Rhishikesh, India
I decided in Buddhist Camp that the body is a container for the mind (soul) and the Ego is a container for them both.
As Leanne, my spiritual guidance counselor in LA would say - we can't actually be rid of the Ego. It is necessary in creating this reality we are in.
... But we can step back and observe
"Aham Sakshahi" - I am the eternal witness
What an amazing process this life is... of unwinding... stepping back... unwinding... stepping back... just to observe.
My meditation teacher kept saying that.
"Just Observe."
I wrote a poem wherein I say "well maybe i don't want to just observe. Sitting on the sidelines sucks sometimes."
But i met my ego twice yesterday and both times, like a rooster with its tail feathers spread and sticking up... I had to remind myself to step down and observe the habits, the tendencies, and the strands of deeper me it pulled on.
First was yoga...
It was the first day of a teacher training at that particular ashram (unbeknownst to me).... They of course took my drop in money and shuffled me through the building to my class.
After one full hour of Surya Namaskaram A - disecting how to do a Chatturunga (a pose i have done nearly one million times over the last ten years) - I found myself standing on my mat, arms crossed tight at my chest, one hip cocked out to the side with a bitchy, sour, "oh. my. god. becky." face on me...
I stepped back from my skin - from my ego contracting around that moment and from the moment itself.
It was as though someone tipped a glassy lake on its side and showed me my reflection through a watery rippling surface.
i saw me.
WHOA! yuck! i thought to myself, "what is your PROBLEM zani!? you're supposed to be a yogini and a teacher - you never practice chair pose or baddha konasana (a master of avoidance you are) and now here you stand SCOFFING at an opportunity to go slow and re-learn important things. WHAT a bitch you are!"
i stepped back again.
The lake tipped up and there i was with my fists clenched and furrowed forehead, grinding my teeth... beating myself up... contracting back the other way.
I closed my eyes
Dropped my arms to my side
Relaxed my face and jaw and the muscles around my eyes
and i hummed inside my head the first bit of "san francisco" by the Mowgli's:
"i've been in love with love and the idea of something binding us together you know that love is strong enough..."
Aaron and I have been singing that little diddy all over Indida.
I let the love i felt for life both here and in India and California too expand out form me...
loosening the grip of the ego around me.
I let everything drop to the floor.
I Rolled up my yoga mat, bowed and smiled to the teacher and skipped out of the studio smiling at the lesson.
I wrote poetry in my head on the walk home.
After a chai and a coconut cookie (or three) - Aaron told me that it was time or my 3rd guitar lesson. (and this is pretty much my 3rd lesson ever)
Aaron is a legit teacher and teaches me for an hour - strong and teacher-y, he doesn't let me fudge over stuff like the dreaded correct strumming. He is definitely challanging me.
KAW-KAW-KAWWWWWWWWWWWW. The rooster fluffed its feathers.
To our credit, Aaron has taught me Blackbird by the Beatles in one week, which is pretty inticate finger picking. But i love love love fingerpicking.
I f you play the guitar and re in my life, i'm fairly sure i've propositioned you to sit n the edge of my bed and play "finger-picky guitar" while i fall asleep.
(snapshot of 8 years i spent married to the finger picky master jamie.
...I would use an obnoxious baby voice and say ' play my song! play my song' clapping my hands together.
Running (imagine a lullaby of strings plucked in perfect soothing beauty)
'everything's fine today. everything's fine and dandy. i'm with you. life is so simple ya, livin out such freedom. ya i love you too. running. ya you know that i am running to you cuz you want me and i want you.'
I spent all my life handing the guitar over and saying "ooh! play such-and-such" for us.
My father, my ex-husband, Mikey & the Mowgli's...
I never lived in a home without a professional musician.
There was no need to learn.
Before I left for Indonesia, Joshua John-Michael Hogan, my sweetest spirit-sharing partner in awesome and inspiration to be good and kind and also tenderly fearless... he gave me one of his guitars. A black takamini that I had played around in our house we all shared (the OM hOMe).
He spray painted it and puffy painted it special for me and made me promise i'd learn on the island.
I have since figured out bits and pieces and i wrote a few songs i played for Baba Glass, the first night at Shanti Guesthouse in Varanasi. This is what prompted real guitar lessons.
I am actually learning now and i'm terrified.
I get unbelievable frustrated and then abusive to myself, shocked that i can't play perfectly, flawlessly, immediately.
"you set your standards SO ridiculously high, Zani. It's not fair." Aaron said to me last night - creeping his compassionate eyes closer to mine in the cold candlelit courtyard.
"this is your third lesson and you have Blackbird down. That song takes most people a year. why do you expect to be perfect at everything immediately?"
I pulled back and observed my tendencies (this is exactly what i do with surfing too)...
I don't give myself the option of being a beginner. I surround myself by geniuses - masters of their craft - and then i insist on being at their level or else not trying at all....
I'd rather not even attempt to be good then to end up mediocre at something.
Scottish Mikey asked "DO you think you surround yourself by geniuses to give yourself an excuse not to have to try?"
whoa.
I want to be the master of every craft, but there is just not enough time in the day... so i have to chose what i put my mind to.
Aaron reminded me how writing, yoga & dancing are like Blackbird. On Lock.
Guitar & surfing are gonna take some time and dedication, like a new song - i need to put in the same amount of hours i've spent writing, dancing and practicing yoga (an exhausting prospect even to think about)
But i do-si-do'd with my ego twice last night and finally found myself lying in bed - my chattarunga muscles aching, my left fingertips calloused and my mind detached...
watching.
observing how lucky i am to be alive and to have something to work towards.
I'm (probably) not going to play guitar like a professional musician tomorrow and that's okay.
I'm here and that's good.
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