Day 6 – 1/5/16
Timer on…
“Still Alive” by Jonathan Coulton (featuring Sara Quin) is playing.
Well, something that seemed impossible only four days ago, the Eka Pada Rajakapotasana “The Pigeon” in its fullest position with my hips on the ground, happened today, and I (almost) have my splits (Hanumanasana “Dancing Monkey) on both sides. My jaw has to be picked up because at 37 years old, I have a hard time believing that my body will be able to do things that it used to be able to do at age 10, but…it’s happening…so…I guess some things are like riding a bike…
Anyway, I have decided today to focus on the meditation I chose to end the practice because I have to say that I have been on the fence about meditation since I was 18 and it was introduced to me as a way to prep as an actor. I was incapable of experiencing what my classmates would talk about…I didn’t get it…I was sure there was something wrong with me, so I didn’t tell anyone that I truly hated it and that I continually would hope that it would end soon. I tried very hard to let my thoughts go in and out and try to find some sense of “peace” or “bliss”, but…NOPE! it wouldn’t happen… Last year, while doing the 69 Days of Mourning, I had some true moments of what, I think, my classmates were experiencing, but…they were so special that I didn’t have words for them, and I still don’t, but…I was hoping that I could capitalize on that discovery this year… It seems as though by Day 6, I am (already) being able to do that. It’s as if after 20 years of meditation my body and mind have decided they “know” how to get to that “place” that unattainable “place” faster and with more ease. Maybe it’s age, maybe it’s the literal weight and emotional weight I have gained from my father’s death…I have no idea, but…it is quite wonderful…and I’m glad to (finally) be in the camp of people who believe in this “meditation thing”.
Anyway, I have a meditation at the top of the practice and at the end, and the one at the end has been very “interesting”. (And for those of you who truly know me, you know I hate that word, but I’m using it here because I don’t have a word for this experience, yet, and, maybe I won’t ever achieve language for this “thing” called “meditation”…). What interests me is that the first thing you’re supposed to say to yourself as you breathe in is “Heart of the Mother”. And…the thoughts of my mother and her heart, of course, filter through me, and those thoughts are complicated, and, yet, so much a part of who I am… The second thing you’re supposed to say as you exhale is “Fire of the Father”. Now, in the paragraph above I admitted that it wasn’t until I had 69 Days of a “Mourning” practice that I (finally) discovered some essence of what meditation is for, and, of course, I spent 3 very hard years before that practice really mourning the person I have loved most in this world, and spent 69 Days in a yoga practice, musing and reflecting on that inimitable being, so “Fire of the Father” brings up feelings that (almost) trump anything that can come up about my mother. The next step is to breathe in and say, “Meet in Me”, and exhale and say, “And flow.” Yikes! This mediation has become a tug-of-war of emotions I feel for my living mother, whom I have a complicated and extreme love for and a father that I revere (almost) like a god… That’s a lot to take in and “flow” at the end of a practice. I can’t say that I’m (totally) meditating at that moment…I honestly end the practice in some sort of gray area of…”What the Hell was that?” And, yet, it seems perfect for who I am today. I am made up complicated and conflicting emotions/personalities and they have allowed me to see a part of the human condition that marks my “practice” as an artist…So…that’s what I’m sitting with and musing on today…
I am over 40 seconds, so I must end…
Timer on…
“Still Alive” by Jonathan Coulton (featuring Sara Quin) is playing.
Well, something that seemed impossible only four days ago, the Eka Pada Rajakapotasana “The Pigeon” in its fullest position with my hips on the ground, happened today, and I (almost) have my splits (Hanumanasana “Dancing Monkey) on both sides. My jaw has to be picked up because at 37 years old, I have a hard time believing that my body will be able to do things that it used to be able to do at age 10, but…it’s happening…so…I guess some things are like riding a bike…
Anyway, I have decided today to focus on the meditation I chose to end the practice because I have to say that I have been on the fence about meditation since I was 18 and it was introduced to me as a way to prep as an actor. I was incapable of experiencing what my classmates would talk about…I didn’t get it…I was sure there was something wrong with me, so I didn’t tell anyone that I truly hated it and that I continually would hope that it would end soon. I tried very hard to let my thoughts go in and out and try to find some sense of “peace” or “bliss”, but…NOPE! it wouldn’t happen… Last year, while doing the 69 Days of Mourning, I had some true moments of what, I think, my classmates were experiencing, but…they were so special that I didn’t have words for them, and I still don’t, but…I was hoping that I could capitalize on that discovery this year… It seems as though by Day 6, I am (already) being able to do that. It’s as if after 20 years of meditation my body and mind have decided they “know” how to get to that “place” that unattainable “place” faster and with more ease. Maybe it’s age, maybe it’s the literal weight and emotional weight I have gained from my father’s death…I have no idea, but…it is quite wonderful…and I’m glad to (finally) be in the camp of people who believe in this “meditation thing”.
Anyway, I have a meditation at the top of the practice and at the end, and the one at the end has been very “interesting”. (And for those of you who truly know me, you know I hate that word, but I’m using it here because I don’t have a word for this experience, yet, and, maybe I won’t ever achieve language for this “thing” called “meditation”…). What interests me is that the first thing you’re supposed to say to yourself as you breathe in is “Heart of the Mother”. And…the thoughts of my mother and her heart, of course, filter through me, and those thoughts are complicated, and, yet, so much a part of who I am… The second thing you’re supposed to say as you exhale is “Fire of the Father”. Now, in the paragraph above I admitted that it wasn’t until I had 69 Days of a “Mourning” practice that I (finally) discovered some essence of what meditation is for, and, of course, I spent 3 very hard years before that practice really mourning the person I have loved most in this world, and spent 69 Days in a yoga practice, musing and reflecting on that inimitable being, so “Fire of the Father” brings up feelings that (almost) trump anything that can come up about my mother. The next step is to breathe in and say, “Meet in Me”, and exhale and say, “And flow.” Yikes! This mediation has become a tug-of-war of emotions I feel for my living mother, whom I have a complicated and extreme love for and a father that I revere (almost) like a god… That’s a lot to take in and “flow” at the end of a practice. I can’t say that I’m (totally) meditating at that moment…I honestly end the practice in some sort of gray area of…”What the Hell was that?” And, yet, it seems perfect for who I am today. I am made up complicated and conflicting emotions/personalities and they have allowed me to see a part of the human condition that marks my “practice” as an artist…So…that’s what I’m sitting with and musing on today…
I am over 40 seconds, so I must end…
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