Let everything happen to you. beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final. Rainer Maria Rilke
I first wrote this as a quick rough draft a few months back for two fine young men before we went out one evening and built a fire at the north end of Jenner beach. We shared our stories, feelings, anguish, but also something else occurred that night... There was gratitude. I can’t explain exactly what happened, but as you read this essay, imagine this being read out loud to two young men after we built a shelter, an altar, spontaneous pieces of driftwood art and a magical fire...
I was told this story by a man I trust and I’ve told it a hundred times since… …about the zen monk and the student— The student felt he had reached his limit. He was no longer receiving anything meaningful from his teacher. Proudly he stood before the master and said— I have learned enough. You have no more to offer. I have learned all that I can learn from you, there is nothing more.
Yes, that might be true, the monk answered, but before you go, let us have a cup of tea together. The monk set the table, two cups and and a tea pot. He filled his own cup first, filling it just so and then he poured the disgruntled student’s. As his cup reached to the brim the student expected him to stop, but the teacher kept pouring tea into his cup, overflowing with liquid as it spilled-over onto the table, onto the floor, through the door, into his shoes, into the cupboards, into the books, into nooks and crannies, the monk kept pouring, and still the liquid kept leaking and leaching sploshing and splashing over everything. The student was livid, the student was confused, he stood and demanded the monk to stop. The monk kept pouring. The student called him names— you crazy old man, what are you doing? I was right you nutty old man! you know nothing, you are useless to me…. yet the monk did not stop, the endless kettle of liquid kept pouring The student horrified, angry, distraught, mouth open, eyes wide…. It was like he had taken a shower, like a drowned rat stuck in an effluent river that had stopped flowing.
The zen monk said quietly— this tea cup is you, you are so full of what seems like substance, of information, of your ego self, In things of matter you have garnered knowledge, but what is truly important no longer has a place within you. like this cup you are too full, everything is tainted and hidden there is no place to grow, to move, to see, to feel. your emotions and your senses have been dulled and drowned in this. He turned the cup over and emptied it… This is how we want to be empty open available….
That cup, that feeling of overwhelmed, of no psychic space to move, exhausted by the drama, riddled by the stories that constantly bombard life with incessant details, talking heads, numbing memes and mindless videos. Some of the details filling the cup are the saddest things imaginable and some are the most inspiring things possible. After a while it is hard to distinguish what is what. A day that starts out stressful with issues and frustrations will inevitably end with some profound gift, magical as anything I have ever felt. I want to post and text a friend. Then the day begins with the most beautiful sunrise and wild curious animals at my door and just so much gratitude can end in something so tragic and disheartening that I feel that I will never recover and just crawl under a blanket and fall asleep hours before sunset. If I look at the timing of this pendulum swing— happening as a day, a month, a year, a decade or over the entirety my life— what seems like failure, betrayal, or disappointment evolves into something significant, meaningful and then the next day I rear-end a car in the lumber yard parking lot because I’m thinking about how lucky I am... the next day it goes the same...
... and so it goes, I know, this is how it is. The cup is constantly being filled and after a while it doesn’t matter if it is good or if it is bad, positive negative, sorrow or gratitude, magical or destructive as what starts one place always changes to another place that is the way of the world. Impermanence is connected to all things and so much of it is beauty and so much of it is a destructive force. Life is always changing. Equanimity is the most beautiful word. Equanimity is sitting in that place where all these stories swirl around us and we are not caught up in any of it, sitting in a calmness, in a state of grace... that is equanimity.
The stories are relentless though. Our landscape has changed. I see this everywhere I go now. How full we are. The information is constant. The drip drip drip of the faucet, the conduit of information is incessant. So much disaster and distrust paired with beauty and inspiration. A constant bombardment. The social medias have become the conduit of these messages. Our planet is out of balance and no longer sustainable and we see images wherever we go— the new normal of destructive fires, melting glaciers, extinction of animals and plants, racism, homelessness, another mass shooting by a white male with an assault rifle, suicides and overdoses.... Then blink an eye and we see another side— amazing images surrounded by breathtaking profound music, hikers on high alpine vistas, surfers on amazing waves, beautiful people doing yoga and sitting at the fire, dancing on the beach, brilliant artists creating and building impossible things, fighting the good fight, new ideas, amazing concepts and of course late night stories of cute puppies and tragic animals saved in the fire by a blind man and a 12 year old girl... all hold us spell bound. There are the sounds of twitter feeds from a name I refuse to mention in this essay, his blabbered anger that tears out our souls with hypocrisy, hatred, fear, racism, misogyny and narcissistic ego bullshit. Redundant memes fill the cup like a nightmare that is endless and loopy and a calm rest seems so far far away. Flip the page and there is an inspirational quote by a purple buddha, by a shamanic sage, a middle eastern poet that for a moment reminds us we are not alone and there are profound, brave, wonderful things afoot. The cup is ever flowing as it seeps into all the cupboards and the pores of our lives. Equanimity and wisdom seem so far away, reduced to a philosophy that is not based in reality.
Anxiety and numbness. I get calls. I meet people of all ages, but so many young adults, kids in formative years, telling me their trauma, fear, shame. Too exhausted to feel angry. I have told my story so many times, I can’t hear another compliment with a conciliatory sigh, no advice that I didn’t ask for. Leave me be alone, I want to just curl up in a ball, fade-away into this fetal position. I wrap a scarf around my head and fall into sleep like a shot of heroin and the I wake up at 2:30 am and never find sleep again. My head feels feverish. I feel like I am dying. I feel like I am having a panic attack. I am immobilized and can’t leave my house. It feels like daggers are entering my body from all angles or even worse I just feel numb all over. I want to write but it all comes out meaningless and run-on. Dribble. I want to eat good food but nothing feels fulfilling. I want to exercise but my body is too tired, my head aches, my stomach is being torn apart by an anxiety that has no sense of origin, just a disabling, dismembering sensation. Yes they tell me this. I feel like I’m dying. I can’t live like this.
Lucid minds with permeable hearts. Parents and well meaning adults try to patiently remind their kids and young adults, words meant to bolster their spirits— oh Billy, oh Susie, you are so beautiful, talented, creative. Oh you are so lucky you have so much potential. You have such a good family, such a beautiful place to live. But it sounds like, dude all you have to do is take out the trash and do your homework! Why can’t you get your fucking shit together, keep a job, stay in school? Smile! Do something other than self medicating and video games I do so much every day for your and all you have to do is take out the fucking trash.... after the first complement the volume is turned into a droning buzz and all that person thinks of is how do I escape anything that sounds like authority.
This is a real thing. Every moment contains this now. This is the cul-de-sac, that full chalice saturating the landscape, draining into the creeks and crevices. I can see the river that I want to dive into, an intuition that there is a flow out there that is clean and from a true source, yet I am drowning over here, treading endlessly in an eddy that I can’t pull out of. I am not strong enough to swim my way out. I am not long enough to reach the branch to pull myself out. I am not resilient enough to figure out how to escape this fucking labyrinth. I no longer trust the words people offer me. And no one sees this. I am totally alone. I am tired of how meaningless this feels. Once I trusted that there was wisdom and that if I dug deep enough, studied diligent, took my courses, studied hard, read good authors, listened to sage spiritual leaders that I could get to that river, that clear water, that source, that feeling of being connected.
Who am I why am I here? You would think at my age that I would have had this figured out. Instead of feeling fulfilled and confident I feel shame and fear. Anxiety and panic. There are ways to dull this and I have tried them all. Alcohol, pot, antidepressants, prescription drugs, computer things, tawdry sex, porno, video games, Instagram, facebook, news, music. I have contemplated suicide and driven for years without a seatbelt, looked over cliffs, metaphorically and literally, and pondered what if? How many friends and friends of friends, do these young adults in their twenties know who have lost someone from suicide, overdose or a simple “drug/alcohol” mistake? My head reals at this thought. It’s bigger than the AIDS epidemic. The numbers are staggering. Yes this is daunting. A new landscape that so many have to live with. Every day. Every moment… yet… Every moment contains another thing. I believe that there are more languages than just this one. I believe the trees have a language and they are teachers in disguise. I believe the soil and the fungus and all the rhizomes and myocardial threads hidden in the roots have a language. I believe that certain plants not only contain language but also contain wisdom. Not just wisdom but a road-map to a web that contains all things, explaining that all of us are interconnected beacons of energy.
I believe that my daughter, who died when she was 20, has a language that is not a part of our physical realities, our notions of time and space and without words and syntax. That language can be felt as well as heard. I believe that there are unexplainable things; synchronistic and magical, so far outside the human condition’s philosophies and constructions, linear modes and models, binary codes and applied mathematics; that by defining them with the language of our subjective intellects reduces the unexplainable to diluted children stores and ancient mythology— Angels, fairies, ethereal spirits and a myriad of other things all have energetic forces that surpass language, have their own definable essence and exist beside us simultaneously. Belief is a kind of faith. I once heard an anonymous quote‌ Faith is believing that if you jumped off a cliff there would be something there to catch you. Faith is also on a need to know basis. Loosing phoebe, who fell from a cliff, pushed me into that place of needing to know about Faith.
In a world that has historically show religion and the notion of God to be more about hypocrisy, war and moral judgements than truth, love and wisdom— it is hard to pare faith with something meaningful. The signposts are so disguised. Hidden. We live in a world of paradox. Dualistic realties side by side, contrary things existing simultaneously. Paradox— I believe Phoebe’s spirit has offered me countless gifts to offer others; I believe she died tragically and she is just gone. I believe that what is my greatest loss is my greatest gift. I believe in mystery and magic, yet I believe in science and all things can eventually be explained by scientific processes.
Phoebe died when she was 20 years old. She would be 31 now. She is ageless now. I view the world through the eyes of that 20 to 30 something. This planet that has so much to offer and has so much to discourage and devour. Where and what is hope. Inspiration. Healing. Courage. How do I make a change, how do I become significant. How do I find prosperity. There are so many expectations‌. Where is the vista? Where is the clarity? Where is the faith? Sensitive, articulate, brilliant, permeable spirits that have found no place to land. Shame, Fear and sadness instead of confidence, inspiration and gratitude. I wish I had a switch or a magic wand or an easy solution. It is thin slice by thin slice. I write these words and they are only good for the moment I am writing them. This is a slice of warm bread. One slice one small glimmer, nothing more. Gratitude. Gratitude is the antidote for the anxiety and pain that has held us hostage.
I build things— I build temples, I build gardens, I build poetry, I build fires on the beach. I build relationships, I build sentences that create meanings and new worlds that before were only reflections and thoughts. I have found resources that I trust, elders who I believe in. I have discovered ancient plant medicines that have helped me empty thy cup and get my system to ground zero. I have discovered communities that are like a tribe of like minded people who share my beliefs and validate me. I have discovered a physical activity that strengthens my body, supports my immune system and also becomes medicine. I eat nutritious living and real food. I reach out to people who are in need of support and I offer it by validating them, not by trying to change or judge them. Every one of these things is a teaching to discover gratitude. Everyone leads me toward a positive outlook on life and something to share for my friends who can’t seem to find a path to it.
Once I was speaking to a young man who felt caught and trapped, that existential fetal ball of anxiety and panic. He claimed that he felt a constant sensation of shame, fear and sadness. I understand that shame and fear are things that make us feel dissociative and dismantled. Fucking assholes in our government and all that fucked up informations send us all into that state… but yes lets get rid of the shame and fear. I thought about the word sadness though. Sadness sits on a shelf with Happy… a bunch of hallmark cards with Happy and Sad as the bookends holding emotions as conditions we co-exist with… Happy, I got a great present for Christmas; Sad, I didn’t get what i wanted. What we really feel is sorrow. I don’t feel a part of this crazy shit world. I feel shame and fear that I can barely participate. I am feeling sorrow for this world, the planet, the animals, my suffering friends. So much sorrow. Sorrow is something deeper than sadness, no longer emotion it is connected to a sense of wellbeing. My eldest daughter died in a hiking accident. I have had tremendous loss and grief. Sorrow is this part that holds my heart in it’s deepest folds. Sorrow contains the truth that we live in this impermanent world and what we love will someday no longer be there. At some point it will no longer exist. The world is always changing. That is an undeniable truth. Sorrow is something to behold and allow. We transform and dissolve shame and fear we evolve sorrow into a kind tender wisdom.
This is the year that I discovered what gratitude is. Love is such a big term and so much of it gets set on the hallmark shelf next to Happy, Sad, Christmas and Love. But there is another kind of love that also holds the heart in all its folds. That place where we are validated and seen. It is the moment when you feel them simultaneously— Love and Sorrow. Then your eyes brim over with tears, your heart expands exponentially, each breath feels like it is filling your lungs with something clear and wondrous. There is a light over your head… Love merging with Sorrow morphs into gratitude. The first wave of wisdom that exchanges shame and fear with confidence and inspiration. The first moment where you feel your feet firmly on the ground and there is the smallest notion of a path to walk on. Funny, I’m writing this the night before thanksgiving when we’re all surrounded by our families or closest friends. Families are a bit of everything and they can trigger the greatest thankfulness for being alive and families can also trigger the deep deception that hides all the ancestral wounds we are carrying, silently in each our own way trying with all our hearts to heal. Tonight dad and mom respectively 95 and 87 and a 5 month old great grand son sit at the table together .... I hold gratitude out as a light to everyone who reads this.
Let us go to a beach and build a fire so we can touch on what is love and what is sorrow. May we feel that first slice of gratitude. Let us find forgiveness for ourselves and for others, even those who have harmed us. Let us put down the things that do not serve us, that hold us in the loopy eddies and cul-de-sacs of our minds. Let us discover the resources and faith to take our filled cups and empty them into the infinite sands along the beach. May the ceremonial fires we light release these things so the angels and sprits that support us feel our open hearts and deliver us information and open doors. May the light of prosperity allow our spirit and vital awareness live in the integrity that the universe gifted us open birth. May we find health and physical strength. May our failures, addictions, mis-steps, and futile anguish be transformed into the vital lessons that become gifts, transform into our greatest teachers that no books nor mystic savants could ever offer. May we find wisdom, nourishment and love where ever we go. May we offer our small glimpses of wisdom to others and help heal those who struggle and are in need. May we offer the same love and devotion to our planet, the trees, rivers, ocean, soil and animals. May we discover our own personal faith and hear the other languages that exist around us and feel blessed by the magic we encounter. With all this may we always walk with love, sorrow and gratitude. May we hold these gifts with honor and tenderness for all living things and more importantly for ourselves. May we find validation in all that we do. Love more. Happy Thanksgiving
