One week back from Burning Man, the great annual fire arts pilgrimage into the desert of Pyramid Lake. SO many dimensions to describe: Black Rock City, the people, the art, the culture, the setting, the scope, the panorama... The power of this event-full event emerges from nothing but creative inspiration and becomes a synergistic, extra-ordinary and magical journey for tens of thousands of Burners:
How does Black Rick City and the Playa inspire, encourage and elicit so much radical amazement in its citizens?
On the Playa, magic really happens: synchronicities, synergies, co-incidences abound (in fact, as i wrote this, the word co-incidence was just spoken in the movie "it might get loud" )!! The setting, the context, the scope, the survival requirements, the generosity spirit, the beauty,... No cell phones, no money exchanged, no car keys, no computers... these are some of the elements that bring out the best in us Burners! My experience for long stretches of time was the sense that ... "it just keeps getting better" and... this is manna from heaven, it tastes like however we might imagine! One experience or encounter completes, and another amazing connection or scene spawns and evolves. One awesome moment morphs into the next, and its just as good. The morphogenetic fields that are generated by radical openness and co-creative engagement generate increasing generosity. That's how it works, as far as i can tell! As we are fed the manna of the Playa, we nourish and are nourished by each others acts of beauty, generosity, openness and love. Instead of closing off to the other, we open and are fed; we feed and feel, in simple acts of giving, an expansive generosity of spirit.
I offered workshops for men and women on the sacred masculine, the mature masculine and intimacy. The conversations and experiences were rich. For myself, the opportunity to step up into leadership of the sacred spaces village "third chakra solar masculine temple" became a brilliant moment in my life. The receptivity and responsiveness was deeply gratifying. There was one moment where a group of 35+ men in our temple dome were in 100% consensus that we each felt valued/valuable on the Playa. Not a dissenting voice! And we felt valued because we were all giving what we had to offer and being received. Its simple: see what needs to be done and do it, offer what you can when the time is right, and receive what is being offered to you without an exchange obligation, i.e. the need to reciprocate. My quivers are full of medicine arrows and i am not alone in that!
The beauty of burning man is astounding: radiant faces, dusty hair, open eyes allowing depth of contact, costume/adornment creativity, inventive structures/ domes/ sculptures/ bicycles/ art cars... bicycle paradise... events like monkey chanting, massage, workshops, healings... all night dancing and some of the the best sound systems in the world... sunrises and sunsets with the desert mountains as backdrop, double rainbows... a metropolis lit up at night in all kinds of crazy-inventive ways,... fire arts performances and sculptures that inspire and ignite the soul... all of this and more makes for an unparalleled variety of experiences, encounters and heart/mind/body/soul openings.
Just wanted to give a taster of a description of why i make the annual pilgrimage. Every journey is unique: each year the adventure burns into my soul, deepens my happiness, peace and overall life satisfaction. It is Manna from heaven, this thing called Burning man. I feel completely filled and am grateful beyond belief.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Meditation as an intimate path
The practice of meditation and the capacities therein are directly related to our ability to establish, deepen and sustain intimacy in our lives. What is more essential to authentic relationship than tuning into our own heart, listening more deeply to our own voice and intuition, cultivating a peaceful surrender and developing our capacity to witness our own and another's true nature?
Turning our consciousness inwards is a basic ingredient in being able to listen, hold, respect and attend to another. Intimate relating can falter on the rocks of not being able to stay in tune with, and "hold onto", oneself. Feeling trapped, suffocated or overwhelmed by the other's intensity reflects an incapacity to hold energy, to ground one's own being, to listen objectively and to speak intersubjectively.
As I quiet my mind and find a greater calm within the chaordic turbulence of life's ebb and flow, I develop an ability to listen deeply to what is, to ground myself in my own sensate experience, to ask deeper questions and and find insight into who i am and what my purposes and intentions are. This is essential to being intimate with another. Gnosis: self-knowing. How else can we possibly attend to another without losing oneself and in an authentic way?
I can then listen to another as a vessel, as an openness, as a container that can behold the similarities and resonances between us while respecting the differences. I can then speak from a place of knowing rather than guessing. I can speak with a sensitivity to the other's capacities for taking in my self-revealing, sensing into the way my revelations are "landing" in the other, an experience of inter-subjective, I-Thou, relatedness.
Intimacy is so much more than sex: tho' sex is a great way to experience and express and deepen intimacy, it can also be an avoidance on some levels of true vulnerability and soulful contact. The two, sex and intimacy, are not exactly the same... more on this in another blog...
your thoughts currently on intimacy??
Turning our consciousness inwards is a basic ingredient in being able to listen, hold, respect and attend to another. Intimate relating can falter on the rocks of not being able to stay in tune with, and "hold onto", oneself. Feeling trapped, suffocated or overwhelmed by the other's intensity reflects an incapacity to hold energy, to ground one's own being, to listen objectively and to speak intersubjectively.
As I quiet my mind and find a greater calm within the chaordic turbulence of life's ebb and flow, I develop an ability to listen deeply to what is, to ground myself in my own sensate experience, to ask deeper questions and and find insight into who i am and what my purposes and intentions are. This is essential to being intimate with another. Gnosis: self-knowing. How else can we possibly attend to another without losing oneself and in an authentic way?
I can then listen to another as a vessel, as an openness, as a container that can behold the similarities and resonances between us while respecting the differences. I can then speak from a place of knowing rather than guessing. I can speak with a sensitivity to the other's capacities for taking in my self-revealing, sensing into the way my revelations are "landing" in the other, an experience of inter-subjective, I-Thou, relatedness.
Intimacy is so much more than sex: tho' sex is a great way to experience and express and deepen intimacy, it can also be an avoidance on some levels of true vulnerability and soulful contact. The two, sex and intimacy, are not exactly the same... more on this in another blog...
your thoughts currently on intimacy??
Saturday, March 20, 2010
poison oak awakening
this past week i found myself exploring the kinesthetic sensations of a toxic oil/heat rash. Quite an adventure and an education! Having ignored any signs that there might be poison oak vines in the field i was helping to clear, the arrogance of my denial was overcome by the fire-plants inflammatory touch. As it dawned on me, over the next few days, and I realized what had scraped and seeped and licked and inflicted its way into my dermis, i began to explore a world of raw sensation we don't usually get initiated into (fortunately!) The intensity of burning; the ferocity of an irresistable urge to scratch and claw and rub and soothe; the virulently firing nerves on and just below the usual protective surface of skin; the experimentation with a variety of remedies, homeopathic, allopathic, drying, cooling, moisturizing,... all of this provided a fantastically unusual experience with going thru something i wouldn't have chosen but received anyway!
what does poison oak teach? Some say: boundaries. to respect the gates of the forest. to be awake and look, to pay attention to our movements in the field. to recognize the shadow of nature as well as its beauty and light.
a friend of mine, Ronda Mikolaitis, died this past year. She was an ardent nature lover, leading wilderness hikes for years before, ironically, she contracted lymes disease from the very goddess she loved! Nature is Kali, bestower and destroyer. Transformer. Not just benevolent. Earthquakes and tornadoes and fires and tsunamis and ... poison oak. admire and respect. beauty and power. arrogance does not do. we will get humbled before what is much greater than us.
some patches of skin now feel lizard like. i allow myself the pleasure of hot showers, of cool baths with oatmeal, the anti-itch creams and gels have offered some relief, the heavy hitting cortisone and steroidal creams have subdued the hyper-activated immune system reactivity, aloe juice cools, ice cools, the pleasure/pain sensations of scratching have been, at moments, blissful and ecstatic! I'd say this has been a remarkable ride, making the most of the immense discomfort that has arisen this past week. I have hung out and expanded/deepened with some friends, seen #30 clients and 3 movies, played bughouse chess, hosted rhythm matrix at tranquility salon and, this morning Equinox, sat with Adyashanti and a non-duality sangha at satsang,... and now write this. I feel totally blessed, moving through and beyond the nasty curse of the plant into relief.
the I Ching reading I found myself called to is #30 FIRE. sun and moon cling to the sky; plants cling to the earth. Clinging to what is right with double illumination (fire above, fire below) develops the world. as the 3rd yang reads, in the fire of the setting sun, either you drum on a jug and sing, or you sigh the lament of the elderly, which is unfortunate. image: how long can the fire of the setting sun last? needless to say, this P.O. process has been illuminating! and fortunately, intensity subsides and resolves into regenerative healing. so I feel graced.
Adya spoke this morning of embracing all, resisting nothing. I smiled during his entire talk. what is difficult wants to be accepted by us. to resist reality is futile; reality always wins! this week i have been granted the kind of experience that fulfills this principle. accepting what is, including the discomfort, calms the inflammatory/ reactive tendencies in our system.
How can you relate to this? what have you been resisting that needs to be met? are you ready to let go of your lament? I am.
what does poison oak teach? Some say: boundaries. to respect the gates of the forest. to be awake and look, to pay attention to our movements in the field. to recognize the shadow of nature as well as its beauty and light.
a friend of mine, Ronda Mikolaitis, died this past year. She was an ardent nature lover, leading wilderness hikes for years before, ironically, she contracted lymes disease from the very goddess she loved! Nature is Kali, bestower and destroyer. Transformer. Not just benevolent. Earthquakes and tornadoes and fires and tsunamis and ... poison oak. admire and respect. beauty and power. arrogance does not do. we will get humbled before what is much greater than us.
some patches of skin now feel lizard like. i allow myself the pleasure of hot showers, of cool baths with oatmeal, the anti-itch creams and gels have offered some relief, the heavy hitting cortisone and steroidal creams have subdued the hyper-activated immune system reactivity, aloe juice cools, ice cools, the pleasure/pain sensations of scratching have been, at moments, blissful and ecstatic! I'd say this has been a remarkable ride, making the most of the immense discomfort that has arisen this past week. I have hung out and expanded/deepened with some friends, seen #30 clients and 3 movies, played bughouse chess, hosted rhythm matrix at tranquility salon and, this morning Equinox, sat with Adyashanti and a non-duality sangha at satsang,... and now write this. I feel totally blessed, moving through and beyond the nasty curse of the plant into relief.
the I Ching reading I found myself called to is #30 FIRE. sun and moon cling to the sky; plants cling to the earth. Clinging to what is right with double illumination (fire above, fire below) develops the world. as the 3rd yang reads, in the fire of the setting sun, either you drum on a jug and sing, or you sigh the lament of the elderly, which is unfortunate. image: how long can the fire of the setting sun last? needless to say, this P.O. process has been illuminating! and fortunately, intensity subsides and resolves into regenerative healing. so I feel graced.
Adya spoke this morning of embracing all, resisting nothing. I smiled during his entire talk. what is difficult wants to be accepted by us. to resist reality is futile; reality always wins! this week i have been granted the kind of experience that fulfills this principle. accepting what is, including the discomfort, calms the inflammatory/ reactive tendencies in our system.
How can you relate to this? what have you been resisting that needs to be met? are you ready to let go of your lament? I am.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Navigating Intimacy
i am contemplating intimacy in depth these days. wondering about essential ingredients in the processes of cultivating and deepening authentic connection and sustaining profound, embodied, essential contact. when I asked my FB friends to chime in on the subject of intimacy, this is what we came up with:
openness. curiosity. inquiry. dropping defenses. vulnerability. honesty. a sensing of resonance. mutuality. respect. authenticity. responsiveness. willingness. a sense of humor. playfulness. allowing. surrendering.
what is essential to you in being deeply intimate? How do you create and cultivate intimacy in your life?
to me, intimacy, like a good conversation, is a spiritual practice, involving deepening consciousness with/in oneself and may, as an advanced spiritual, sexual and developmental practice, engage another being in a way that greatly expands and deepens heart and soul. As a partnership path, the potential, synergy, activation, co-creativity abounds with possibility. Yet intimacy can also often go awry. What begins with a passionate start can fall off the cliff! Intimacy can grow into intense conflict, a sense of entrapment, a sense of betrayal and loss of the promised land! How does that happen? How can we both avoid the pitfalls and optimize the potentials for growth??
that/this is what I am dedicated to studying and presenting on these pages.
A good friend, Samantha Sweetwater, had her birthday party the other evening. One thing she said is that she "starts with how she doesn't really know the other". That is radical openness. I like that as a starting and a returning place in authentic relating: Not knowing who the other is. Not labeling them, categorizing them, defining them. So easy to control our worlds by naming, projecting, assuming, limiting and otherwise not see the others true self! We falsify ourselves with our ego identities, lose ourselves and lose sight of who the other is. Our relating then becomes rote, superficial, constructed.
Defining an intimate moment too soon can stifle its growth. "Premature relationalization" is what i am calling that tendency to define something before its time. In the phase of early dating it can be wise to refrain from such stifling practices as: talking about other relationships, talking about other people, talking about relationship(s) at all!
In middle phases of relationship, commitment does of course come into play. Deep intimacy requires a strong container. Relationship agreements, sexual dynamics, emotional needs all need to be negotiated. Our question is: how do we create an optimal holding environment that is neither too restrictive nor too loose?
more on this subject soon...
please leave comments on what interests you!!
be well, be intimate with life! Practice being openness!
see into yourself deeply and into those you chose to be intimate with.
openness. curiosity. inquiry. dropping defenses. vulnerability. honesty. a sensing of resonance. mutuality. respect. authenticity. responsiveness. willingness. a sense of humor. playfulness. allowing. surrendering.
what is essential to you in being deeply intimate? How do you create and cultivate intimacy in your life?
to me, intimacy, like a good conversation, is a spiritual practice, involving deepening consciousness with/in oneself and may, as an advanced spiritual, sexual and developmental practice, engage another being in a way that greatly expands and deepens heart and soul. As a partnership path, the potential, synergy, activation, co-creativity abounds with possibility. Yet intimacy can also often go awry. What begins with a passionate start can fall off the cliff! Intimacy can grow into intense conflict, a sense of entrapment, a sense of betrayal and loss of the promised land! How does that happen? How can we both avoid the pitfalls and optimize the potentials for growth??
that/this is what I am dedicated to studying and presenting on these pages.
A good friend, Samantha Sweetwater, had her birthday party the other evening. One thing she said is that she "starts with how she doesn't really know the other". That is radical openness. I like that as a starting and a returning place in authentic relating: Not knowing who the other is. Not labeling them, categorizing them, defining them. So easy to control our worlds by naming, projecting, assuming, limiting and otherwise not see the others true self! We falsify ourselves with our ego identities, lose ourselves and lose sight of who the other is. Our relating then becomes rote, superficial, constructed.
Defining an intimate moment too soon can stifle its growth. "Premature relationalization" is what i am calling that tendency to define something before its time. In the phase of early dating it can be wise to refrain from such stifling practices as: talking about other relationships, talking about other people, talking about relationship(s) at all!
In middle phases of relationship, commitment does of course come into play. Deep intimacy requires a strong container. Relationship agreements, sexual dynamics, emotional needs all need to be negotiated. Our question is: how do we create an optimal holding environment that is neither too restrictive nor too loose?
more on this subject soon...
please leave comments on what interests you!!
be well, be intimate with life! Practice being openness!
see into yourself deeply and into those you chose to be intimate with.
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