Acceptance

Every time that we meet for a one-on-one consultation, Dr. Ashwin talks about the importance of acceptance and a positive attitude.  Some things I need to hear again and again.  This morning, I woke from a string of bad dreams about Matthew.  I couldn't see him, but I knew he was there.  I'd previously woken from a dream where I was mad at him for no reason and in my waking state I felt bad for being angry at him for no reason, and also frustrated that I hadn't actually seen him.  I then had another dream about Matt.  All of his friends and I were present for some sort of ritual honoring him and everyone was wearing white.  It was a silent dream.  Alex and April were wearing their wedding attire, but it was all white.  We were on a ranch somewhere and Matt or an effigy of Matt were on stage (again, I couldn't see/look at him) and they were doing a prostrating dance for him like the Indians do in Pujas here.  Jesse was nearby, looking lovely and shamanistic in white, doing a blessing in the four directions of north south east and west in Matt's honor.  I was then in my old neighborhood in Santa Clara and Jack Thorpe and Kara Nelson were with me looking at teenage decorations in my old bedroom.  Then, the doctor woke me up for treatment.  I was jostled and frustrated that I hadn't seen Matt in the dream, but that I'd seen so many other people from our community.  My skype messages had a new one from Matt saying he missed me.  I wanted to speak with him very badly.

So, I went directly to treatment.  It's a cleansing oil and nourishing water that has been boiled and brewed for 40 days to treat the cental nervous channel.  The doctor will do a cleanse of the central channel one day and a strengthening of it the next.  Today was the first:  a cleanse.  As the oil was being rubbed on my body, I was thinking about how much I missed Matthew and also about how bad I felt that I hadn't seen him in my dreams and that I'd been frustrated with him.  I was also thinking about a walk I took yesterday.  I ran some errands (clothes to the laundry man and a shirt to the tailor) and decided to walk down to the river.  I sat by the river for some time and it was becoming twilight, so I took the long route home around the village and along a ridge overlooking rice fields to see the sunset.  I started to feel tingling in my legs, even though I hadn't walked 25 minutes and it wasn't too hot.  It wasn't bad tingling, just a bit.  And I had just 5 more minutes to go.  I walked on and thought of all of the things that I like to do - long hikes, adventures, being in the sun.  I thought about how I'd need to curtail those activities.  Walking from cabin to cabin in Yosemite if we win the lottery?  Maybe not.  Going on multi-hour hikes with friends without stopping?  Maybe not.  Being a slower walker b/c I'm generally tired now? Yes.  I started to get so down on myself and my limitations, a well as frustration with my dreams, that I started crying.

I told the Dr. that I was still in the acceptance phase and feeling very frustrated and sad, and that I'd had a nightmare about my husband with negative emotions and that I hadn't even been able to see him in the dreams.  He said 'the reason I keep making special time to talk to you is because it's very important for you to accept where you are, Kyra."  "These things that happen to us in our lives are beyond our control."  "You must keep a positive attitude and accept."  "Three years ago, would you have been in as good a place as you are now to accept what is happening?"  "Probably not," I said.  "Everything happens at exactly the right time and for the right reasons."  "You have been given your health and your father and your husband for a reason that is beyond what you can conceive; you have to accept."  I said that my husband was a very good man.  "There are many very good people that do not have good people in their life."  "You have."  "You are joined together in destiny and must simply accept all what is happening - the good and the bad."  "You can not assign blame to others or point your fingers outside of yourself."  I thought about how I've been blogging about so many externalities and all of the bad things that I had done to result in harm to others in my life.  

I then thought about my walking as of late - having to ask Jen to slow down from her speed walking and only walking 30 minutes before needing to take a rest.  I told him I was frustrated that I could no longer walk very far and was afraid that this was going to limit my options in the future.  He responded:  "You can train your body to walk again - maybe not as far - but quite far."  "You are starting at level 5-10 and must take your time to master each level before moving to the next."  "It may seem like a backward slide to the negative mind, but to the positive mind it is a new beginning."  "You take your time to get to know your body as it is now and then you test the limits of how far you can expand."  "But first, you must accept where you are."  "Accept and be positive."  " this is a new beginning for you."  "Accept it."

And so, I am accepting in theory, but still struggling a bit with the actuality of it.  I am glad that I have some more time here to continue listening to, learning from, and experimenting with my body, mind and intellect in such a nourishing place.  Matt has texted through skype and we're working on an exact time for him to call today (you see, my phone doesn't ring so I have to be looking directly at it to receive a call).  It's been good to be here and mostly removed from technology b/c I can focus on the subtle aspects.  I'm looking really forward to talking to him.  I'm accepting that my body and I are studying devotedly at level 5-10 and we will make progress.  But for now, I accept.  I accept. I accept.

Innocence of India

Venus is now rising with the morning Sun as flocks of snowy egrets fly over me on the roof doing Trikonasana.  With the beginning of the New Moon today,  I have finished my detoxification and am allowed to do yoga again.  The doctor said that my purgation of 11 bowel movements in one day thanks to a little tonic he gave me in the morning was very successful and that we must thank the gods, goddesses, energies and plants, as well as my own intention, for such a successful detox.  It turns out that the prayer he does every time is asking for the healing powers of these local energies.  Thank you energies.  I feel light and cleansed.  The Dr. said we've gotten rid of 70% of the toxins in my system and all of the ghee.  It certainly felt like that this morning as the prana eased through my body during asana.  He promises to get rid of 90% of the toxins by the end of my stay here.  The rest is up to me.  

The day before purgation, I stayed in the sweat box a little too long.  It was only 10 minutes, but I was enjoying the hissing of the steam and the heat on my body, as well as the dew drops forming on my forehead...I was fantasizing about the kabuki spa with my eyes closed...suddenly, Dr. Shubha was standing directly in front of me with a look of consternation and concern.  "You are sweating," [concerned head wobble] "you must get out now" as she opened the sweat box door and cool air came pouring into my fantasy.  I later realized that I should've listened to the Dr and gotten our when I was merely warm.  My arm was in great pain all day and I was trying really hard not to worry that I was having another MS flare-up.  I was quiet at dinner and went to bed with prayers that my arm would be better, not worse, the next day.  It was.  Thank God.  That day was the day of purgation.  My period started this day and the Dr. said that we couldn't have planned it any better.  Why?  Because I need two days of rest/no treatment post-purgation and there's also no treatment while on the cycle.  So, in essence, it's perfectly planned.  Thanks again energies.  My arm hurt a bit the day of the purgation and lasted into the evening.  Again, the Dr. said not to worry.  He said that my body is exhausted - that it would be 40% tired with just the purge, but 90% also with the menses.  The next morning, I felt better.   I didn't go on any long walks or do any yoga.  I just rested.

During that rest, I got an email from Dr. Geeta - an eccentric doctor that I'd met previously (Jan. 2009) in India.  I'd travelled all the way across India with her (from Tamil Nadu to Gujurat) to do five days of Panchakarma at her house.  Her house was freezing cold and she required me to listen to spooky chamber music from 'The Mother' of Sri Aurobindo Ashram.  I did a runner for the airport, but she came after me and convinced me that she was supposed to teach me something.  She was so earnest that I went back, finished the treatment and left her house feeling lighter, happier and more energetically vibrant than I ever had in my life.  When my Bollywood actor friend picked me up at the airport after travelling from Gujurat, his mouth dropped and he told me that I had the glow that only the stars had in Bollywood (more on him soon).  Anyway, it ended up working very well, but I'd always had a bit of a reluctance to go back to her, but fascination at the same time.  Imagine then, how strange it was to get this email from her out of the blue after four years:  "Hi Kyra, Where are you? What are you doing? I have moved permanently to Pondicherry.  Here's my phone number.  You can call or come anytime."  It just so happens that my chakra yoga teacher from Thailand's guru has his school right next door and I'd been wondering if I'd ever have a chance to study there.  Um.....

Naturally, I called her.  I told her I was at an ashram getting ayurvedic treatment in India and she said 'come to me,' 'I want to make sure you have a child.'  Well, that got me.  I asked her if she knew I was in India.  "Kyra, we have a soul connection, I keep telling you.  Of course I know that you're in India.  Come to me!"  I didn't ask if she knew I wasn't yet pregnant, but really wanted to be.  And so, the day after I emptied my toxins and was recovering, I had THIS tossing around in my mind.  I looked at how I could get to Pondicherry:  leave this ashram early, change my domestic flight from Bangalore to Pondicherry, move back Dubai a bit, etc. etc. etc.  And you know what?  My arm started hurting.  A lot.  When I slowed down and remembered that it's important to finish what one starts and not to go for the shiny new thing, even if it seems uniquely mystically alluring to me, I decided that I would finish this ashram and not go.  My arm instantly felt better.  Just. Like. That.  Yet another new connection between me and my body.  When I make a bad decision, my left arm hurts.  Well, that's handy (no pun intended).  Earlier that morning, I'd had a dream that my mom needed a new car and I was trying to convince her to buy a tried and true used Honda from Craigslist, but she wanted something like a shiny new Kia.  I remembered this dream and thought perhaps it was a bit prescient.

Nonetheless, the allure of Dr. Geeta lingered.  The next day, I called her to see how much it would be and what she was offering.  She told me it was 10 days for about $1K (room, board and treatment) for prenatal education, 3 hours of external treatment plus 2 hours of internal treatment.  She mentioned the good luck that I would be there during 'the Mother's' birthday.  I asked if the internal treatment had anything to do with the Mother.  'Yes, with the Mother's blessing, you will be gifted with a child.' 'I am an ayurvedic MD and a gynecologist MD, as well as a devotee of the mother.'  'The last time you were with me, you felt her presence, remember?' 'I have people come to me from all over the world.' 'A negro couple came from Africa and they wanted a white child.' 'After four months of prenatal education and treatment with me, they had a white child with the blessings of the Mother.' Um...

And so the decision to go to Pondy was made:  not this time around.   I will instead pray to the energies and planets and gods and goddesses, as well as myself and my husband and the universe at large, as I continue to detoxify my body and move forward in a lighter manner - both physically and emotionally.  I'm sorry, 'Mother', but I am quite well taken care of on this track and will stick with it.  I was fortunate to study Chakra Yoga in Thailand and will continue to find my own way with me as a teacher.  When I asked Dr. Ashwin his opinion, he guessed that she was opening a new buiness and contacted everyone that she knew rather than 'knowing' that I was in India.  Perhaps I give this country too much credit for its mysticism.  Perhaps not...   

Dr. Ashwin says that the beauty of this place has to do with the 'innocence':  the innocence of the people, the innocence of the water and the innocence of the forest.  Indeed, throughout the day, we here children singing, pujas being done, birds singing (even peacocks in the morning), cows mooing, and only occassional - not constant- honking.  As a Brahman village of 800 people, they respect the land and eachother.  There is very little garbage on the streets, men are not openly urinating on the street, there is no begging or harassment, the children excitedly say 'hi' and keep going while giggling, and the calm in people's eyes is very relaxing and bright.  The river is also unpolluted and swishes in front of the great temple at the base of steps leading down to it.  If you stand in the river long enough, little fish gather at your feet and nibble off the dead skin.  Just across the river (which can be walked across with ease) is a Vedantic school for young boys where they learn the yogic ways of life - you can often here 'The Gayatri Mantra' echoing across the river.  The forest is the home of king cobras.  The not so innocent three men that were stealing their venom for sale in Bombay were recently caught and punished - two of the people here heard them being whipped at the police station next door.  Indeed, the forest is lush and verdant.  I watched several dozen snowy egrets flying east at sunset across the green floor with a pinkish hue --- it was lovely.  Every day, I see two new kinds of birds - bold and colorful.  I have not yet seen a cobra and likely will not, but this forest is their primary home in India.  They are scared of humans - don't worry, Mom.  

I have a new companion with whom I take walks.  His name is James and he's almost 60 years old and from London.  From the age of 23, he has been a transcendental meditation (TM) teacher.  He's not allowed to teach me TM meditation outside of a formal facility, but has a very calming presence and I like to meditate with him with my own methods.  He's travelled all over the Middle East (in the 70s) to bring resonant peace to people in conflict.  I like him very much and am happy to walk through the forests (on the path, not narrow cobra filled ones!) with him.  It's just right.

So, as I let India enrapture me, as I heal, as I revive, as I feel lighter and more hopeful and more connected with my body than I have in years, I wonder...should I extend my stay a bit?  I can still stay two extra weeks and be home in time for ovulation.  I checked in with Matt who says that he's so busy with work and that if he were me, he'd stay.  And so I called a couple of friends.  Both are willing to meet me in Bangalore.  Asif, the Bollywood (and now making quite a name for himself as a Tollywood) actor, said he'd rent a motorbike in Bangalore and we'd explore around Karnataka.  (He is the geeky manager in the American movie 'Outsourced', btw).  Sounds good, but Dr. Ashwin says I must stay in one place for at least two days while travelling.  We can do that.  I started to look into going to the State of MP to see tigers and ancient tantric ruins, but guess what?  My arm started hurting.  And then I remembered Dr. Ashwin's words about the innocence of Karnataka.  Why not stay around here and explore.  Just then, Asif called and suggested he pick me up here and we travel around this area for 2 days, then he can drop me off here and I'll be on my way to Bangalore...thank you energies of this local place once again.

And now, I'll go do gentle yoga again on the rooftop.  The sun is nearly setting.  I am hoping that the gypsy staying here will either be on his flute or guitar.  I finally got his name when he gave a CD to a Swedish woman (a great teacher for me - my 50 year old walking partner who tells me I must meet the pain, not fear it) who left today.  His name is Estas Tonne.  Our wifi is too slow to download anything, but if you'd like a taste of what it sounds like around here, google him.  Today I commented about the symphony of birds all around us and said he must find a lot of inspiration.  He smiled and did a little lyrical gesture of his hand.  He doesn't say much, but his gypsy guitar sure does...

I'm attaching a picture of 'Pappa' and the first born grandchild.  They walk around this property with awe on their faces as they look at and listen to the innocent beauty of the forest.  In one glimpse, they actually had the same childlike faces.  The Brahman healing through nature tradition continues...I believe in the confluence of body, mind and spirit that Ayurveda offers.  I told Dr. Ashwin that the western doctors suggested that I try a treatment of daily hormone injections for 10 days with three ultrasounds for an IUI.  He gently explained that the reproductive layer is directly on top of the nervous system layer.  "For you, with your MS, to inject any such hormones would cause great disruption to the nervous system."  It's explanations like this that make me feel that I'm in exactly the right place to get myself balanced enough to let nature take its course.  And if it doesn't, I will accept it, as with everything.

Rooted Expansiveness

The smell of it was everywhere.  Through every pore, both nostrils, my mouth, even my ears, the ghee was burbling out of me as sweat from my skin.  I turned my nose to my armpit - a sea of ghee assaulted my senses.  It smelled like the thick, rich, hot butter oozing out of every aspect of my being.

I woke from this dream with dry skin and no discernable smell of butter.  I washed my face, brushed my teeth and did some yogic breathing to greet the new day.  At 7am, I was given a glass of ghee and a prayer by Dr. Ashwin for the fifth day of ghee detoxification.  Yesterday, he said that I was at about 50% total saturation, but that the completion phase is rapid in the last few days.  If my dream meant anything, I'm already there on some level, or perhaps it was prescient of the future.  The following day, I felt like a giant butterball of ghee.  The light sweat from my morning asana smelled of ghee.  I felt like a tick full of butter, who could roll down the local hill and collect cow dung and tree branches as I descended with a great possibility of popping and making a huge mess!  Earlier in the morning, Dr. Ashwin scratched the top of my arm and took my pulse.  "You should be at 100% saturation by tonight; we will see by tomorrow morning."  I did what anyone can ever do in India:  put my hands together in 'namaste' and said 'very well' with a feeble smile.  He was right.  Today, I slept through the call to prayer and awoke to his gentle scratches on my skin and calming brown eyes telling me 'saturation is complete,' 'you make take hot bath - four buckets of hot water.' And so it is...  

The ghee detox is followed by three days of sweat treatment in either a hot box with a hole cut out of the top for my head, or through piped steam on my body like a massage, or through sevral buckets of a hot water bath.  In my case, Dr. Ashwin prescribed the least heating because MS symptoms can be exacerbated by excessive heat (true: see below walk story).  I will then have one to two days of purgation:  I'll take a shot of a medicated beverage and then eliminate four times either through my mouth or through the other end.  That will complete the detox process.  

Why would one want to saturate her body with ghee as a detox treatment?   As the most sattvic form of provision from the holy cow, ghee is believed to have healing properties.  In Ayurveda, ghee is a miracle cure-all remedy for everything from eye problems to constipation.  In my case, the ghee is actively attaching to the toxins in my body and lubricating them so that they can loosen up/decalcify and then  leave my body through sweat and purgation.  This ghee has been treated with special herbs to focus on my mind, body and intellect.  I asked Dr. Ashwin whether the mind and intelllect weren't the same thing.  'No, the mind is actively thinking; in your case the mind is very active."  "The intellect is a higher state of consciousness that is always present, but can get a little bit blocked."  "Once you are calmly rooted in your body, the mind eases and allows the intellect to come into the body."  "This is why this particular batch of ghee is designed to alleviate your symptoms."  This made sense to me.  I thought to myself that I couldn't envision a  better palliative cure or causal explanation for a disease of the central nervous system could be prescribed.  

I've been exploring these questions:  'What do you think might lie at the root of your illness?" and "What does your body need in order to heal?"  The answers that come up aren't easy to articulate; it feels more like a frenetic energy to an increasingly sensitive organism caused by overdoing.  The healing feels like pressing pause and surrendering in to the peace within my body rather than trying to shove it into something that is convenient for me to keep doing.  Naturally, I should be able to tap into rooted peace anywhere, especially since I was trained in pranayama, asana, meditation and bhakti for hundreds of hours in 2007 and 2008.   But since I stopped my practices in 2010, I haven't touched into them too often except for those rare times when I'm in nature and there are no plans to be made.  At that time, I feel a whoosh of synchronicity and my body is smiling.  THAT is what I heard in Dr. Ashwin's description of how ghee helps body, mind and spirit.  I like this treatment very much.  The four buckets of hot water felt delightful this morning.  Dr. Ashwin was right - it was just the right amount not to exacerbate my symptoms.  

In the meantime, harmful emotions and thoughts are also getting loosened up and clarified.  I've seen that I've lived a strong masculine pesence as a Taurus/Bull, lawyer/litigator, socialite trying to make sure that I'm well liked and all people are provided for.  Iin the Vedas, the right side is the masculine/sun side of the body.  The left side is the feminine/lunar/nourishing side of the body.  Indeed, I have felt scorched and imbalanced for the past several months.  My left side is very clearly telling me to nourish my feminine side -- to listen to her.  There is a purpose to be done in me through my feminine side that is being ignored.  Once I tap into that and trust it, I feel there will be great Grace, peace, power and purpose in my everyday being.  But I have to listen...

The other day, I went for an hour long walk with one of the ladies who is a 50-year old Swedish woman struggling with lifelong physical impairments due to being caught in a threshing machine as a six-year old girl.  She led the way in the sun as I followed along with my umbrella.  After 30 minutes, I had to sit down because both of my legs and feet were tingling in the sun.  It felt like electric shock pulses that were growing stronger and almost bouncing off of my legs.  So I listened and I stopped, even though I was embarrassed to ask her to take a break; after all I'm only 40 and to the naked eye in perfect health.  Not so on the inside.  I sat and focused on lovingly breathing fresh prana into my legs; I connected with and nudged the tingles down into my feet and into the earth.  The result was remarkable - it was as if I turned a jug of tingles upside down with fresh air and they literally poured out of my feet into the earth.  The connection with my nerves and my body was instant when I came from a place of gentleness and grounding and nurturing compassion.  What a gift!  I continued home for another 25 minutes and was just 5 minutes away when it happened again.  I didn't want to stop again - I was too embarrassed, so I ignored my body.  I then tripped on nothing a couple of times, once catching Ann-Catrine's shoulder as not to fall to the ground.  We were nearly home and suddenly my left hip seized up as if in protest.  It was completely stiff and I had to swivel walk to make any progress. It was as if I was a walking zombie.  Ann-Catrine apologized profusely and I told her that it was my choice and I'd simply overstretched my limits.  I made it home in this akward gait and collapsed on my bed for two hours.  I had dinner and then went straight to bed.  This was a good lesson in asserting the aggressive over the nurtuing.  Instead of pushing through, I should've honored the body by resting and giving it soothing attention to release it.  When I honored the feminine side previously, there was a beautiful, natural and nourishing relief.  When I didn't, the symptoms grew worse.  Is this not my body speaking to me directly?  Listen.  Indeed, Dr. Ashwin had warned me that during this treatment, I shouldn't walk for more than 30 minutes.  But, I didn't want to be restricted.  Dr. Ashwin sees right through it.  I trust this man more and more each day.  

The following morning, my whole body was stiff and I went up to the roof and rolled out my yoga mat.  The pre-dawn mist nourished my skin as the breath of prana lubricated my stiff joints.  Collectively, me and the dawn of nature blended to bring my body relief.  Through rooting, through breathing, through listening and nurturing my body in whatever pose felt right (and holding it for a very long, slow time), I brought my body back to health.  I feel that this is a macrocosm for what I will continue to do in my life.  Bring grace through rooting and connecting with the great source of nature; always healing; always rejuvenating - I will not stray from this practice again.  The sacred feminine left side - like the lunar energy of lubrication itself is so very rejuvenating, no matter what.  By finally paying attention in this manner, I have very much started over as a beginner with my breath and my body.  I am exploring and experimenting and re-learning that which I once taught to others.  It is very humbling and inspiring.  And feminine.

I have since walked only 30-40 minutes and have not had such an episode again.  I continue to experience emotional upswells of fear and anxiety in the not knowing, but they are growing less overwhelming as I find grace in my core.  Here, it is a soothing process.  Every morning, Dr. Ashwin brings up a cup of hot tea and hot water and gives me a blessing by touching my head and saying a prayer.  I feel like he's singing me a healing lullaby as I prepare to drink a cup of hot ghee followed by steaming herbal water.  I feel held and nurtured and cared for by a doctor who understands so much more than I do about the interconnectedness of things and the Grace of grounded healing.  Indeed, the energy of India is so vastly wise and spiritual --- again, I can't put words to it, but it's everywhere.  In the midst of MS, to have an Indian doctor give me a blessing with holy medicine designed to clear me out and connect me up with Source is the very aspect of healing that I couldn't touch as I drove from healer to healer to healer throughout the Bay Area in my search for trust.  Trust? Trust that I can heal through this.  Trust that I have the strength.  Trust that I can find the Grace.  India is a vast vessel of rejuvenating trust for me.  It undeniably shines the light back to me as the source.  If I'm unbalanced on the left, go to source to find the balance and then listen and nurture.    

Likewise, my lessons about self-created mental turbulence are increasingly clarified.  As soon as I let go of wanting to be invited in to people's experiences here, I connected bit by bit with people without even trying.  Likewise, as soon as I stopped lambasting myself for having jet lag, I realized how lucky I was to enjoy this sacred, quiet and cool type of morning all to myself.  And now, I'm sleeping in until 6:40!  I heard the woman from whom I felt actively disliked say that the 12-step recovery program saved her life and suddenly I saw her as a delicate and brave being who was on her own journey to healing.  Why would she want to give me her energy?  I'm guessing that my needy energy felt invasive.  I GOT it - in a flash.  And later that day, we had a nice chat.  Never mind WHAT her journey is, but it's not mine.  Likewise, the energies of all the people that I deal with day to day in the city and take on are not mine to become absorbed and worried about.  It's a constant drain of energy to be so sporadic with one's energy.  Of course, there are loved ones of whom this is beautiful.  But, I'm talking about virtual strangers and my preoccupation with making sure all of the ts are crossed and is are dotted all the time with everything.  When we entertain, I want to make sure everyone is having a good time and then spend hours cleaning up until the wee hours of the morning.  So often, the night has passed and I haven't connected with anyone and don't want to trouble anyone to ask for help, but feel energetically depleted.  This was supposed to be fun; instead I feel exhausted and wonder why I can't enjoy my own parties.  Recently, a friend asked if he could host a dinner at our house a few days after we had a holiday party.  The thought of it made want to crumble, but I didn't want to say no.  Matt gently suggeted otherwise, so it passed without issue, but THAT is an example of my lack of boundaries with energy in order to appease, as well as my desire for making sure that everything is lined up just right.  My housemate calls me 'The Falcon' because I notice every little thing that's out of place all the time.  That can't be healthy.  I get that.  In a flash.

As I delved into why I care so much about everybody being satisfied to the point of my own exhaustion, I realized that I have a fear of rejection.  I want to be included.  I thought abut my past relationships with people and saw a pattern.  Is it true that we re-live the same cycles of behavior and experience again and again until we simply recognize the pattern, merge with it and then let it go?  This is what I was thinking about.  As a child, my older sister wanted nothing to do with me, but I thought she was the sun, moon and stars.  I never gave up.  I still haven't.  But, there is a distance the size of Montana between us.  In first grade, the kids made fun of me for being pulled out of class for speech therapy classes.  I liked the counselor and ended up becoming a speed reader and placed in the GATE (Gifted and Talented Education Program), but I never really felt like I was like the other kids.  In third grade, the cool girls allowed me into their makeup club only after I acquired enough makeup and a purse to give to them.  In fourth grade, we moved from Morgan Hill and I was suddenly the new girl in a 'city' school.  When I wore flip flops and a torn gunnysack dress to a school outing, the kids pointed and laughed and laughed.  My sister transformed me into a cool kid, with feathered hair and painted nails, in 5th grade, but then the older girls would 'bark' and 'woof woof' at me when I walked by.  In seventh grade, I used to run to the bus after school so that the 'hair bears' - chicks with feathered ratted hair up to the ceiling and heavily made up faces wouldn't beat me up:  "I'm gonna kick your ass, bendeha!"  My best friend from 4th to 7th grade didn't defend me when her new best friend threatened to kick my ass for flirting with her boyfriend by asking him questions about himself while we were sitting across the table from echother at a big group gathering.  Finally, 8th grade was a transfer year and it took a while, but I gradually was somewhat comfortable, although never quite.  It goes on and on...basically, I've lived my life repeating this pattern.  Even becoming a lawyer was to prove that I was as smart as the rest of my lawyering family.  In fact, I never wanted to be a lawyer.  What I wanted was to be liked, wanting to be accepted, but never feeling like I fit in anywhere.  It's truly a pattern of self torment, judgment and pain.  I saw this so clearly as I sat for hours just meditating on it.  Merging with it.  Will this, too, melt away?  I believe with ongoing focus and compassion that it will.

  

What do you think lies at the root of your illness?  Fruitless energy being expended and expended and self-created and expended again.  What does my body need to heal? Learning to trust in my own being, focusing on my root, tapping into connection with the natural awareness that we all have.  Flowing.  Much easier right now in a sanctuary in nature and healing, but surely being re-introduced and saturating into my body.  The left side - the feminine side - has been hurting.  I honor her welcome her and will slowly slowly nourish her/me back to health.

Grace.

Two nights ago, Krishna Das led a kirtan for the seven of us staying here.  It was rejuvenating and soulful to sing to the deities with a man of faith.  He is a beautiful soul and I am most grateful for his gift of song.

Grace.

Yesterday afternoon, as I finished my yoga, I took the below picture of the sky.  It seemed like Mother India was reaffirming the vast possibility that comes with rootedness --- expansion into a beautiful, boundless sky of...

Grace.

  

Musings of a Muddled Outcast Mind

The mornings here are black and misty and quiet.  I've been waking at 2:00 each morning and walking out onto my balcony to ease into the darkness.  There is total silence - not a bird, not a dog, not a person...it's the perfect sattvic time of day that the rishis claim is the best time to meditate.  Ommm.  The call to prayer wails through the darkness at the crest of dawn over a crackling loudspeaker answered by howling dogs and awakened birds.  As the sun rises, the birds' songs grow louder and the darkness slips into a patchwork of golden fleeced clouds aloft an ever brightening pearl blue sky.  This morning, I stood on top of the roof deck to greet the sun and lost myself in the jungle surround-sound.  True peace.

I'd been frustrated with myself for not getting over my jetlag, but the fact of the matter is that there's no schedule - no activities - nothing that I must do, so what does it matter?  This is the peace that is so very healing...a gift.  I wish all of us could access such a peaceful place.

And yet, I find ways to sabotage the peace.  Social life here.  I was feeling badly that no one had invited me on a walk and no one accepted my offers to do the same. I was wondering why I couldn't just make a friend like I so easily do back home.  I was reminded of my childhood with my older sister - of always trying to keep up with her and having her ditch me with her friends.  In truth, I feel that a very juvenile aspect of myself has come out and it's making me feel very excluded and very sad.  And so I go out alone during the day and explore.  Another gift to have this time and space to explore when and where I want to.  Yet, I wish I was not alone.  And then I remind myself that this is not a social vacation.  Perhaps I'm not bonding with someone because the POINT of being here is to go within and heal.  

This anxiety I have is a reflection of the monkey mind that rules my stress at home with my over-booked schedule and feelings that I'm never doing enough for my husband, friends, family, health or profession.  I remind myself that I took this one huge step to India because i'm making time for health.  And believe it or not, I think this psychological stuff resulting from social stresses has contributed to my dis-ease.  This self depracation for not being cool enough, healthy enough, smart enough, or for example disciplined enough to sleep in through my jetlag, creates so much stress and anxiety where it need not be.  For Christ's sake, I'm in paradise here!  I get the morning all to myself and it's the most pristine time of day.  What a gift!  I'm here at an ashram to really go within and heal myself - it's not about giving out to others in order to share external distractions of experiences.  I am grateful.  And yet, there's a child-part of me that wishes that the kids wanted to play with me.  But are they not on their own journeys?  I must respect that and not try to barge in just because I fear I'm missing out.  I must trust the flow, focus on myself and relax.  It is a practice.  And it is an important lesson to bring back home and maintain good health.

Relax.  The past three days, I've started the late mornings (6:30/7) with a warm sesame oil massage followed by an herbal 'bath' where hot water is poured over my body on the table in order to stimulate circulation and pull out the toxins- all provided with a prayer and a blessing.  Today was the beginning of a ghee treatment (also with a prayer and a blessing) that will last from 4-7 days and consists of drinking ghee in the morning followed by a sip of hot water every 30 minutes until I have porridge when I'm hungry, then rice and veggies for lunch and dinner.  This phase will be followed by three days of heat through a sweat box or a hose or hot water depending on my sensitivity.  MS can be exacerbated by heat (goodbye Burning Man; last year was really painful!).  I'll then do one day of purgation and thus complete the detox phase.  What happens thereafter is a mystery.  The treatments are undoubtedly sweet and nourishing and soulful healing.  I can't really put it into words.  The food is also:  it's fresh, homemade and hot.  We have idly, chapati, dhal, coconut chutney, mung beans, vegetables, perfectly seasoned sauces and occasionally chai.  Our water jugs are constantly refreshed with hot herbal water for drinking.  The devotion and attention to purity and healing in this place are remarkable.  I feel very, very we'll cared for here.  

Yesterday, I took a rickshaw for 30 minutes to a nearby town of Koppa in order to get SIM cards.  It was great to pass through the verdant foliage of these mountains.  The telephone headquarters was very Indian and I was shuttled from one office to another to another with my request.  Finally, I was placed at a desk of a very disgruntled man who seemed highly annoyed and was clearly going to take as long as possible to drag this out and make my life hell.  I decided to take a chance.  'What's your good name sir?" I asked.  "Gopal Krishna,' he muttered.  "Ah, a very good name, sir.  I know a song celebrating this name, would you like to hear it?'  He grunted with a sidelong, slightly incredulous look that melted into a half smile as I sung a mantra I know from bhakti yoga teacher training in 2007 (thanks Rusty Wells!).  It was as if the sun came out and lightened up his face and attitude.  Suddenly, I had an ally to wend through the red tape and countless forms that he insisted he fill out instead of I.  The engineer on the other side of the table started asking me about life in the States as he moved items around on a huge electronic switchboard that he said controlled all of the banks' telecommunications and ATM systems.  I could've just reached over from my chair and disconnected the Bank of Karnataka's phone system with one move.  So very Indian....  Anyway, he asked what the difference was between Indian and American attitudes.  I told him that my experience is that Indians live in a constant state of Spirit with their rituals and celebrations.  Spirituality is a big part of life here.  I didn't notice such a devotional spirit in American people.  He asked if I was Christian and seemed shocked when I said I didn't have an official religion, but that nature was my God and I believed in the Universal connectedness of everything.  To that:  the universal flow, he nodded and said 'Ah, yes, I understand your religion now.  This is why you sing in Sanskrit - the language of nature and Spirit.' 

After two hours, I hopped back into the rickshaw that I'd hired to take me to town and back and ran a few more errands around town.  The shopkeepers were friendly and I received subtle stares, but nothing was threatening or uncomfortable.  I found that I easily flowed into the crazy traffic of cows, people, rickshaws and cars as I crossed from one side of the street to the other.  A chai walla was hollering 'chai garam...' and the smell of fried pakoras made me lick my lips.. Everything was chaos and at the same time very easy.  Another difference to India.  I love this place.

I returned home in time to go to the neighborhood college's 50 year anniversary.  I knew it was happening b/c the ashram family told us and because the college decided to test their sound system at 2 in the morning - it worked very very well and they tested it for a good 30 minutes.  Only in India...a group of us went over together; the two ladies in saris were swarmed by admirers and they loved it!  The scene was epic.  Massive tents with colorful ceilings of Indian designs fluttered in the breeze as hundreds of children ran around in their best clothes with doting mothers and proud fathers.  The saris were stunning and the entire affair was over the top India.  Blaring loud music, colorful elaborate flower displays, garish flags, ornate designs and decorated walls and floors with deities planted here and there.  It was a celebration like no other for me- splendorous color! And of course the ever curious children practiced rote English questions and hovered around my chair.  I was with a nice lady from PA and we fantasized about breaking into a sychronized Bollywwod dance to go along with the music and the unwavering attention from our neighbors, but that didn't happen.

A couple of gypsies from Belarus arrived at the ashram and they were sick.  They disappeared into a room for some time and had their food delivered to them rather than joining in with our communal meals.  When the man finally joined the group for a meal, the ladies tried to make polite conversation with him, but he gave vague answers.  The next day, I almost backed into him at the sink and without thinking exclaimed, 'Ah, welcome back to the land of the living, it's nice to see you up and about.  You looked nearly dead when you arrived!'  He seemed amused.  I asked his name and he said 'Estas.'  'How funny,' I said - that's the one comeback that no one can respond to.  No matter what insult or accusation someone hurls at you, you can say 'You are!' and there it is.  He said, 'Estas, no estas, none of it is real anyway' and I decided he didn't want to be bothered with conversation.  Someone asked where he was from and he said 'nowhere' and he asked where I was from.  'San Francisco'.  'Ah,' he stroked his black goatee and flipped his scraggly long mane behind his copper gypsy vest, 'I've been there for some time, I passed through...' 'Yes, it's a small town, we may even know the same people,' I mused.  'I'll say just one name...Meriana Dinkova...yes?' I asked.  His smile broadened.  'Yes, Prachanti (her partner) just invited me to go on a medicine journey with him in Peru,' he said.  'Small world,' I winked.  It gave me some comfort that I could relate to a gypsy and call one person out of 750,000 that he knew.  I may have some magic to me yet even if I explore alone most of the time around here.  I call the woman he came with 'Surya' because she's always basking in the sun and doesn't say anything?  They're an intersting pair.  I heard from Dr Ashwin that he's a famous musician who just gave a tour and got sick.  He and Krishna Das have been bonding.  They keep to themselves.

Last night, Krishna Das showed me how to drive earplugs really deeply into my ears to sleep through the noises.  That was nice of him, but I still woke up at 2.  I used his technique this afternoon and drove the plugs in while pulling my ear up and out-whoosh-it goes deep.  As he said, I couldn't even hear my fingers snap.  It was a peaceful and quiet nap.  I hope that I don't damage my ears...

As for my health - when I'm tired and I go for a walk around this beautiful place for more than 25 minutes, my arm tightens.  But mostly, I don't feel anything - no knotting or tightening - and I feel that I've really dropped into this place.  I feel that all of this social weirdness that I'm experiencing is part of dropping in even deeper.  I hear that the ghee treatment pulls up a lot of toxic material that is both physical and emotional.  I certainly feel that today.  If part of the cause of my disease is stress and anxiety over everything, will not that arise during detox.  I learned from the Bhagavad Gita that the best way out of a busy mind is to focus on one's connection to God.  Since my God is nature, it's all coming together quite beautifully.  Healing starts with relaxing the mind and going with the flow.  Got it.

There's a part of me that think this blog may be too much of giving out of myself and that I may need to reel it in for a while; Stop putting out to externalities and just meditate on being, not doing.  So, if I take a hiatus, I'm detoxing....on many levels.  Allah Akbar!

Ayurvedic Flow

This is a place of healing.  And it's surreal.  Far through the KK forest is a sweet little complex with a family that tends to foreigners via panchakarma.  There are all women here - about 10 with just one man - Krishna Das.  Yes, that one.  He hasn't sung a note since we've been here.  I asked him the one word to help integrate the lessons of India into life in the west:  Ram.  And Love.  I can dig that.

I still don't feel that I'm totally here to be honest.  There is the woo woo bird in the morning accompanied by the birds of the surrounding jungle, a snake slithers across the property at times - could be a king cobra, could be a gopher snake, tigers in the jungle that I haven't heard, but know they're there, the honking sounds of cars in the distance water being drawn from the well, roosters crowing and puja bells and low chants in the distance overwhelmed by the mosque's call to prayer echoing through dawn and sunset.  This is India.  I'm back.  And this time, in a jungle in an ashram for one purpose:  ayurveda.

I arrived two afternoons ago after a travelling marathon that ended with three hours in a taxi that drove through hair-bend turns honking and nearly careening into every passing bus and truck on a one-lane road.  Yep, right back to India.  I calmed myself by sizing up his age of roughly 40 and the ease with which he careened past gigantic TaTa trucks with never a tremor.  There's an art to Indian drivers - truly - honking to let you now that you're coming up behind you, or around a blind corner, or alongside a car, or to tell people or cart drivers that they're about to walk into your line of fire.  I remember someone telling me when I first moved into an apartment near Chinatown in San Francisco that rather than fighting the tide of people bustling through the streets, that one merely needed to surrender to the flow like a river.  My ability to walk through Chinatown without getting frustrated greatly diminished at that point.  It's similar in India - the drivers miss each other within millimeters, it seems, but there's an overwhelming flow (with honking)  to the drivers in this country.  It's nice to remind oneself of that when a passenger on these roads.  Nonetheless, to say I was relieved to get out of the car once we finally arrived was an understatement.

This is my second morning here.  Yesterday morning, I met with dr. Ashwin for an interview.  It ended up being a philosophical spiritual physics talk about life and the expectations that we have for ourselves.  He told me that my sadness is a sign of maturity.  That mature people have sadness because they've experienced so much.  And that my diagnosis is something much larger than me that plays into the vast realm of the incomprehenible.  The more disciplined we come to actually relax into the rhythms of the universe, the more able we are to heal our bodies.  He said that this is a healing place for me and that while he can not promise a cure for my MS nor guarantee that I'll get pregnant, 'we'll see.'  The first step is the commitment and you are here.'  I'm here.  I told him that there must be grace in illness and he agreed - everything that happens is divine interplay.  Do I want to surrender to this flow too?  Is that why the Indians handle chaos with such ease?  Is that why a part of me felt at home when I looked at Indians and smiled at them to receive a soulful and heartfelt greeting smile back.  There is a vibrance, a rhythm, a natural flow here that is like nowhere else on earth.  It's very easy for me to say this from my refuge in the jungle, but honestly, even in the airports there was an ease to which we all related that I truly loved.  It felt like my song and I was dropping into the rhythm with my special instrument.

Ive had two treatments thus far.  Two abhyangas - full body warm sesame oil massages and one ??? of hot herb water poured over my body.  It feels like heaven.  The doctor says I need another day of this combinatin to ground down my energy.  Indeed, my dreams are restless and I wake at 3am and then again at 4:30 am.  My dreams re frenetic and plentiful.  Last night I dreamt that I was pregnant with the baby of a professor who was proud to wal around with me and so very in love with me and the baby.  It was beautiful.  The night before, I dreamt that I had a lovely home.  These are nice dreams, and yet I also have this anxiety when I awake.  The sore throat that I wake up with belies the dis-ease with which I sleep.  I wake at least four times a night with an urge to pee and coax myself back to sleep.  This may be just a term of getting grounded.  I look forward to being there.

My first morning here, three of us went to a puja for a woman named Jen at the  Shiva temple.  She had previously asked the swami for a blessing for her travels and he told her to come back the next day for a puja.  And so we went - she brought a bag of fruit and a bag of yellow flower garlands.  The doors to the shiva lingham encased in the inner chamber were open and the shiva lingham was being washed and oiled and decorated with flowers by the chanting priest in yellow.  Fruits and notes and flowers were offered by villagers before they circled the shrine three times and then did three circles standing in one place before prostrating themselves to the ground, rising and awaiting a blessing - some flowers or pepper on the head - from the priest.  The puja lasted about an hour and the priest chanted the entire time.  He blessed the fruit and gave it to Jen.  During the ceremony, I also circled the shrine, including the adjoining one of Sati.  Here was the place where she burned to death because her father would not accept her husband Shiva into the family.  Legends are that she self combusted in deep meditation or that her father threw her into the fire for her insolence.  Shiva was so devastated that he reached into the flames and took her out, reviving her as Parvati - his main consort who had parents that did approve of Shiva.  Anyway, there was the shrine for Parvati in an even smaller chamber but she was more beautifully adorned with flowers and fruits than the lingham.  I gave her shrine special love because of the great power of women to withstand fire and come out stronger and more full of grace than ever.  Jen certainly felt blessed by India on this New Year's Day and I felt like I was in a dream of sorts.  Not quite grounded.

Indeed, the first day I woke up in India there was nearly a full moon and it was Indian New Year.  Whatever one starts on that day is strongly empowered with intention of the universe.  I tried to meditate that evening, but was still so discombobulated.  In fact, I was HERE in India at an ashram to heal and find grace in the rhythm of the universe.  I was participating.  I am here.  Even though the details of meditation in that moment weren't perfect, I was here.  That's what mattters.  Bit by bit, I recapture my practice...of self love, health, meditation, yoga and ealth.  The perspectives of India that I have are so deeply held by me.  I love this country.  I love this place.  There is something so familiar and healing and inviting here.  I've returned to partake and contribute again, but this time I'm learning to interpose them into my life in the west.  Integration.  Ram. Love.   

Northern Journey

'Wake up, Madam, wake up!,' I heard as I was jostled out of my middle-seat substandard plane napping fog.  'It's the Northern Lights!,' 'take a look.'  She beckoned me out of my seat and invited me to kneel next to her and peer out of the emergency exit row window at the massive splendor of the Northern Lights.  Vast billows of morphing white-green trails eclipsed the night sky as they swirled above white snow caps of the North Pole for as far as the eye could see.  It was a dream come true.  'I've always wanted to see the Northern Lights,' I exclaimed.  'Thanks so much for waking me...how did you know?' 'You were so excited that we were going over the North Pole that I thought you might appreciate seeing this, too.'  Indeed, I had earlier asked that she wake me when we passed over the North Pole; when will I ever pass over the North Pole again?  She remembered.  She acted on it.  It was so special.  Emirates service gets a top rating from me, for sure.  

How can I explain how lucky and blessed I felt to be gazing upon two other-worldly phenomenons simultaneously?  I sat at that window for 20 minutes in awe of the swirling Aurora Borealis.  It lit up the sky like nothing I'd ever seen before and was ever shifting, arching and reaching into a vast abyss of darkness all around it.  Limitless.  Perhaps I'm projecting  a bit here....but, as the middle seat occupant squashed for 16 hours between two business exectives (Aussie global construction firm self-described 'paper pusher'and a displaced Syrian working for an Italian oil and gas company in Quatar), the sight of such expansiveness, grace and beauty was a dream come true.  Aussie looked out his window seat window and Quatar took a glance, but was more interested in pacing around the plane to manage his nicotine withdrawls.  When both of us had returned to our seats, he  told me that his family is still in Syria and he can't get them out.  He hasn't been back for five years.  'Nothing is safe there,' he said 'it's the problems of Iran and Russia brought to our people.' 'But, it's hopeless.  Hopeless.'  I told him how sorry I was and we sat there in silence for some time.  No wonder he smokes.  

The landing in Dubai was very smooth.  The airport is something out of a futuristic sci-fi film - like an elegant, gleaming space-palace with wings of opulent duty free stores, waterfalls, life-sized holographic shieks who spring to life and welcome you to Dubai as you walk past his station, black burkas and glittering wrists, heavily made arabic eyes, old indians in saris and younger ones in cardigans - men pushing past or walking right in front of me with barely a glance, children of every color of every nation running alongside their travel-weary parents and a rainbow of cultures passing by on their ways to more options of flights and restaurants and shops and lounges (three floors and three giant terminals of them) than I've ever seen in any one airport.  I have an 8.5 hour layover, so decided to walk around the airport. Terminal A is a glittering jewel of this airport.  I haven't the audacity to sneak into the business class lounges on the second floor, but I see beautiful furniture and lights from below.  The entire airport is inside what looks like a giant glass tunnel with floors that are so clean that they sparkle the lights from above off of them.  This place is immaculate!  There are so many people and yet not a stain to be seen.  This all comes at a price.  I checked out the price of a massage in the spa and it's too much money.  I checked out the price of a hotel room and it's $70 USD/hour -- too much money.  I found a lounge that is $50 USD for 4 hrs including food, but I don't really see the point since there's no guarantee of a recliner chair and I got a free meal voucher from Emirates for waiting so long.  Another point for Emirates, btw!  I'm presently so tired that I may check out a sleep cube depending on the price, or try to find an open seat that reclines.  To lie down just now would be great.  The sleep cube store looks like the entrance to Madame Tussaud's - it's dark and touristic looking and beckons people to a dark chamber with white shaky chalk writing promising 'SLEEP' 'REST' 'RELAX' - but where are these cubes?  I'll have to check this out.  The most mysterious offering that I've seen yet in the airport.

Already, I've been befriended by a lady from Mumbai and a man from Ethiopia - both of whom I keep running into.  They have nice, pleasant ways about them.  And then I see a woman with downcast eyes and a husband with razor thin lips and glaring eyes.  Then I see a buff American with a t-shirt and women in shorts talking loudly in American accents.  I see military looking men in and out of uniform - you can just tell looking at the...I hear the lyrical rhythms of Arabic mixed with hindi from bobbing heads.  There are beeps and babies' cries and lovely women inviting you to try their restaurant as you walk by.  I'm eating indian food just now and there is a huge line coiled around the next-door McDonald's.  None of the other restaurants in the three terminals that I've just explored has this many people.  They are not very American loooking, but they sure love McDs.  One middle eastern young man was eating a Big Mac and wearing a t-shirt that said 'Hollister Surfers.'   I wonder if he knows that Hollister is a land-locked dustbowl with prolific orchards just south of Gilroy.  Surfing.  Really?  

I walked past the Emirates Airlines-sponsored business lounge that had pictures of the Kiwi boat that they sponsored in the America's Cup.  The next wing over was plastered with Oracle all over the escalators.  I wondered whether I should try to say that I'm from San Francisco and that Larry (Ellison) gave me permission to use the fancy lounge upstairs for a few hours.  But I'm too tired for trickery just now.  So, I'll leave you with this picture of the Northern Lights over ice flows that looks very similar to what I saw on my way over (minus the trees).  Auspicious, mystical, rare, exotic, commercialized, overwhelming and so very different from home...

Next stop - Bangalore.  I hope I make my connecting flight to Mangalore (90 minutes to get through customs and to the domestic terminal) and can meet the ashram-arranged driver at the airport.  Just about 15 more hours of journeying to go before I'm safely at the ashram. Oh, but what a journey it is on the way over...    

On my way...

Tomorrow is the day that I will return to India.  The Facebook world has been notified and I will leave most technology behind me as I return to the magic of India.  What a rush...

Monday Morning

I found my eastern path.  A friend, Hrimati Fauman, suggested that I try panchakarma with her teacher in India.  I looked into the price - at $40/day, it's quite affordable - and the doctor is highly regarded.  I learned that my yoga teacher, Scott Blossom, and my meditation teacher, Chandra Easton went there for a month of panchakarma with their children.  Their shadow yoga master teachers went there for PK all the way from Australia.  My tantric philosophy teacher, Dharmanidi Saraswati and his wife have gone there for PK from Thailand.  Panchakarma is a cleanse, a detox, a rejuvenation.  It lowers my baseline of toxins that I'm living with, brings back the practice of yoga and meditation and restores my body to its natural balance.  I'm clearly out of balance and before I start copaxone, I'm going to be as healthy as I can then start the western treatment with a thriving body that remembers discipline and follows good health and diet practices.

So...the ticket is purchased, visa application submitted, reservation made.  I am going to the ashram arogyaniketana.com in Karnataka - it's in a forest, unpolluted, isolated, pure.  If Frace is to be found, I believe that panchakarma is the best way to find it, feel it, live it, transmit it.  I sit here this morning with my beloved husband.  This morning, I woke up and clung to him like a barnacle as he slowly shifted into waking mode.  When he awoke, I cried and cried in anticipation of missing him.  'It's our last Monday together,' I wailed.  He smiled and held me.  I knew I was being dramatic, but was so sad to be leaving him for over 40 days.  It's easy in moments like this to forget that the reason I'm going is for my own health.

Now that I've gotten mostly better with some residual 'souvenirs', it would be easy to delude myself that I'll be fine.  And at the same time, the tightness and tingles are like a small army - legionaires- that remind me - 'not yet, not yet - there is work to do' ... and so I return to my health.  I'll bring down the baseline and trust that the practices will bring Grace to all of this.

This New Year's Eve, we went to Mt Madonna in Watsonville.  Baba Hari Dass, my guruji was not present.  He has had a stroke and the onset of dementia.  The sangha did a ritual of farewell for him on New Year's Day.  Five years prior to the day he gave me shaktipat in that very room.  At the time, I was a skeptical litigator who couldn't feel a mind body connection with spirit.  I felt so trapped and angry.  When he gave me shaktipat, I felt light energy go through me and I knew that I could actually tap into something brighter and more vibrant.  I didn't know how, but trusted that if I merged with my pain and kept a strong mind that my spiritual path would unfurl.  Just as he said it would.  And so my path has been unfurling.  Five years later,  it was a complete circle to let him go and thank him within that great sangha.  And my husband got to experience that place and all the love for Babaji - what a blessing to share such a place and feeling with him.  I am reminded to recapture my practice that has languished.  A practice that I first felt possible for me in Babaji's presence on the first day of 2007. He advised in the past that if you've lost your practice, start over as a beginner.

I start over as a beginner.  It's like leaving your home to travel and learn something new.  Its exciting and scary and difficult to leave the things and people that you so love at home.  Yet, I am blessed.  I have had dancing and dining and laughter and hiking with so many lovely friends and family.  I've seen pregnant grey whales travelling south and super pods of dolphins leaping through the air while sea lions jump again and again through the water astride otters feasting from their bellies.  Yesterday, I watched as the wind blew the top of the calm Pacific tides around rocks from on high.  It looked like a zen rock garden with rippled wave around the calm stone.  There is beauty everywhere.

There are great forces that have colluded to get me here:  my mother with her financial support, my cousin with his generous gift of an i-pad mini with which to blog while in India.  He said, 'you're not supposed to write until you're 40.  Now you're 40 and you must write about your life - you do so many interesting things.' And so I will.  Thank you Earl.  Thank you Nancy.  Thank you sweet husband, Matthew Freedman for five zillion wrap-ups to see me through and your undying support.  I love you I love you I love you.