Cleaning, Chaos and Attachment: Adventures in Meditation

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When life seems out of control I do the only reasonable thing.  I clean and organize my apartment. And when I say clean and organize, I mean it. Knick-knacks and clothes are bagged for donation to Goodwill.  Books are boxed for re-sale at Book Buyers in Mountain View.  Every surface is scrubbed and dusted and then furniture is moved in the hope of creating the perfect Feng Shui flow.  This last time I went so far as to cancel my cable and donate my television to charity.  It seems the only way I can reclaim control is to pare down my life to little more than the bare necessities.

When there’s nothing left to clean and if I remain desperate for more control, I update my calendars. I have three calendars – the calendar on my laptop, the hardcopy I keep in the event of a computer meltdown and the calendar on my iPhone (which of course is supposed to sync with my laptop but I haven’t sorted that out yet). I’m embarrassed to admit that all three calendars are color-coded.

If I continue to feel unsettled I start with the lists.  I write shopping lists, goals for the immediate and the far away future and a list of day-to-day chores.

I keep at it until I’ve lulled myself into believing that I’ve created order from chaos.  Of course, instead of feeding my compulsive nature by focusing all my energies on the external environment I could be creating the control and calm I crave by – wait for it (smacks palm of hand on forehead) – meditating.

And while I’m preparing for meditation by hanging out in Adho Mukha Savasana I could ask myself the right question – what is the turmoil I’m experiencing within all about?

The sense of impending calamity I feel from time to time boils down to my talent for creating unreasonable attachments to events out of my control.  The more I sense the loss of control, the more I attempt to cling to the story I have in my mind of how my life should be. But clinging to a story is like trying to grab vapor.  You can’t, can you?

The truth is, I can clean and clean until my knuckles are raw but that will bring me no closer to the control I crave.  If I truly want control, then I have to relinquish my desire for it and instead embrace the gift of clarity that a growing meditation practice offers.  I need to understand that we can only control our response to the events around us – not the events themselves.

There’s Healing in Staying Still

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In late May of 2005, on my first full day in America after a decade away in Donegal’s cool and rainy climate I stood outside of my hotel room in the Nebraska sun with my former college art professor.  I was wearing a short-sleeved cotton blouse and cotton trousers.  I remember how those clothes felt strange to me.  Too light.  Too feathery and thin against my skin.  But as we walked to Richard’s car across the blacktopped parking lot at ten o’clock in the morning the sun began to penetrate.  It began to heat my blood and wrap around my bones. I felt my body melt and become limber.  My damp and moldy joints began to flex. For the first time in ten years I felt warm.  Warm through and through.

Today is one of those breezy and blue Northern California days that beg a person to come outside to play.  And while I’m not so much in the mood for playing – despite Rosie the Labradoodle’s persistent attempts – I am in the mood to feel warmth wrap around my bones.  I’m in the mood to be still.  I’m in the mood to close my eyes and experience the change of temperature on my skin as the clouds roll over the sun.

I’ll practice yoga today, but not on the mat.  Today I’ll find my yoga practice in the sound of a kid practicing violin a few doors down, the shouting squawk of two blue jays in the plum tree and the persistent hum of traffic on Homer Street.

While life spins around me, today my body, my heart and my spirit will stay still.

A Private Practice

One of the things I promised myself when I returned from teacher training was that I would continue with the 30-minute meditation we practiced each morning.  Without fail I would rise at the crack of dawn and sit in quiet contemplation.  Every morning.  For thirty minutes.  Without fail.  Oh yeah, and then I’d add thirty minutes of yoga.  Adding this to my crowded schedule would have the alarm going off sometime around five.  That’s actually before the crack of dawn.

And yet, I tried.  For about three days.  Until my plan was shot down by my pesky snooze alarm.

So how do we do it?  How do we keep the promises we make to ourselves?

Easy.  One step at a time.  With forgiveness.  By accepting that the desire to change should be a joy and not a chore.

The new plan?  Three days a week.  Ten minutes at a time.  Either in the morning or the afternoon.  On some days maybe both.  And when it becomes a part of who I am, then four days a week, and then five.

You see where I’m going here.  It doesn’t matter if it’s meditation, or asana practice, or going to the gym.  Change doesn’t happen over night.  We don’t go to bed on a Sunday evening and wake up on a Monday morning a new person.

It takes commitment and patience.  It takes love.  And we’re worth it.

A Thousand Sundays Later

When the California Street Farmer’s Market opened two years ago (or was it three?)  I promised myself I would visit every Sunday morning and come home with a week’s worth of organic goodness.  I’d have fresh produce breakfast, lunch and dinner while treating myself to organic goat cheese or fresh pressed cider.  Even better, because the market was only a mile away, I’d wake up with the sunrise and walk the scant mile.

One thousand days later, give or take a few Sundays, I did just that.

Let’s face it.  Good habits are difficult to establish.  I’m trying to trick myself into a ‘new normal’.

When I returned from yoga teacher training, I was certain I’d maintain the meditation practice and alcohol free vegetarian diet.

I promised myself I’d practice Flying Dragon or The Infant Series every morning before sitting down to write.

I was going to cancel my cable no matter how horrible the withdrawal from Mad Men was.

And I’d manage to do all of this before opening my laptop to check emails.

I dream big.  But I was asking for too much, too soon.

What I needed was to re-establish my rhythm – I needed to embrace my ‘old normal’.  I needed to give myself time to settle into a familiar schedule and to process everything I learned in those last weeks of August.

And now, six weeks to the day that I loaded my yoga mat and suitcase into the back of my Honda CRV and made my way over the mountains to Soquel, I finally feel ready to embrace a bit of change.  To welcome a new normal.  Am I going to cancel my cable?  Oh heck no.  Mad Men is brain candy.  And we all need something sweet now and then.

But here’s some humble advice anyway:

  • If you feel the need for change, ask yourself ‘why’. If you don’t know why you want to see a change in your life, then it probably won’t ‘stick’.
  • Play with your new normal – see what works, let go of what doesn’t without guilt or regret.
  • Hang on to a taste of the old normal.
  • Don’t make change a chore – make it fun.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a fridge full of fresh vegetables to prep for the quinoa salad I’m making for my lunch tomorrow.

Day Six – Land of Medicine Buddha. No – Make that ‘Home Sweet Home’

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We have today off. My roommate invited me to drive down the coast with her but I’m a homebody.  After Friday’s last ‘Namaste’ I made my way ‘over the hill’ and came home.  Being home grounds me.  I can confirm the apartment is still here, my houseplants are still alive and the upstairs neighbors are still loud. The bottom line?  There’s a week of laundry to do and a DVR locked, loaded and ready for viewing.

So I’m here in my little studio processing the last six days and anticipating the next seven.  What I’m really trying to say is this:

Teacher training has been a colossal mind-bender (and you can feel free to replace ‘bender’ with slightly saltier language).

  • One moment I’m certain I’m a good yoga teacher – my teaching philosophy runs parallel to Paul and Suzee’s.
  • In the next moment I’m a failure because I’ve never seriously considered introducing yogic philosophy to my classes.
  • Before I arrived my yogic path was an Iyengar path – I believed his system of alignment meant my students were safe.
  • Now I’m asking myself, ‘how do I tell my students I’ve been wrong for the past sixteen years?’.
  • I convince myself that I can teach a hybrid of Iyengar and Yin (I call it I-YIN-Gar!).
  • But then I see that beautiful photo of Iyengar and his curiously long eyebrows in the studio where I teach.  He looks at me.  His brows are knit together in disapproval.

It’s a delicate balancing act, integrating two disparate schools of thought.

If you asked me, “What are you enjoying the most about teacher training?” I think the answer would change moment by moment.  But I have to admit I believe the most meaningful part of the day is the thirty-minute morning meditation.  I believe that continuing the practice when I return to “real life” will go a long way toward discovering where this new yoga path will lead.

Self-Care

I have friends who are great at putting themselves first.  In a good way.  Some friends simply know when to say ‘no’.  Others have the means to make twice yearly trips to their favorite spa.  Still others begin their day with reflection and meditation – before turning on NPR, before checking the emails, before putting on the kettle.

I do not fall into any of those categories.  I’m terrible at saying ‘no’, my last massage was at least a year ago, and the first thing I do when the alarm sounds is open my MacBook to check for important emails that arrived in the night.

For shame.  And me being a yoga teacher and all that.  You’d think I’d know better.

The closest I come to self-care are visits to my acupuncturist Dea Burmeister.  But they only happen once every six weeks or so.

The last time I saw Dea, I was in her office not as a client, but as a practitioner.  She wanted some bodywork on her lunch break.  While we were preparing she mentioned that she’d gotten out of bed early that morning.  I asked why.

“If I don’t get up early enough to fit in my meditation and my walk, I’m no good to anyone else.”

And that’s the thing, isn’t it.  Nurturing self-care isn’t just about making ourselves feel good.  It’s about helping us to love ourselves so that we may love others.  And apparently this self-care business isn’t something that just happens.  You actually have to work at it.

What is Self Care?

Self-care is taking time for us.  Taking time that’s different than ‘down time’ in front of the television or computer.  It’s offering ourselves time to reflect and to center.  Self-care gives us permission to return to our still point – permission to find balance in a chaotic life.

For Dea, self-care includes meditative walks in the morning.  But we all have our own way of giving ourselves the care we deserve.

I’ve had two blessing in the past ten days.  First I was asked to dog and cat sit for a family who receive one television channel.  One. And it’s a bad one.  So I’ve not seen Keith Olberman or Rachel Maddow (my favorite source for news) since last week.  There’s been no Jon Stewart to make me laugh in the face of tragedy. In fact, I’ve not seen any news at all.  I’ve caught the Yahoo! headlines, but that’s it.

Reducing the amount of time we spend absorbing bad news is good self-care.  It doesn’t lessen our awareness of what’s happening around us, but it breaks our addiction to it. I feel different without the constant bombardment of what is – lets admit it – bad news.  I haven’t been this ‘chilled out’ since ‘chill out’ was the cool thing to say.

The other blessing happened a week ago.  I was enjoying a margarita with friends in their garden.  The subject came around to music, and ten minutes later I was holding a sixty-year-old Martin guitar while the owner said to me, “Why don’t you borrow it?”

My parents had a country band when I was growing up.  I began on a baritone ukulele but eventually graduated to a 12-string Guild.  I sold my guitar five years ago, telling myself I had no time for music.

Silly me. It turns out, for me, nurturing my musical side is very good self-care.

What do you do for self-care?  Do you meditate?  Do you row a kayak?  Do you need a hot tub and a massage or will curling up in front of a fire with a good book bring the balance back?

My goal over the next few weeks is to make time for my self-care – to block out a few hours in my schedule each week.  It won’t be easy.  The most difficult challenge for me will be saying ‘no’.

I just have to remind myself, it’s one step at a time, but forward.