It is Tuesday morning, the sky is azure blue and the air is crisp with autumn. I fall into a slow, natural rhythm. My body adjusts to the pranic energy that now nourishes it. This subtle and refined sustenance is like nectar from the Gods. I sleep so soundly, so deeply. I am conscious of this body as never before, the thoughts as they arise and dissolve into the emptiness. I relax into the moment.
My ego is being shed, layer by layer, ever deeper. Emotions arise and dissipate like morning mist, but they have no place to settle. The internal workings of my being have become transparent, clearly distinct. I watch my mind, and observe how it functions, responds, distracts, and obsesses. The state of my mind determines my experience. I feel the correlation between my thinking and the corresponding reaction in my body, instantaneous. It is a revelation. I have become the observer, my witnessing consciousness. It no longer feels like a separate phenomenon. The elements within myself are in the process of unifying. I am being remade. I surrender myself completely to this evolution. Every moment I live the cycle of birth, death and resurrection. I am intimately aware of this never ending ritual. In the midst of the transitions I feel their shared bloodline, as old as time. Their energy infused with joy and sorrow, hope and despair. How fragile and fleeting our sojourn. I am not bound nor tethered, but free. Time has ceased, the moment becomes seamless. I feel the spaciousness of my own interior. How peaceful to be emptied, to be scraped skin from bone. I belong to the nameless. My identity becomes membrane thin. My attachments grow pale in this Self that knows the truth. Nothing belongs to me, nothing ever has, and nothing ever will. I serve, love, live and die, without attachment. This realization is liberating. Where ever I am, I am at peace. Severed from the gravity of human longing and desire, I feel the stars descend. I am whole unto myself. What ever I have is enough. I breathe into the heart of my beloved, gratitude. My dharma, my truth has laid my path, stone by stone… I walk this walk in the company of those who have gone before, who have braved the unknown in search of the holy grail, Self-realization. I feel their presence, their compassion and grace. This journey of awakening continues to bring forth the fruits of this life. I feast. santidevi
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It is day 14, and my belly rumbles. I feel the gravity of my own weight, and the stillness that suspends me. A paradox. My mind is nebulous. The solidity evaporates.
Not a moment escapes me. The world has gone adrift, continents away from the air I breathe. Strange how even the most familiar objects and places seem foreign. My perceptual lens shifts. The simple becomes ever more sublime. I see through the physical into the complexity of relationship that binds us one to the other, our mortal bodies not as separate entities but as a singular expression of unity. This is my experience, vision, and what I know to be true. We are all One. In this body, heaven, and earth, find their home. I have always felt the briefness of my own life. The transiency of my body on this earth. This awareness has compelled me, from birth, to discover the inherent meaning and purpose of being human. This quest was only furthered by the trauma and suffering I experienced as a child. I knew that those initiatory conditions, though painful, were awakening a great compassion, a fearlessness and strength. In enduring, I found that I was resilient, in surrendering I found grace. No matter what happened to me, there was an aspect of who I was, that was incorruptible. The innocence of my being could not be destroyed. The greatness of my soul was determined to rise, to take complete possession of my worldly life. Suffering has been a portal to my destiny. It has distilled the truth from the marrow of my bones, extracted the finest of my human qualities, and resurrected a Self that could commit to serving human beings in their darkest hours. Had it not been for the losses I experienced so early on in my life I may never have become who I Am. The truth is that I am an immortal and divine being, embodied. I was a born a bodhisattva into a world of despair. I have but one purpose for my existence, and that is to be an accessible source of redeeming peace. The divine has carried me to the most unlikely of places to be a refuge, to protect the helpless, to heal the sick, to comfort the dying, to usher in new life. In these moments I feel the presence of the numinous, my own inextinguishable light. Every soul longs to feel their noble birth, to ascend to the greatness of their nature. It is our sole purpose to do so. Through Self- realization we express the deepest aspects of our true nature. Our innate wisdom, goodness and compassion become the wellspring of our experience. These virtues are rooted in our humanity, and meant to be intrinsic to our lives. I awaken each and every moment to what is real within myself, to the unconditional peace and happiness that illuminates my heart, and defies all circumstance… that leads me to the very Source of life. santidevi My mind is syphoned into the moment. It rests where I Am, undisturbed. The quiet has become a constant. I am aware of the weight of air, its caress penetrating beyond my thin skin… it seems to reach into my interior, a spiraling breath. It is day 12. I wonder at this body that becomes Self sustaining. I feel the intelligence of this miraculous vessel discerning what is of value and what is not. I am being systematically sorted like wheat from the chaff. I watch this process, a curious observer. What will remain? Do we ever know what will become of us? Are we not at every moment a mystery?
I find such grace in surrendering to life. Listening to and trusting, without logic or reason, the dictates of my own soul-fed voice. It leads me into the unknown, into an adventure filled and mythical life. Where fear would seal a staid fate, it has lured me beyond the objections of all fight and flight. The power that lives within this someday carcass, humbles me speechless. I follow it like a shadow into the wilds of the less traveled. My spirit is not bound. It is my will to surrender, to experience even for a moment the play of the divine, the union of my Self with my Beloved. It is morning and I repeat my mantra… I am absorbed in it’s rhythm, in the hand strung wooden beads that glide through these practiced fingers. I see the eyes of Satyananda, ageless, staring back, the peace of Samadhi. I am not here, nor there. Time, between this place and that, is perished by this consciousness that takes flight. I nourish myself in the truth of the sacred seed sounds that repeat themselves seamlessly. The boundaries dissolve, I am in this body and not. The naturalness of my being becomes ever more present. I pray for those who are suffering, for those who are in the bardo of grief and loss. All the human beings who are sick and diseased, who are hungry and homeless. I pray for those who are mentally ill and imprisoned, drug addicted, violent, and murderous. I ask in the name of all that is holy that my fasting will bring peace, love and compassion to this world. I bow to those enlightened beings, ever present, who have devoted their lives to the awakening of humanity. I dedicate any merit from this abstinence to the restoration of divine consciousness, that we may all realize the beauty and peace of our true and abiding nature. santidevi I am filled with a holy emptiness, fed by the unseen. The hunger of my belly wanes. It is day 9, and I slept at last, all night. In meditation the practice reveals itself. Inhaling the suffering and pain in the world, exhaling love and compassion. Breathe in, breathe out. The observer, my sentinel is ever present. I am at One. I surrender fully to my Beloved, to the lotus feet of my sat guru, my true and essential nature. Communion.
My awareness becomes more subtle, my energy more enduring. My mind giving way to gaps of nothingness. I feel the natural world in every cell of my body. As I walk the river with my Sara, the light on the water becomes the light in her eyes. The underlying patterns of relationship reveal themselves. I experience the composition of vibration that creates all worldly form. I am a child in wonder of existence. I find my rhythm in this alchemical body. I feel the elemental forces silently at work within me. Earth, wind, fire, water, and ether. Together they create this divine vessel. In the midst of their transformative chemistry, I sit crossed legged, eyes closed, in the heart of my heart. I work with my medicines from the plant and mineral kingdoms, the animal totems, that have seen me through the most arduous of physical and emotional challenges. They carry me. There is a stillness within me that is unchanging, a peace that is ever present. I hear, like a mantra, the beating of my own heart. I know that seeds are being planted in the darkness of my womb. These seeds are a portal to a life that is awaiting. I can see images faint and fleeting of traveling to distant lands… My vows are to serve all of humanity, to awaken divine consciousness, and create peace. I know that this process is an initiation, an ever deeper distilling of my own Being. I trust in this. I walk with all of those who have gone before me, who have fasted, prayed, and meditated for the benefit of humanity. I take refuge in these great souls who knew that nothing is a sacrifice when it is a holy decree. I weep at the beauty and grace that has been my life. I am eternally grateful for all of the experiences that have illuminated the truth of my indwelling divinity. That have brought me to this moment of consecration. My beloved, Lead me from the unreal to the real, from darkness to light, from death to immortality. Om, santi, santi, santihi santidevi The day is cold and wet. I began a 40 day fast on September, 18th 2009. A spiritual pilgrimage to the innermost heart of my true being. I have been intuitively preparing for this process. But all things must ripen. Now the fruit is full and laden with the weight of summer. Autumn begins the inward stroke. I heed the call. My body has always been a reservoir of profound wisdom, I trust in it, implicitly. It has led me faithfully without food or water on the sides of mountains, on desert plateaus, in the sage brush covered ground of Northern New Mexico. These hanbleceyas ( traditional vision quests ) were supported by the presence of my teacher, fire keepers and those that waited in prayer for my safety and well being. Alone on that hallowed ground with my chanupa (sacred pipe ) I prayed for a vision, for wisdom, and truth. I sat in the sanctity of my own fragile self and the earth transformed me cell by cell. I was emptied as never before. It was here that I first experienced the true Oneness of all creation. There was no division between the earth and the sky and my human body. All of the fear, doubt, and insecurity I had ever known appeared and there was no where to go, nothing to do, but sit with it. So I did. I watched it, and it transformed. I experienced the transiency of even the deepest and darkest of human emotions. I learned the power of observation, of remaining unmoving when confronted with the contents of my unconscious mind. I connected with a power within that was luminous and immortal. The veil between the worlds thinned and I understood that the concepts of past, present, and future were illusions. In the moment all was present. The suffering of my body was inconsequential because I was being nourished and restored as I had never experienced before. I thought of the legendary Taoist “magic tortoise.” A creature possessed by such supernatural powers that it lived on air and had no need of earthly nourishment. I was walking with the ancestors, I was being initiated.
The fasting deepens my purification, stills my wandering mind, and illuminates my spirit. My breath deepens into my belly as I relax all resistance. The first 3 days were challenging. I have had an intense headache that is finally easing. I have felt every ache and pain, every growl and moan in my stomach. Yet despite these common maladies I feel the quickening of my senses, the moment to moment awareness of my consciousness. I walk in Wash park, it is raining lightly. The drops land on the lake making perfect little circles that hold hands. The leaves take their solo, earthbound flights and land in disarray. Their choreography takes place under shifting skies. I wear my black polka dotted rain boots, a lucky find at a funky used clothing spot in Colorado Springs. I splash my way around the park, each puddle an invitation to say… yes I am alive! I am not “on the hill,” I am not sundancing, I am not at the ashram in India. My ceremony, my sacrament takes place in the every day of this life. I dedicate this fast to every being that is suffering, to the hungry and the homeless, to those who are impoverished. To every man, woman and child in war torn lands. I fast for those who are stricken by grief and loss. I fast for those who are addicted, for the mentally ill and imprisoned. I fast for peace in this world. I feel the suffering in the core of my Being, I hear the pleas for help and I am listening. I pray for the strength and courage that has always seen me through every initiation, every trial. Beloved guide me, be ever near. Let me surrender completely to the One that is my home, my belonging and my love. Let all the fruits of my labor bless this world. santidevi I step outside of my mind and watch the tide go out. I drop my silky at the shore and begin my wandering. There is no compass. The borderlands await me. I feel the marrow of my bones quicken, I shed my skin. I let go. The braille of my life becomes ever more indistinct. I feel my way, eyes closed.
The breath deepens, there is nothing to fear. I know this descent. From the seen to the unseen, from the topside to the underworld. The attachments, fine as thread, thin. I loose my name, my gender, my body, the story of who I am. It is consumed in the great sacrificial fire. I am purified, made whole and holy. As I descend the voices grow distant and faint. I begin to hear my own heart beating. In the silence I am absorbed. The outer world recedes and my senses are heightened. The feral part of me, instinctive and sure footed emerges. She was named long ago by spirit… “Sees in the Dark.” Medicine and talisman she is the embodiment of fearlessness and wisdom. I trust in her power and knowing, in her ability to navigate the perilous with courage. As the ground beneath me disappears I hear the words… fear not. Every part of my mortal self wants to flee. It is fuel for the flames. I have great compassion for this part of myself that feels so transparently vulnerable and transient. It desperately wants to have an identity that isn’t subject to change, a home that is constant, relationships that endure. This self becomes microcosmic in the presence of the incorruptible spirit that sustains me. I walk into the pyre a willing surrender, a sacrament. There is nothing of intrinsic value that is ever lost in this process of calcination. In fact it is through the burning off of the profane elements within my own psyche that the essence of my Being is further illuminated. I am transformed in this fire, all that inhibits or limits the expression of my true Self is destroyed. The afflictions and habits of mind, the attachments, the worn thin identities and egoic ambitions… all is turned to ash. The forces within me know exactly what I need in order to be distilled and refined. The outer world responds in correlation by giving me time and space. I curl into my womb, I inhabit myself. Licking my charred remains, the salt of tears fallen, I bow. My beloved I will follow you where ever you go. I will follow you on this never ending path into the darkest night. When I am nothing more than ether I will shroud your body and whisper all the languages of your name… In the borderlands of my death and resurrection, I dance in the rain… santidevi “The highest form of human evolution is the presence of peace. Where there is peace there is love… where there is love there is truth… and where there is truth there is liberation.” santidevi
Back in the city that steals my breath. I cocoon myself. Closed shades and thick bed linens, the comfort of a darkened room. Soaking in a porcelain tub I imagine floating beneath a star studded sky. I feel the growing distance of my heart to this place I have called home. Even its familiarity is unsettling. I sift the once ripe and blackened soil now pale and fine, it falls through my fingers into soft mounds. My living has never been more precarious. Even this truth will not ignite the “fight or flight” of the physiology meant to keep my pulse beating. The fire of alchemy reduces me to ash, and my body sighs. Six months nearly to the day. February 9th 2010. A one way ticket to Dublin Ireland. Julian Lee, a famed locational astrologer… He is initially perplexed by the configuration of stars that has left me a rootless gypsy. He concludes that the U.S. is an astrologically challenging location! International? After more exhaustive research he determines that the western coast of Ireland is where I will find my true belonging. My heart awakens. Is it possible that there is a place on this planet that my mystic soul can call home? Where my work will be nourished and supported? Have the stars been waiting for me to align myself into a constellation of destiny. I see myself a little brown sparrow in monochromatic glory pecking at one bread crumb after the other all the way across the Atlantic. Storing the artifacts of my collected life. The objects of human need and desire. I have loved these belongings for their function and beauty, for the relative comfort they have provided all these years. They have been hauled in my sister’s horse trailer all the way to Taos over La Veta pass, in cardboard boxes in the back of my old 64 white Ford pickup, in borrowed vehicles and Uhaul’s generously paid for by others. I try to visualize my life boxed and stacked, stored, locked and labeled. I smell the non- moving air, a windowless space where even dust won’t settle. My alters wrapped in the daily news, hidden beneath the print that will fade in time. Will they be able to breathe. Will I? This new adventure holds all the terror and all the unknown of first love. Who will I meet when I board the train from Dublin to Galway City? How will I root in a place that only allows for a three month tourist visa? How will I support myself? The effort to respond to what is beginning to feel like a personal interrogation just isn’t there. I simply don’t have the answers. I don’t know how I will form a new life. What I do know is that the land is diverse, fertile and green…even palm trees have found mooring in its northern latitude. I remind myself that I have never known the “HOW” of anything! Perhaps my faith is reckless… Clearly from the perspective of “other,” it is, if nothing else, irresponsible wanderlust. At least I have been consistent in making other people question the sanity of my endeavors. santidevi Varnished desert walls, ancient and towering against an azure sky. The road snakes through the canyon following the Dolores river that tires in rhythm with autumn’s wake. Spacious solitude. It mirrors what lies within me and I breathe into the hollow of my own timeless landscape. The colors of southwestern Colorado are a feast. The iron oxide of bleeding rock, burnished and blackened, the sage in its blue green hue merges into umber tall grass and rusting soil. An eagle rests on a phone pole, purveying the meadow for movement that will fill its belly.
My senses are awakened. The scent of uninhabited land, wet earth, sagebrush and pine. The wind dries my hair into winged curls that take flight and the boundary between this finite self and the natural world dissolves. Cradled in the walls of the canyon I sigh into its other worldly embrace. These sentinels have always silenced the inquiry of my restless mind, the ache of my heart. Their presence a comfort to my transiency, to the briefness of my human life. From their stony bodies they have witnessed time claim its own. The erosion that distances history from the present moment never ceases. I watch as fall begins to gain momentum, stealing the distinction of summers palette, the heat of desert sun, and the predictability of afternoon rain. I feel the cold breath of snow not yet fallen, of wind that will strip bare the trees that now shade. It is a strange solace to witness this timely and ritualistic death. Continuity within change. Resurrection is natures grace, it is also mine. Having cast a host of paper thin guises, as naturally as a snake sheds its skin. In my demise I am reborn. The earth swallowing its history, my history in guiltless pleasure, an insatiable lover. I am fluid, letting nature form me accordingly, just as the canyons offer no refusal to the water that shapes them. We are destroyed and made anew moment by moment by the subtlety of our own longing. Something is always thrown into the abyss of the unknown, given as a token of our trust and our surrender. We lay bare our willingness and vulnerability to face the uncertain life with noble wonder. In the city that steals my pulse I am an exile. Far from the terrain that reflects my soul, from the broken unevenness that I boldly tread upon. Nature is my muse, the inspiration of my being. I follow it into the wilds of my own insistent heart and I lose all claim to knowing myself. In its ever changing haven I discover secret arroyo’s worn smooth by time. If I listen closely their hush will speak to me. There is a sound resiliency in surrendering to what is, accepting my own unearthed selves with curiosity and patient love. In letting go, I free my hands and take flight. santidevi I am mute. I walk the tight rope.
My savings becomes nearly obsolete. No work. I head to Orvis. It is refuge for my soul. Surrounded by the San Juans I find my breath. I float on my back as cold rain falls. A holy baptism. I dive under the water with darkening skies overhead. I am anonymous, boundless and free. The sounds of the world are muted and distant. In a symphony of silence my mind dissolves. Breathe my love, breathe. I touch the silken green of summers moss, like the hair of a newborn. I stroke it lovingly. This naked intimacy I have longed for. The rocks of the pool form a little shallow where my body curls into amphibian form, non-human. I follow my breath. I pray to my beloved in every language my body knows. I pray for the means to live. I call to the knowing One within myself that has no fear, that trusts even when my heart stops beating. Come to me I whisper. In a moment all of the noise disappears. I relax into the warmth of the water, the stillness of the well. I feel my own presence. Here my life is weightless. The roots of my belonging are being severed. As my financial resources are exhausted I grow pale. The marionette of my mortal attachments pull on my heart . I am suddenly aware of the requirements I have made of my life, the demands that make me weary. What do I need? I come back to my breath to the soft sand beneath my feet, to my unquestioning faith. Does the ocean refuse the tide? I let go of my effort, I let go of the struggle. I wrap my arms around the water that holds the chill of my body. Why mourn? “There is nothing that is without purpose.” The voice rises above the tsunami of my fear. “Surrender, surrender, surrender to love.” I will be what I Am. Every moment a new history is born. santidevi As human beings we naturally try to eliminate and avoid those elements of our lives that create uncertainty, anxiety, stress and discomfort. These are the conditions that typically precede the evolution of consciousness and awakening. They provide the fertile soil out of which new life emerges. The wise know that it is nonresistance that supports transformation. The more adaptable we become the more adept we are at responding to the challenges inherent in life. When we suspend our judgments and assessments we allow the field of consciousness to engage us on deeper and more enlivened levels. We become receptive to the force within us that reveals our true nature, our natural and unconditioned state.
The adventure lies not in controlling or manipulating our experience but abandoning our need to do so. In trying to define who and what we are, where we are going and what we will be, we lose our essence. That essence is the unknowable mystery the very ground of all creation, pure consciousness. It is enough if we are able to surrender to the moment in which it arises and experience the ineffable grace of the divine. The dynamic forces that challenge us on an external level impact us internally. The inside and the outside are in constant exchange. This is because at the most basic level they are indistinguishable, inseparable. Within us lies an invisible universe of complex, synchronistic, and interdependent relationships. Our bodily systems are always engaged in maintaining a condition of balance and equilibrium, this process is called homeostasis. The body relies on a nearly incomprehensible intelligence, a self aware system that defies our most complex technology. Homeostasis applies to an open system, especially to living organisms. These organisms regulate their internal and interrelated mechanisms by virtue of multiple dynamic equilibrium adjustments. These calibrations are designed to maintain constancy, a stable environment. These adjustments or changes happen naturally and synchronistically as needed. We endure as a species as a result of our natural ability to adapt holistically. Should any part of our system revolt or resist it creates a potential health crisis. We trust that these invisible systems will function, and maintain our bodies regardless of external or environmental changes. The point is that we rely on forces that are independent of our control. Every moment, by some miraculous correlation of events we are sustained. We rely upon that inherent awareness and intelligence to skillfully navigate the constant ebb and flow of our physiology, to efficiently regulate our bodies internal needs. We innately trust in this mysterious and unseen consciousness, for it is our self awareness that characterizes our humanity. To experience this part of our nature we need to be present. By being present we naturally respond to life in a highly skillful and creative way. We access the part of ourselves that is intuitive and spontaneous, that knows exactly what is needed in any given circumstance. The intelligence that arises when we are present is the very same intelligence that governs our physicality. When we align ourselves with this source there is a congruency that occurs between the inner and outer experience, it is called union. You can realize this state by being present. Relax the body, soften the mind, and allow the breath to become natural. Bring your awareness to the moment. Be completely present. This is the practice. Practice my beloveds, practice. love, santidevi |
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