Fear and Awakening – 8 December 2008

I’m working with a teacher whom I find delightful in many ways and on many levels. We’re co-creating space with others where I go very deep into my awakening of Who I Really Am. He’s such an amazingly powerful mirror and catalyst for me. I’m making marathon length strides in mere days.

We’re doing silent meditation, guided meditation, reading, dissecting and discussing the book I Am That, by Nisargadatta Maharaj and sitting in Satsang. Satsang consists of everything under the sun, from using Tarot to Socratic dialogue, discussing everything from sexuality to family relationships, to giving up opinions, to living in the awakened state. Most of the time, while I’m there and after, I’m saturated with a sense of peace and an awareness that there is nothing to do and nowhere to go. He teaches the same thing as Ginaji; there’s no way to do this wrong.

There’s an intensity in this work that is effecting a deep shift in me. There is an intensity in my feelings toward this teacher. There is a trust that I feel with him that goes to my core.

For me, this is where it gets scary. I’ve misplaced my trust before and my body/mind is reminding me in a big way of past negative consequences. All of a sudden, today, it went on full alert. I have good friends here that know of this fear that’s coming up. I’m glad they are here and can help me suss out what’s old stuff coming up and if anything is truly a threat. I value them highly and met them before I met the teacher, so I trust their objectivity in this area.

In addition, I feel I’m very close to a big awakening and my ego is scared shitless. It has shifted into survival mode, telling me in numerous ways how dire the consequences will be without it.

I can tell I’m existing on a different plane than before. I’m constantly leaving important things (like my pack!) in rickshaws and restaurants. Thank the Goddess for Jordi, who keeps retrieving my things for me, pointing me in the right direction when I start to make a wrong turn on the way to class, and paying my cheque when I leave a restaurant without doing so. That just gives my ego more ammunition in it’s dire predictions for living in an awakened state.

I’m close. And I’m scared.

As Dear Sara puts it: I’m in the washer.

Again. Markji says I’ve been on this threshold before. He’s right. I get so close and retreat in fear. I don’t quite think retreat is an option this time. The awakening has already begun. It began with my intention for this trip before I even left Seattle.

I asked for a teacher. I received several; all wondrous and amazing and beloved.

I asked for awakening. Um, I think Be careful what you ask for. applies here.

Ginaji has taught me many times, over the last year and a half, that transformation and awakening doesn’t have to be traumatic. It can be done with Grace and Ease. It’s nice to remember that, when I’m able to.

I keep hearing predictions from friends and family that they don’t think I’m going back and it’s just reinforcing what I already know. This is the point I foretold with much trepidation before I left Seattle. The point in the journey where I felt in advance that the person who left Seattle would never come back. And I really, really hate goodbyes.

I’m not saying I’m not returning to Seattle. I do plan to return, eventually. However, I won’t be living there permanently and I won’t the person who left when I get there.

I keep pretending I’m not sure I’m extending my stay here *cynical laugh* I’m fairly certain I will stay through most of January. Then, my intention is to fly into NY and visit my daughter for her birthday and spend around a month on the East Coast visiting friends and family. Then I plan to fly to Seattle, collect my car and some things and head off on a road trip through California and Arizona; visiting with friends, exploring new spiritual endeavours and expanding upon current ones. I may spend a few weeks in Seattle sorting out my affairs before heading out, perhaps even a month, but probably no longer than that.

That puts me back in Seattle briefly sometime in March. March! Seven months after I left and only for a short while. I love my city, but it’s been an effort to live there, financially and climate-wise. It’s simply cheaper to travel than to live there. However, I miss my friends, I miss my love, and there’s no way I can commit to the Choir of Light again and that thought alone has me in tears. Never mind what the thought of no Tuesday night voice classes or kirtan with Ginaji is doing to me. It’s so not pretty!

I keep coming back to the fact that things I’m experiencing here are more enriching, gratifying and life affirming than the things I’m missing in Seattle, and they are more numerous. It still doesn’t ease the pangs of sorrow over the missing and those pangs are fueling the fear of changing.

I know I have to let go. I cannot swim back up the waterfall in mid descent. It’s simply not possible. There is no other possible outcome for me, other than to awaken. My Dharma demands it. Resistance is futile. Besides, resistance is not much fun.

I keep seeing myself founding a spiritual center on the coast of South Carolina; a section of the country that could use a safe haven for exploration and expression of New Thought and Non Dual philosophies. I have no idea if this will come to fruition, but it’s a persistent vision.

So, of course, this could just be another emotionally fraught shitstorm my ego is kicking up and after this much foretold and much anticipated awakening I look around and, once again, say, Well, hell. Here I am again, same as always! Actually, I think that’s probably the way it will turn out. After all, wherever you go, there you are and I’m already That anyway. I’m probably just the last one to know it.

I could still get on that plane on 23 December and have two full Christmas Eves, one in Seoul and one in Seattle. Somehow, though, I kind of doubt that part. Somehow, that plan just doesn’t matter any more.

This all leaves me in a place of not knowing. I’m staying very close to home tonight. I’m venturing out only to post this, check my email and grab some soup, then returning to my bed. I’m conserving my energy and nurturing the parts of me that are experiencing fear. I’ve been expending a lot of psychic energy the last four days and I’m feeling a bit drained. I’m totally mothering myself tonight, and it feels good.

Tomorrow, I move to a new residence that has a hot water shower! Woo Hoo! It’s a much nicer place and Jordi is next door in a complete apartment with a kitchen she’s offered to share. She already took most of my stuff over there today, bless her heart. I just have to take my computer and toiletries and a few clothes. Life really is very good here.

Lastly, Deepam is in a few days, on the full moon, and the energy has been building daily for the last 7 days. It will peak in the biggest circumambulation of Mt. Arunachala of the year. It’s the biggest Shiva festival ever (according to local thought, your mileage may vary) around the living Shiva Lingam, the mountain itself.

Ahh Nataraj! Shiva dancing constant destruction to make way for creation with each step. What a very appropriate metaphor, yes? There are no fucking accidents :)