That which defeats everyone else will be the thing that defines you.
One-Line Wonders, Part III
April 5th, 2010Marble, Smoke Monsters, and the Texture of Your Mind
April 5th, 2010So last week Boyfriend and I were in the car for a brief junket to PA when I posited an innocent-enough question: What is the texture of your mind?
Almost without hesitation, the answer came: Marble.
I found this absolutely fascinating, and also totally consistent with Boyfriend’s character on more levels than he could have possibly foreseen. Marble is cool and smooth and elegant; it carries with it a certain sophistication. But marble also has soft spots that can turn into fissures when a bit of pressure is applied, and when the cracks sneak deep down inside the block, it can break open at the seam like the earth after a quake. A mind like marble knows something about itself, something about its stubborn streak and sweet soul.
It was a case of first thought, best thought in its purest form.
But when the question was redirected to me, I struggled to find an answer that conveyed all of my feelings about mind and, in particular, my mind.
“Well,” I said, “the only thing that seems to fit is the Black Smoke Monster from LOST. Only my mind doesn’t uproot as many trees.”
While I try to figure out what I meant, maybe you could think about the texture of your mind? Is it smooth or jagged, crunchy or creamy, effervescent or stagnant, brindled or dappled or stewed or chewy or clumpy or just gray? First thoughts welcome below.
Bon week!!
One-Line Wonders, Part 2
March 19th, 2010“I think you can choose to love and what is more, that is how you survived the war.”
-The Weepies
Hideaway: “How You Survived the War”
Where I’ve Been, Spring, and the Birds & Bees
March 19th, 2010I’m alive!
I know I’ve been absolutely MIA in the cyber-sphere for the last few weeks, but the radio silence is the result of my attentions being pulled in a thousand different directions as projects continually arise, abide, and dissolve. Even as I write this I’m staring at the clock, trying to allot my time before taking a class, working on an editing project, maybe even taking a breath or two…
As I continue to try and pull the many pieces of my life into a cohesive puzzle today, I leave you with an anecdote that has all the markings of a modern classic in the BFY chronicles:
There are birds nesting under the air conditioner in our bedroom. I believe they’re house sparrows, though I’ve never been good at identifying these types of things; they’re small and brown with adorable little faces and loud, chip-chirpy voices. Yesterday I walked out of the house in a rush, and stopped dead on the stairwell leading down to the freshly-paved sidewalk in front of the apartment. Underneath the gang-plank connecting the stairs and the street (bypassing wet cement), I saw an outstretched wing. One of the house sparrows seemed to be flapping about underneath the plank, and on closer inspection it appeared that he was pushing another bird — laying quite still, wings folded by her sides. The fluttering bird was chatty and agitated, and kept pecking at the still bird’s beak.
I nearly broke down in tears right there on the stoop. This poor little bird must have flown right into the house, I thought, and fallen to its death. At the same time, I felt trapped; I didn’t want to step over whatever mourning process was being played out for fear of being disrespectful or, you know, attacked.
“Excuse me, Bird,” I said, “I’m so sorry this happened. I’m wondering if I can get by?”
And just then, BOTH birds started up and commenced chasing each other, flying low by the street and then jetting up to a nearby tree and then swooping back down to fly under the plank again!
That’s when I realized those cute little birdies were doing it on my front stoop.
21st of March or no, Spring has sprung in Brooklyn.
Bon weekend!
One-Line Wonders, Part 1
March 2nd, 2010Until you’re forced to pick up all the pieces of your shattered heart, you won’t know how big it really is.
For Your Consideration
February 26th, 2010Two weeks ago I had a yoga private with a woman whose dementia is slowly eroding her memory and concept of time, place, space. She is incredibly lovely, a former English teacher and beloved mother and grandmother.
When I arrived at her apartment, she was staring at the snow swirling outside her kitchen window. I went and stood next to her. We didn’t talk for a few long moments. Without turning to me, she whispered: They don’t always dance this way. Usually they just fall.
If you’re cursing a snowy commute or canceled travel plans this weekend, I humbly offer the cogent observations of an incredibly wise, wonderful woman for your consideration. Precious is the life that lets us witness this ballet…
Bon weekend!
Birthday Letters, Proverbial Rivers, and Trying to Let Go
February 23rd, 2010So remember my big idea? Yeah, THAT big idea. Well this past Saturday was my 25th birthday, and I absolutely couldn’t wait to open the letter from past-me to future-me (really, present-me). I had the great, great honor of teaching a class at OM on Saturday morning, so I explained my experiment and ripped open the envelope and read the whole thing aloud:
2/19/09
Dear Becca,
Today is the last day you are 23 years old. Here are some things that seem(ed) important today:
1. Your plans to go home with D. and D. Your high school friends flaked but you’ve resolved to go to New Hope and drink and maybe pierce something.
2. Completing your Yoga Synthesis class assisting requirement.
3. Your boss joined eHarmony today and even though she doesn’t have faith, you really hope she finds someone special.
4. You are reading Pema Chodron’s The Wisdom of No Escape and the Path of Lovingkindness.
5. You are anxious that D. will give you a shitty gift and if he does, that it means he doesn’t really know you. You are trying to simply label this “Thinking” and let it go.
6. The inspirations for this list were PostSecret and the desire to write anything at all because your handwriting rocks today :0)
7. You miss Eli…more than anyone knows.
Happy Birthday!
A year and one day later, none of it matters.
I did go home that weekend but didn’t go to New Hope, and I didn’t pierce anything but got my first tattoo shortly thereafter; I assisted a class that very night and it was an absolute nightmare; my boss found true love, but not on the internet; I read and re-read and re-re-read Pema’s book; my boyfriend gave me a great gift, but I’ve since realized that has ferociously little to do with how well he knows me (and he knows me quite well btw); I’m not as impressed with my script, though it’s cute; and I still miss my bunny, Eli, more than anyone knows.
The fruition of this experiment could not have come at a better time. Now more than ever, as I cope day-by-day with a family tragedy, and keep trying (unsuccessfully) to put down my grief and let go of this exhausting, all-consuming sadness, I know that in time its intensity will dissolve. I try to keep reminding myself that all of the things that seem so solid today will drop to the bottom of the proverbial River of Time and rest where they fall even as the stream pushes forward, forward, forward. The rocks don’t change, of course, but our closeness to them does, and that…well, at least that’s something.
News, WEATHER, and Thawing Your Inner Snow Mountain
February 11th, 2010I very seldom turn on the news. The news is 1) poorly written, 2) often vapid, and 3) depressing.
Today I made an exception. This morning I had to leave the apartment early to teach on the UWS, but I woke up even earlier than earliness required, so I had some extra time. Let’s see what’s happening in the world, I thought, Let’s watch the news.
Of course, whenever we’ve had WEATHER, the news becomes totally obsessed. The storm yesterday was no exception. Newspersons are charged with the noble task of reporting on that which is occurring directly outside viewers’ windows. It’s an important job, and they know it. So after a big WEATHER event, I imagine newspersons get a bit depressed. They’ve gone from being immensely important to being…persons on the news. Hm.
“Joining us now is Suzy Weatherkins, reporting on conditions for this morning’s commute. Suzy?”
“Good morning, Bob.”
“Good morning, Suzy.”
“Good morning. Road crews have been working around the clock trying to prepare the streets for this morning’s commute. New Yorkers have to traverse a number of obstacles after a WEATHER event, and I’d like to show you some of what you might encounter on your way into the office this morning. As you know, plows sweep snow onto the side of the road, and it piles up at the corners. [Walks to a corner] The snow gets densely packed, creating a ‘snow mountain.’ You can see how dense it is [kicks mountain], so you can be sure this will hang around for a couple days. Once you climb over The Mountain, you’ll have to face what we call the ‘Slush Ocean’…”
Oh, Suzy.
The truth is, while it may seem silly and vapid, this morning’s newscast epitomized a pattern that traps us each in turn. Something happens, and it’s really really big when it’s happening, and then it stops happening, but our reaction stays really really big anyway, even though nothing is actually going on and we’re okay. I think part of this phenomenon has to do with the fact that we all really want to be seen. We want to know that people care about what’s happening in our lives, and we want people to listen to what we have to say. So we cling to what happens, and we hang on for dear life. Even when hanging on is stressful or hurtful or harrowing, we cling nonetheless.
You probably didn’t make a snowball and stash it away in your freezer on the off-chance that we won’t get more snow this winter, and in much the same way, we can allow that which is past to thaw, melt, slide down a sewage drain, and eventually join the ocean.
Not the Slush Ocean. The real ocean.
This weekend, New York (and much of the East Coast) will be a drippy, melty mess. No one will notice if you kick off a chunk of whatever mountain you’ve been freezing and throw it into the mix with everything else.
Bon weekend!
Tragedy, Bodhicitta, and Missed Connections
February 3rd, 2010Last weekend I received some devastating news. I don’t much care to post about it here, but suffice it to say that my family and I were reminded that the human mind is a tragic, complicated, terrifying place. Hearts and lives are broken.
I’ve been trying to take care of myself, despite my inability to sleep for a few nights after hearing the news. My self-care process is a combination of crying when the mood strikes overwhelms, distracting myself with editing work & old episodes of Veronica Mars, going to yoga with one of my favorite teachers on the planet, and trying to allow each sensation of grief to arise, abide, and dissolve in its time.
In Buddhism, we believe in a person’s basic goodness, their Buddha-nature or bodhicitta. Especially in the wake of tragedy, when recognizing bodhicitta can be especially difficult, it’s important to remember that all beings everywhere are fundamentally good. The karmas that lead to the events that transpired…well, they can’t be qualified by the lives in which they manifest. All we can do is perpetuate compassion and try to avoid giving rise to more non-virtuous karma, more suffering, by hardening our hearts to the reality of our painfully human condition.
So I’ve been reading “Missed Connections” on Craigslist. What could MC possibly have to do with recognizing bodhicitta and coping with loss, you ask? It’s no secret that I take a healthy dose of dharma cues from my time on NYC subways, and MC reminds me that my fellow subterranean passengers are searching just like me, seeking each other out for connections and meaning and heart-mind vibrations. I feel like our culture has become so preoccupied with maintaining our steely facades, we’ve forgotten how to take action when our Buddha-nature starts to hum and our heart-mind reaches, reaches, reaches to connect with someone. MC is a forum for slightly delayed reactions to this very human yearning, and as sappy as it may sound, it gives me hope. If we could all find a way to recognize our sameness — our beautiful, perfect bodhicitta — we might not feel so alone. We might have the courage to turn to each other instead of retreating to a place where we can’t be reached, where we deny our essential nature and reject the Buddha within.
Fair warning: There are a lot of not-so-noble, lust-driven, casual-encounter-esque posts on MC. But if diamonds were easy to find, they wouldn’t be so valuable…right? See some of my favorite posts from the NYC site this week, or find your city’s Missed Connections page here.
Contest Results, Boating, and the Truth About Where Your Dreams Will Take You
January 25th, 2010So first things first: I love you all, but you kind-of fail at contests. I’m keeping my mediocre blog-name until someone comes up with something excellent. The only thing I’ve managed to think up = my secret Sanskrit name + a hackneyed play on a beloved HBO sitcom title. No, I won’t tell you what it is and yes, I’m withholding as a display of my bitterness over the aforementioned contest fail.
It’s a gloomy day today in NYC, which affords me a chance to catch-up on my freelance editing work, which in turn affords me the opportunity to reflect on why I even have editing work to do in the first place. Here’s the thing about being a yoga instructor: it’s not something one does for the insta-cash. Or the not-insta-cash. Okay, it’s not something one does for cash, period.
If you’re like me, teaching yoga is something you do because you believe in the practice’s ability to transform suffering, and view teaching the practice as a way to live your Bodhisattva Vow. Noble aspirations? Check. Money in the bank? [insert purposeful silence here].
Meaningful sidenote: When I was younger, I spent countless hours in voice lessons and choral workshops, steadily preparing for my sure-to-be-imminent Broadway debut. I never auditioned for community theatre, never worked backstage in school productions, and refused to take dance lessons. I took up smoking, never practiced enough, and quit piano lessons. But I kept dreaming. And guess where that got me?
Fucking nowhere.
Readers, I share this quaint anecdote because it’s time to cut through our delusions about dreaming. Dreams, passion, desire — it’s all totally worthless without hard work and the willingness to do whatever it takes to succeed. Charging at life armed with nothing more than your super intentions and a smattering of passion is stupid and will get you exactly nowhere; charging at life armed with super intentions, passion, dedication to cultivating your craft, humility, determination, and an action plan might get you nowhere fast, but you’ll go somewhere. Oh, you’ll go.
The very esteemed Buddhist teacher Chogyam Trungpa often wrote about “spiritual materialism” or “spiritual shopping,” our pattern of drifting from belief system to belief system in order to find what makes us feel good instead of what really leads us to spiritual truth. He taught that in order to gain insight and move toward enlightenment, you have to pick one boat and stick with it, no matter what. If you want to discover new worlds, you can’t hug the shoreline and have one foot dragging in the water; you have to strap on a life vest, pack supplies, and paddle until your arms feel like old Jell-o Wigglers hanging at your sides.
Dreams are like that too, I think.
This is all to say that I hope you dream really, extraordinarily big — I really do. But more than that, I hope you have the strength and support and adequate levels of crazy to doggedly pursue the thing that makes you feel alive. Make a plan. Do the plan. Give ‘em hell, and take what’s yours: a dream dreamed, a reality earned.