pout that i dont want to move and an internal sigh of resignation that its time for the next pose.

there's a lesson in there somewhere...

just when you think you've got it...

but what kept coming up was this strong internal sense of ick. they call downward moving energy in the body apana. i have so much apana, i might as well have concrete blocks on my feet. poses that were freeing and easy a few weeks ago are nearly impossible. i feel thick. gross. out of practice. lazy. ugh! after class i resoundingly hear the word 'graceful' to describe my practice but i outright reject the notion. so i watch it and i resolve to get back on the mat tomorrow and again and again.

through me, pretty please.
c.

modern day mystic

Clinch by Picasso

yesterday was rumi, today Hafiz (poet and mystic born in the early 1300s in persia.) i have long coveted a book of his poems called The Gift for this poem...

Two Giant Fat People

God
and I have become
like two giant fat people living
in a tiny
boat.

We
keep bumping into
each other
and
l
a
u
g
h
i
n
g
.

b/c it describes my divine relationship rather perfectly. i threw my head back at the fabulous Visible Voice Books in tremont a few years ago when i read it and laughedlaughedlaughed.

so i was surprised today to learn of a later edition of Hafiz poems called I Heard God Laughing. i think that will be the byline on my autobiography. no kidding! i wonder if the translator came up with the title or if Hafiz did, my kindred spirit, dead hundreds of years.

excerpts from this compilation...

Someone Should Start Laughing

I have a thousand brilliant lies
For the question:

How are you?

I have a thousand brilliant lies
For the question:

What is God?

If you think that the Truth can be known
From words,

If you think that the Sun and the Ocean

Can pass through that tiny opening Called the mouth,

O someone should start laughing!
Someone should start wildly Laughing –Now!

-Hafiz

and

A poet is someone
Who can pour Light into a spoon,
Then raise it to nourish
Your beautiful parched, holy mouth."

indeed! send me present day poets filled w/ such passion!

i need to spend a day in silence. so many needless words, trying so hard to formulate things that don't need to be said. "think 10 times before you speak" says Baba.

i've long despised the "activist" label but perhaps i'm more a sacred activist, according to Rob Brezny's latest...

"Sacred activism is the fusion of the mystic's passion for God with the activist's passion for justice, creating a third fire, which is the burning sacred heart that longs to help, preserve, and nurture every living thing." -Andrew Lawler, The Sun

interestingly enough, my father was very dedicated to the Sacred Heart... hmm... what is the real meaning of that?

time for yoga class playlists then hot summer night sleep. sweet dreams.
c.

p.s. to you who called for a boost yesterday evening, i hope i provided.

daily dose of rumi

Stop looking for something out there
And begin seeing within.
-Rumi


This flute is played with fire not air.
-Rumi

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase "each other" doesn't make any sense.
-Rumi

thus inspired:
i am in love with june
the world doesn't darken during these summer months
it simply dims
10pm i sit at the window watching the light leak out
no dusk like summer dusk
5am birds heralding the earth's brightening
body energized

for this body, when the earth warms
and physical focus removes from being cold
awareness expands
back from minutia to bigger picture
such is my current limitation that i cant keep it all at once
dedication of work as practice
finally

time spent this weekend w/ a kindred spirit
taken care
cloud watching
red thighs
may flies
i wish they told you when you're 18 & feeling very different internally from your peers, that sometimes it takes years to find others like you, scattered across this globe...

refuge in the sangha,
c.