Earlier in the day I took leave and walked over to the Capitol to bear witness.
This morning when I woke, my first thought was that I thought it had rained in the night. My second thought was that I felt well-rested for having slept through the night — not having had my sleep disrupted by thunder or the earthquake, as was the case for recent nights — perhaps I had just dreamed about the sound of rain..
The yoga teachings say that there are four states of consciousness: waking, dreaming, deep (dreamless) sleep, and the fourth or turya state. The fourth state is both beyond the other states and also encompasses the others. It is where we find in meditation the merger of the individual consciousness with universal consciousness. The better we are able to access the fourth state, the more the other three states, and how we think and act in them, are illuminated by the very light of being.
The more I meditate, the more aware I am of what is going on around me while I am in a non-waking state. I am also finding that waking and dreaming are more luminous.
My awareness of the rain without knowing whether the awareness came while I was awake or asleep show both that I am finding more awareness in the different states and that I have a long way to go and much to discover.
Along with sufficient nutrition and shelter from the storm for as many as possible in greatest balance with the ecosystem,
“Sometimes,” said the woman in red sitting outside the courthouse.
“Sometimes you gotta,” she said to her co-workers, the red jersey
Of her dress clinging to her ample curves while she kicked
The granite ledge where she sat amidst a din of everyone talking
At every one else, not listening, some smoking, but not eating, on a break
Of some kind. Maybe they were jurors not court staff or perhaps visitors.
Funny that they didn’t have some kind of badge, all of them talking.
All of them talking and looking like they did the same type of work or had something
In common, talking all at once to a group that was familiar, but didn’t care to listen.
Amidst the talking, too many at once, and the clacking of her heels, like a kid, against
The granite ledge, “sometimes you just gotta be quiet,” she said to nobody listening.
Send me a message if you want to join.
Also, don’t yet have exact details, but I will be leading a free Zoom practice on Thanksgiving morning and hope to see some. Making a donation and sharing about it in chat will be welcomed, but not required. Details to come.
What a magnificent life: to have made art, explored truth, and felt the freedom to allow for contradictions:
Rabbi Hillel is famous for having said, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me; if I am not for others, what am I? If not now, when?” Taken in its best light (and not as the recruiting technique for going to war this quote has served), this means we must, as they say on the airplane, “put on our own oxygen mask first before helping others.”
I often think of this principle, when I am emphasizing the fundamental physical alignment principle of shins in/thighs out. If you have taken even just a few Anusara classes, you have probably heard the teacher say “shins in, thighs out.” It is really short hand for the action of muscular energy that hugs the legs to the mid-line, followed by the spiraling upward and backward expansion of inner spiral.
When applied with enthusiasm and in the right sequence, “shins in/thighs out” protects our knees and opens the groins, hips, and pelvic floor in a way that gives us greater access to finding the strength of our pelvic floor, low back and abdominal muscles. It is a perfect example of an appropriate personal boundary: it leaves us open and available to receive and observe all that is good, while creating a protective and appropriate boundary from which we can grow safely better to serve.