Drat and double drat.
Monkey-mind is on its trampoline, to be precise: it seems to have several trampolines out and is multiplying like zygotes, jumping from one trampoline to the other. It’s 12 pm and I’m back in bed. Ego has even brought out its clubhouse. It has a sign on the door, “no enlightened thinking allowed!” I shudder. I haven’t seen this clubhouse in quite some time.
As I melt into my covers I offer the ethers the excuse that I am sick. Sick of being sick actually.
“I’m usually never sick” self-consolation is now flat. “You get to read,” Looking on the bright-side rationalization has transformed into, “you can’t fucking remember what you just read.”
I breathe. “Start with that,” I encourage myself.” It’s slippery, but I can feel some Force at work. I want to turn my face from it. I want to say, “no”.
Then I hear the gentle, beckoning, judgment-free Voice say, “You have a practice for a reason”. “Shut up ass hole,” ego snaps.
I gaze across my bed. Grab for a tissue. “Shit.” It’s empty. I watch myself pick up the box and smash it. Fur babies startle from their sleep. Nutmeg, the English chocolate lab is first to me. She puts her paw on me, sniffs the box. Beau the Black English lab is now sniffing the box. They look at me. Worried. Pensive. I can feel the question in their penetrating stare, “Who are you? And what did you do with Karen?” I’m totally shamed by the question. “You have a practice Karen,” critical ego chortles.
My ego voices aren’t all dressed up, with names and outer ware. They are probably like yours—an attribute of some kind. Judgment, critic, satisfaction, proud, –all variations on the ego distilled into a clear ‘I want” from a certain perspective.
But this gentle, beckoning, judgment-free, “You have a Practice for a reason,” Voice-it’s not any of those voices. It’s Energy, it’s Clarity, and it’s qualities I first got to know from previous almost dead experiences. That might sound dramatic, but heck, I think death brings out drama, it can’t be helped.
Death always brings clarity with it. In the middle of chaos, it’s clear what is important. Secrets fall, hearts soften, and what is True becomes self-evident. Almost dead has been a teacher. It gave me the space for the Voice.
Gag. One of the dogs has gas. Really. I’m sick and and can’t smell crap. but now I’m gagging on doggie farts. I take that back, turns out that is all I can smell: crap. And now it’s clear. I have been praying for more happy and less crappy. The crappy has been breeding like roaches. The anger under the surface is now clear and palpable I am back to the Voice.
“Practice your Practice,” it says.
I’ve done this so many times.Why is it still so fucking hard? I notice ego-righteous indignation, stubborn and tell me why, are jumping sky high on the trampolines.
“Why?” I pray. “The suffering prayer,” Buddha says. “Oh great, another freekn’ voice” ego comments and continues: “Voices that do not get on the trampoline are not useful,” and ego slams the “no enlightened thinking” clubhouse door, as it retreats inside.
The Voice doesn’t argue. I notice this about the Voice; it NEVER tethers itself to something by resisting it. It’s like it’s all there is and there is nothing else.
“Much better,” the Voice says. I pray as sincerely as I can muster in my pissed off illusion: “Dear Jesus: you know I have gotten quite good at not invoking your name in vain and I’m hoping you’ve noticed. Here I am, Divine Elderly Brother please put your hand in mine, pleeeeeese.”
Nothing. I feel nothing. No presence, no power. Ego thinks, “fuck you Jesus.” But I am not hooked. There was no sting in the fuck you. My energy isn’t rallying against Jesus. It’s shifting. “Shifting the shit,” I observe. I smile at my joke. Ego’s voices are peeking out the clubhouse door.
Peace. Ahhhha, Divine Peace. “It’s so good to see you again Jesus, it’s been a long time”.
“Prince of Peace” the Voice says. I smack my forehead. “Oh yea! I remember that part of Sunday school,” I think. Sunday School –not a total loss–that’s quite a thought for a recovering Catholic: I smile.
“Oh thank you God for your Grace,” Is in my exhale. Nothing on the outside has changed, but the shift inside it’s as real as the ground beneath my feet.
“More real.” The Voice corrects. “Gottcha,” I acknowledge. I notice ego is out of the club house and back on the trampoline, standing, waiting.
The Space inside, the Presence that is there all along~for me, for you, for any Being ~it breathes my Spirit into it. It expands to hold all, all the Love and all of my garbage.
Tenderly, Lovingly it welcomes all the crap I’ve been storing up. I’m amazed as I observe this. Most days I’d never guess this was possible, despite the number of times I am blessed with the Divine Alchemy of a Merciful God and this experience.
“The Doctor,” The Voice says. It takes me back, back to last year and the emergency room doctor I met. Totally forgotten. But that is what the ego is: one big persistent sleeping pill. Ego is beginning to bounce on the trampoline~again. But I’m unhooked. Detached. Observing.
The Doctor shared his ER experience: when someone came in who was not going to make it, he would see light. He’d work on them longer than the others just to be sure, because that is what his ego would have him do. He’s observing himself work on the dying person and all the while the light was streaming down to them. He’d witness them rising into the light-their essence-their light leaving their body and merging with the light.
“A body can’t live with-out its Spirit, “ the Voice says
I breathe deeply; I am aware I am back in my body, commanding it to breath. Slowly, one breath in and slowly one breath out I realize all the crap I left in the space is still waiting for me. My Spirit has been pick-pocketed. One little aggravation, one grievance, one judgment at a time~bit-by-bit leaking my energy, my Spirit.
“You can say yes to when you do the lesson, but never no to the lesson,” the Voice says.
Ego stops jumpn’ on the trampoline. Transfixed and frozen ego is terrified-I can see that now. Ego is afraid of Spirit’s, “yes.”
Well it makes sense now. More happy and less crappy is not about changing anything. My secret list of what I want to be different I hand to Jesus.
“I have to know Jesus,” I plead, “when most of me understands, truly sees that it’s all good~and dear God I have SO SO SO much good~why does this happen? Why do I let my ego take over, again and again?”
I see my list transform into a dove. A feeling consumes me, this must be rapture I think. The Dove makes the most elegant flap of it’s wings: powerful and silent and yet the waves of Energy are unmistakable and the waves imprint:
The Voice. Jesus. Buddha. God. Dove. Me. The list. We are all One. Together, we are going to go through the crap.
I take a breath. “Oh Lord! I can really breathe!” I’m observing how well my body feels, amazed. I understand: one more choice point on the Sacred Spiral traversed. Deeper and deeper into life, it’s layers and purpose: to learn.
Ego is looking very sad. Clubhouse in Tatters. Trampoline turned over. I feel bad for ego. Decide to give it a blessing, let it know it’s okay~ego doesn’t get what it wants (for now).
I decide to get up, rescue the day. I look at the clock and it’s 12:01.
Beautiful words. Beautiful reminder. Life is suffering. It’s about remaining attached and–noticing. Just watching, right? When I was a kid I loved Buddha school. I could go and just bliss myself out in dissociation. I thought that being dissociated was being detached from desire. The desire to want the abuse to stop, the desire to actually have somebody caring for me. A savior. Desire, desire, desire.
But of course that’s not the point. We must cultivate desire correctly right? Or else we would not be human. We would have no reason for mindfulness, no reason to pursue enlightenment.
It’s about letting the monkey go and just…noticing. You give me a gorgeous reminder here. Ego is full of itself as I work on a mass of paper. You have a gift for numbers screw your Practice. To cease feeding ego, it’s a moment to moment Practice. Now go and eat something Lucious. Namaste.
Namaste dear one. Thanks for your wonderful comments. Yes, we have to cultivate, everything so it blesses us and others. But as you know, it’s easier said then done. It’s an honor to be walking the path with you.