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
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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 I strip off my clothes. They land in a formless heap. I am naked, I am nameless. I have no identity, no history, no story. I am free. The ritual begins. I put my head underneath the water . I hear the rhythmic beat of my heart as the world recedes into an embryonic moment. In the darkness I listen to the silence and I wait. I wait for the the invisible One, the one I call the “bathroom guru God.”
As a child I couldn’t wait to take my nightly bath. In the darkness I would slip into my watery womb, the lone window above me sealed by winters icy embrace. I would follow my breath until the outside world was absorbed in the silence of my interior. The further I went inside the more endless I became. The boundaries of my body evaporated into the mist. How I wondered could my body be so small and yet so vast? There was a whole mystical world inside of me. A powerful presence seemed to appear genie like and eclipse my whole existence. The bathroom guru God had arrived. Bathing became a sacred act of communion, communion with my Self. This was my meditation. My first remembered experience and intimacy with the divine. I would leave my body spontaneously and without effort. I looked down upon my little human form lying motionless. “I am here and I am there.” I felt so deeply nourished by this revelation. There is a part of me I realized that is invisible. I couldn’t see this self, but I could feel it. I became an immediate wonder! “I am inside, I am outside. I was just like God. I began to communicate with the silence within. It listened in the way that only silence can. I would share all of my adventures, my daily trials and tribulations. It was my confidant, the reservoir of all my hopes and fears. I would awaken from my journey to cold water and a shivering body. The concept of time I discovered, ceased to exist in that place within myself. I was timeless and vast, a refuge of peace and joy. I was infinite. I would hold a question within my heart and I would listen. I would wait for the bathroom guru God to answer me, my essential nature to come out of the depths. It always did. It has been unfailing. What it revealed was knowledge and truth beyond my worldly experiences, this omniscience was a part of my being. At some point I realized that the sacred presence within me was my true Self. It was profoundly liberating to know that I would always be under its sovereignty, led by its unerring compass. Experience would prove that my presence was dependent only upon my being PRESENT. I have always sat at the lotus feet of the bathroom guru God waiting. Waiting for the water to take me deep into the well of the unknown, into the spaciousness of my own Being. Now I simply arrive where ever I am. Everyday I bow to that unbound and invisible Self that compassionately guides me into the heart of peace. ” I am my beloved, my beloved I Am.” love, santidevi What do you know? How do you know that what you know, you really do know?How do you know that what you know is true? We spend our lives accumulating information. We try to gather as much information about as many things as we possibly can, after all it has been said that knowledge is power. If we have power we might be able to supersede the vulnerabilities of our humanity. To a degree that is true. If we know that proper hygiene is essential to limiting the spread of disease that information could save our lives. The power of information has dramatically changed our world. We have begun to unravel the mysteries of our origin, the conception of our galaxy and its approximate timeline of extinction. We have analyzed and dissected our bodies to understand how they function. How to treat illness and prolong life. Through quantum physics we have discovered that we exist in a unified field of consciousness. This field has been defined as dynamic and self-aware intelligence that generates energy that is virtually infinite. Our interrelatedness has become an indisputable fact. This knowledge has had a profound effect on how we perceive ourselves and our world.
Yet ironically enough no matter how much information or knowledge we acquire it remains an empty acquisition if we cannot derive personal meaning and value from it. We know something is true by our immediate and direct experience even if it remains inexplicable. I have known brilliant individuals possessed with incalculable knowledge who were completely exiled from any personal sense of Self understanding. They had been completely absorbed in gathering data even if it was completely devoid of any relevance to their experience. My own bias is that knowledge should in someway have a direct and lasting impact on the quality of our lives. To know ones Self is to know the divine, the immortal aspect of our nature. The human being is after all a microcosm of the entire universe. Within you lie all the forces of nature. Somewhere in you are the remnants of the Big Bang. Your DNA contains the entire genetic code of human life. How more spectacular do you need to be to gain your interest? I remember being asked as a child what I was most interested in studying. I responded without hesitation, ” I want to study the unknown.” I had no interest in learning about what had already been discovered. Memorizing facts seemed irrelevant and a useless waste of my mind. The unknown had always intrigued me. Being curious I was always wanting to see what would happen if… I am grateful for this inquisitive and adventurous part of myself that seeks to experience everything in lieu of knowing anything! In fact the thing I love most about life is that I never know what is going to happen. The unpredictability makes it more of an experiment, an opportunity to “play.” It is liberating to know that none of us really KNOW. I have always made my Self the destination of my inquiry. In doing so I have realized that no matter how long or how diligently I sit in the silence of my own interior it will remain a mystery. This gives me a strange sense of fulfillment and peace in knowing I will never really know. It makes me feel childlike and innocent. In fact I no longer have a desire to define what cannot be known. The more I have experienced the more I realize how little I know. I can rest in that. In the vast presence of that ineffable field of pure consciousness one is immediately humbled. I continue as a venturing pilgrim in the home of my belonging. As I wander I thank all of those brave adventurers who have gone before me. Into the mists of the unknown I linger, longing to experience the borderlands of human endeavor. Follow me. santidevi I write this post with a certain apprehension. You see this is the third time that I have written “Every Moment Grace.” The prior two entries written on consecutive days were mistakenly erased. Ironic. As the words vanished before my eyes I was confident that I would be able to retrieve them. Alas, even the technological guru’s were mystified. Thus I was given another opportunity to bow before the Divine, to relinquish my attachment. To let go.
Truth: What is intrinsic to who I am can never be lost. I have been challenged by spirit all of my life to live what I know to be true. To trust with absolute faith, that every experience of my life is an act of grace. Grace is defined as“the freely given unmerited favor and love of God.”I have known this in joy and in sorrow, for grace is truly whatever awakens us to a deeper level of consciousness. Pain, suffering and loss are harbingers of transformation. These experiences take us to the marrow of our being, to the core of our human longing. They inspire and challenge our strength and courage and ultimately reveal that every moment is possessed with meaning and value. They connect us to the present and illuminate our true nature. I have never not known the “unmerited favor and grace of God. In fact I have felt it most keenly in the most traumatic moments of my life. I have been made whole and holy by“ill fate.” Sacred pain is the “great awakener,”and it is inescapable. It is the light that pierces the darkness of our ignorance. For it connects us to the truth of our circumstance, to the depth of our feeling, to the calling of the soul. It carries us limp and lost into the sanctity of our interior. It swiftly removes the superficial and the extraneous. We are left with what is raw and real, intrinsic and eternal. In our naked emptiness we are liberated. Pain is grace. The greater the adversity the greater the opportunity for transcendence. When we exhaust our own “known” abilities and resources in times of adversity, we are forced to surrender. This surrender allows us to experience the deeper levels of our nature. Here we are freed of all resistance, judgement, and effort. Thus we access the part of ourselves that exceeds the boundaries and limitations of our usual modes of perception. We awaken. Adversity hones our virtue, inspires our innovation and creativity and fosters an endurance and perseverance that defies our own will. It whispers to our reluctancy and fear… Rise! And so against all odds we do. To live in a state of grace is to be in communion with the Divine. I have awakened to this truth. Life is grace. It is continually conspiring to choreograph our lives in a way that is awakening and liberating. We must be willing to surrender our expectations, our attachments, our limiting belief systems, and our incessant need to control our experiences. How is this done? By radical acceptance and trust. Faith in what cannot be known, rationalized or reasoned. This requires a perceptual lens that sees the world in all its beauty and horror as ultimately benevolent. A desire to willing sacrifice the sovereignty of the ego to the sacred fire of consciousness. This is a ritual we enact every moment that we wake up. For in that instance we are no longer possessed by our conditioning, by our thinking minds. We allow the power of our own consciousness to illuminate our experience and define our path. Remember whatever we bow to becomes our teacher. Bow, bow deeply. santidevi Al l beings seek peace and freedom.
Students have come to me in internal conflict, in a state of disharmony and suffering. They are in opposition with themselves and their experience. They invariably believe that their unrest is a result of their personal circumstances. They try to manipulate, control and otherwise alter their external experience believing that peace lies in the resolution of dissent. Peace is not reliant upon agreement. Otherwise it would be a temporary phenomenon dependent upon ones ability to negotiate conditions. The beauty of conflict is that it generates the longing for peace. Generally speaking people contrive “peace” as the equivalent of having their personal desires fulfilled. This will not grant peace because the nature of desire is insatiability. Peace is the absence of desire. Peace is the unequivocal acceptance of things as they are. Peace is a choice. Peace as an enduring condition arises spontaneously and naturally when the mind is still. When you no longer object or resist what arises in the field of your experience. When you enter into a state of non-resistance you immediately feel a spaciousness and freedom. Ironically whenever you try to control your experience you lessen your personal freedom. You limit your choices. Acceptance creates possibility. You can’t fully engage in life unless your willing to surrender the illusion and dysfunction of control. Do you truly know which of your experiences are of redeeming value and which are not? Has anything ever happened against your will that proved to be grace? Has any disappointing moment led to a greater opportunity? Salvation often comes in the form of tragedy. There have been times in my life when I have fallen headlong into suffering that scraped the flesh from my bones only to find that my descent into pain and darkness was my deliverance. I have learned not to judge what appears at my feet or knocks at my door. What appears initially as misfortune is often the gift I have prayed most devoutly for. I have learned throughout my life that where ever I proceed with judgement I am humbled. Whenever I resist my experience I create suffering. When I desire things to be other then they are I miss the grace inherent in the moment. I have found that peace is the natural state of the mind. As I return breath by breath to the vulnerability of my mortal self I feel compassion well within my heart. Peace in the end is love. santidevi |
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