Big news on my front today. Let me give the back story...I moved to LA 2 years ago, welcomed by a group of friends. Some I had known for years, some I had known of for years through mutual friends. It was a family that I was immediately taken into. I loved them all...even if I didn't like them all the time.
The friend that I new the longest (friend is an understatement, a huge understatement, if there is a word to sum up eons of past lives together let me know) left a year ago. She went to live out her dream of wandering the earth with a little glitch in her plan...the realization that no one can truly plan anything because life and love happen in the most fascinating and unpredictable ways. She became intertwined with the life of another before she left the country, and after a near 10 months of chasing each other on one of the most expensive and global affairs I've ever vicariously experienced, a decision has been made. That decision is to settle in Boston (of all places?) for a while (6 months?). I scoff at Boston not because I don't believe that it is probably totally rad, but because they surely don't say things like totally rad there. And if I can paint a picture of this friend of mine...it is of her doing handstands on a beach...not at a white sox game. To be honest, I am just a little jealous that she is choosing a cold city with a strange accent over the place I think she fits...in my life...because everything is about me, obviously. Oh and see, I know how ridiculous that sounds. And truly truly, I support whatever her decision is, and I will go visit even and enjoy it. But she isn't really the point of this story.
And neither is this, although it helps to give context. Another one of the people that welcomed me became a good friend too, one that I hung out with very often, acting ultimately silly. He and I could stay up until 4 am, laying on his floor making throw up noises at each other and laughing until we were afraid we actually may really throw up. He and I were able to find comfort in each others weirdness that needed to be expressed. Over the last year we haven't seen each other as frequently, but I was aware that he was planning on moving to NYC at the end of the summer. Well, as time would have it, the end of the summer is upon us, and my friend is gearing up to leave the West Coast. I made dinner with him tonight, and we joked and laughed an listened to good music and enjoyed each others company, genuinely. He dropped me off a few minutes ago and as I was giving him a hug I told him that I'd really miss him. And then I came inside...and felt like I needed to write to a bunch of non readers out there on the interwebs about it. He isn't really the point of the story either.
What I'm really trying to say is that right now, in this moment I feel...vulnerable, and happy, and sad, and nostalgic, and like life is the most fantastic and dreadful saga ever written. The thing is, I don't feel dreadful in a way of wanting to keep everyone right here by my side. I don't want that, seriously I don't. That isn't the way it works, and I wouldn't implement that rule even if I could. But it's like those break ups that you know are eminent...you know its for the best, that the person, and you, will grow and flourish and continue on...and that is what your heart authentically wants and understands...and at the same time...there are feelings of loss or grief. I know I am not loosing friends, they are mearly just at a further distance. We won't see each other as much. We won't talk as much. Maybe we even loose contact in ways, but I say in ways because it is never completely. In the fibers of my essence I know the experience that I have shared with these wonderful souls. They have enriched my life, they have enhanced the experience of the brightest colors or the most delicious tastes. Without them, it wouldn't have been as sweet. It would have been different completely, and maybe that is ok too, and maybe this is where I realize that I am not a Buddhist monk and I still have attachments.
What this is really about...what everything is really about in the end some how or another is love. Here it is again, that word, that feeling, that experience that is so unique and similar for each of us. It's like at this moment I am experiencing the excruciating beauty of life....the full circle of relationships...the opening and closing of chapters. I know that the friends I mentioned above are closing a chapter and writing the beginning of the next...and my ego is a little afraid that my character in this new chapter has less lines. But never fear says my authentic self, because even if the lines are less, they are packed with substance...or just plain love.
Hmm, I guess what I can conclude is that if the only line I ever have in the rest of their books is "I love you" it will be enough...because I mean it, and they know it.
Monday, August 8, 2011
Saturday, August 6, 2011
The Ouroboros
A few years ago I was having run ins with snakes. This was unusual for me, as I assume it would be for anyone who doesn't live in the forest. As it was, during that time, I indeed was living in the forest, in Costa Rica. Seeing snakes there wasn't uncommon. Being attacked by a snake there wouldn't be that uncommon either. In my case, I was dreaming about snakes, crossing paths with snakes on trails and almost being attacked by a snake one time during a yoga class...inside. That was a weird occurrence.
I was laying in shavasana, receiving wisdom through my third eye while simultaneously relaxing it so that I could receive wisdom (or lesson my chance for self induced wrinkles). I felt the teacher's presence near me, not because I have a really outrageous 6th sense, but because I could hear her feet creaking on the wood floor around where I was laying. I tried to not pay attention as I was trying to not try to connect to the universe. When she called us back to awareness we rolled over to our right sides and sat up, ending class with 3 ohms. As I was rolling up my mat she came over to me and told me that a snake had somehow slithered it's way into the room during our last pose. She spotted it as it made it's way toward my head. She said that it came very close to me and reared up as if it attack. She tried to scare it away, and that was why I was hearing all of the creaking on the floor around me. Supposedly the snake stayed near my head, didn't attack, but didn't move away either, until on it's own time, when the teacher had surrendered to trying to make it leave, did it slither away into a crack in the molding (better get some caulk!) She told me that maybe it was some kind of sign.
I talked to some other people about this occurrence, about my snake filled dreams and close encounters. They all decided yes, it was some kind of sign. One man went as far as to say that the snake must be my totum animal. He carved a bracelet of a snake eating it's own tail (called the Ouroboros) and gave it to me to wear. It was a heartfelt gift and I wore it with pride, until I broke it slamming my hand on a counter after too many Imperials (cerveza).
The Ouroboros signifies death and rebirth, infinity and wholeness. Cycles. Endings and beginnings. Potentially something was dying inside of me during that 6th month stay in Costa Rica...only to have something else born in it's place. I can see that now, a few years later. I can see how many times that has happened in my life...in everyone's life. Growth. The difference is that the snake that eats it's own tail doesn't fight...it allows the cycle to flow through naturally without struggle. As I reflect about this, it serves as a reminder to me to stop trying to receive wisdom through my third eye, to let wrinkles come as they will, and let this life be what it is.
The Ouroboros
the rhythms of this universal song pound with sweet reminisences of ultimate truths-sweat rumbles, waving and washing over the oneness, dripping down and splashing into out ocean as we dance with graceful ease and shine joy. we are moving on our own, but our beats follow the same drum, our steps parallel, our reflections mirrored. my sorrow is yours as your love is mine, we borrow, share, feed and bathe each other in this unending abundance of connection. heart opening and rising, bodies fade away but this circle lives on. i am full, complete, i am a dancer that moves with spirit, that follows the lead of unlocked wisdom, outpouring from the waterfalls, rivers and veins of this life. to flow is to know love. to know love is to live love. to live love is to show love and share love and be love. i am but an open servant to loves unblockable flood, i do not fight the current, because it flows through me and through you and with this it is true that we are love. that you are me and I am you.
I was laying in shavasana, receiving wisdom through my third eye while simultaneously relaxing it so that I could receive wisdom (or lesson my chance for self induced wrinkles). I felt the teacher's presence near me, not because I have a really outrageous 6th sense, but because I could hear her feet creaking on the wood floor around where I was laying. I tried to not pay attention as I was trying to not try to connect to the universe. When she called us back to awareness we rolled over to our right sides and sat up, ending class with 3 ohms. As I was rolling up my mat she came over to me and told me that a snake had somehow slithered it's way into the room during our last pose. She spotted it as it made it's way toward my head. She said that it came very close to me and reared up as if it attack. She tried to scare it away, and that was why I was hearing all of the creaking on the floor around me. Supposedly the snake stayed near my head, didn't attack, but didn't move away either, until on it's own time, when the teacher had surrendered to trying to make it leave, did it slither away into a crack in the molding (better get some caulk!) She told me that maybe it was some kind of sign.
I talked to some other people about this occurrence, about my snake filled dreams and close encounters. They all decided yes, it was some kind of sign. One man went as far as to say that the snake must be my totum animal. He carved a bracelet of a snake eating it's own tail (called the Ouroboros) and gave it to me to wear. It was a heartfelt gift and I wore it with pride, until I broke it slamming my hand on a counter after too many Imperials (cerveza).
The Ouroboros signifies death and rebirth, infinity and wholeness. Cycles. Endings and beginnings. Potentially something was dying inside of me during that 6th month stay in Costa Rica...only to have something else born in it's place. I can see that now, a few years later. I can see how many times that has happened in my life...in everyone's life. Growth. The difference is that the snake that eats it's own tail doesn't fight...it allows the cycle to flow through naturally without struggle. As I reflect about this, it serves as a reminder to me to stop trying to receive wisdom through my third eye, to let wrinkles come as they will, and let this life be what it is.
The Ouroboros
the rhythms of this universal song pound with sweet reminisences of ultimate truths-sweat rumbles, waving and washing over the oneness, dripping down and splashing into out ocean as we dance with graceful ease and shine joy. we are moving on our own, but our beats follow the same drum, our steps parallel, our reflections mirrored. my sorrow is yours as your love is mine, we borrow, share, feed and bathe each other in this unending abundance of connection. heart opening and rising, bodies fade away but this circle lives on. i am full, complete, i am a dancer that moves with spirit, that follows the lead of unlocked wisdom, outpouring from the waterfalls, rivers and veins of this life. to flow is to know love. to know love is to live love. to live love is to show love and share love and be love. i am but an open servant to loves unblockable flood, i do not fight the current, because it flows through me and through you and with this it is true that we are love. that you are me and I am you.
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