Spectacularly Off the Wave

Hi, folks.

This childhood memory rotates back into my consciousness every few years. Watching the scene that it paints isn’t emotional for me now. But back then, of course, what a profoundly excruciating trauma it was. I can’t access those feelings today, since they have softened and integrated. But I do find the memory important, first because it is such a profound example of off the wave, and then more significantly, because it shows how much healing I have been offered in this lifetime walking around on our planet.

How much healing is available to all of us.

In this memory, I am an 8-or-9-year-old child. I so honor and bless that terrified little girl. I offer this child to you—here she is:

This ancient memory is almost 70 years old, if a moment. I am a new student in Hebrew School. It terrifies me. I despise it. My stuttering, debilitating enough in English, becomes even more traumatizing with Hebrew.

Now in class we are reading the vocabulary words aloud, going up and down the rows. This is death to my heart, this death of waiting. Knowing I can’t say the sounds. Knowing everyone will hear. Will see. Me.

Miss Tischman, our teacher, has the tattoo on her wrist. That number, her number, forever imprinted. Her number of death. I know that tattoo—my forever and monogamous friend G.’s parents share that tattoo.

She is short and squat, and looks—different. Her clothes are not familiar, she is not familiar, her language—she insists on speaking to us in Hebrew—scares me. English words are hard enough a thing for me.

I know I should be kinder to Miss Tischman. Hitler, that bad man, tried to kill her along with all the other Jews. I should feel sorry for her. I should surely not be rude to her. I’m not an acter-outer-kid at all—I’m a please-don’t-notice-me-I’m-not-here-kid. Invisibility was my goal, my solace.

But now, here, in this bleak classroom, misbehaving seems to be the only available way to escape this fray of emotion. This was not a thought or a plan, but a visceral, thoughtless response. I push the kid’s desk in front of me, a little nudge forward, again, then again. I stomp my feet on the floor, just a little at first, then gaining in momentum, in my frantic attempt at escaping the situation.

As we go up and down the rows, as the spotlight of visibility gets closer, now I am truly terrified now, sweating and hot and shaky. It’s almost my time to speak aloud. As my terror escalates, so do my attempts at escape. I do more kicking on the floor, more pushing the desk in front of me.

Finally, Miss Tischman, rightfully and ultimately frustrated with me, storms toward me and yanks me from my seat by the collar of my beloved deep-blue-turtleneck sweater. She pulls me out of my desk, across the room and into the hallway. With a dramatic flick of her hand, she throws my red rubber boots after me.

She slams the door behind herself. The echo of the slamming door seems to vibrate in the empty, deserted hallway.

I escaped the moment. Phew.

Yet this empty and alone moment I have created, standing in the hallway, boots deserted in front of me, is so much worse. Its hollow silence defies me, challenges me, terrifies me. I am so ultimately alone.

Instead of terror, now there is only shame.

~~~

I have no memory of before or after this event. It is my last day in Hebrew school. But it is not my last day running from moments, from situations, from people, places and things. I run and run for a very long time. Over the years, as I leaped off the wave, I continued to create worse situations for myself, much more complicated than what life was offering me.

Now, it’s different. Now I imperfectly practice staying where I am, feeling what I feel, allowing the situation, the feeling, the experience to come and go. Now I practice most imperfectly relaxing into what’s happening.

In the moment, prayer helps. Breath helps. Moving a muscle helps. Reaching out to others, all these things help. But I can’t always do it.

I still try to escape.

Over and over again.

And then I practice.

I practice

Coming

Back

To the moment.

There is no perfection.

There is only practice.

Friends,

How do you get off the wave?

What is the cost of that escape?

What might you do to stay just a tad more present, just a nanosecond longer?

Please let me know.

~~~

I love sharing weekly music that is currently supporting me, opening me, comforting me. I dive into a song, spend a week or so compulsively gobbling it up, and then move on. This week has taken me to Playing for Change.

I so respect this non-profit, whose mission is to take musicians from all over the world and weave their voices and their instruments into one song. Their mission so reflects Swami Kripalu’s core teaching, the Whole World is One Family.

Here’s a goodie, What’s Going On. I might have sent this out a while ago—sorry, folks, here it is again. Watch it through. Listen to the brilliant guitars. And when Sara B. sings at toward the end, in front of the arch in Washington Square Park in New York, I tingle—I lived a few blocks from there.

Enjoy:

~~~

Dear Folks,

Breathe.

Relax.

Feel.

Watch.

And allow.

Allow your moment to come.

Allow it to go.

Just practice.

Returning right here and right now.

May we continue to find our way forward,

With kindness and with blessings.

May all beings benefit from our time together.

All blessings,

Aruni

Good Luck with That…..

Dear Friends,

Who knew?

Who knew our role as humanoids is to accept what’s happening? Did you know that? I certainly did not. I learned to take control of what’s happening (good luck with that), to make sure bad things don’t happen, and to keep everything and everyone going in the direction I choose.

What’s the cost of this behavior? Well, for one thing, it is totally ineffective—it doesn’t work. Reality is in charge. She wins.  If only controlling reality worked…

When I’m busy trying to run the show, the cost is massive—the cost is everything. Quality of life drops—relaxation flees—stress increases.

When living as if I am in charge, I would miss out on:

• the cute little black ducks feeding, with their adorable rear ends high up in the air
• the remarkable families of Canadian geese flying, soaring, dancing together in the air
• the golden/yellow/red leaves shifting colors into and through and with each other
• and pretty much, everything else.
• I would be too busy to notice.

Being present with what’s happening does not mean passivity. It does not imply apathy. It is a practice, a skill, a strategy for living that literally slows down the moment, that literally opens up the moment to additional resources of energy. And choice. It opens the doors to choice.

I believe we are asked to be partners with Reality in the moment. We are asked to be present with what is, and then, lean into the direction we choose. Over-reacting, over-thinking, forcing a solution interrupts the flow of life. Life is coming to heal us. It certainly doesn’t always feel that way or appear that way. But ultimately, eventually and inevitably, life is coming to bless us. I don’t say this to minimize the inevitability of our suffering, our pain, our trauma, our grief, that which we are asked to live with. I say it to give us the courage to keep on going, to keep on practicing, to keep on partnering with the moment—to outlive the feelings, to outlive the experience, to allow the door of Grace to open for us.

~~~

Folks, how are you being? Doing? Feeling? Where and how does this conversation land for you?

• What moments in your life are challenging to be present with?
• What moments are easier?
• What strategies do you use to slow down, to notice what’s happening?
• What does practice mean to you?
• What is life teaching you now, right now?

Feel free to let me know!!

~~~

Here’s an oldie but a goodie—Leonard Cohen! Oh, Leonard, how I wish you were still alive. Whether this is a song about a rowdy bar scene, facing the glooms of aging, or an apocalyptic red light, all I know—my dog Lucy Kay Doodle and I loved dancing to this song together. Try dancing around to it with yourself, with an animal, with a person—it works.

Thanks for sharing it with me:

~~~

May we be present.

May we be whole.

May we ride the waves of our lives.

May we live in peace not matter

What we are given.

May all beings benefit from our shared words.

Best,

Aruni

What are We Doing Here?

What are We Practicing?

Wait.

What?

What are we doing here?

What are we practicing?

How are we getting through these days?

Does anybody know?

~~~~

The sky has been so beautifully, exquisitely bluer-than-blue. Like, Living-Blue. Like, the Deliciousness-of-All-Blue.

The nights and the mornings have been Sweatshirt-Cool. Like, looking for Another-Blanket-cool.

And the days have been softly warm, gently warm, lovingly warm.

Ahhh, these days and nights have been beyond-perfectly-perfect, as we lean toward the Solstice. Autumn hovers, opening her arms to us. It is a wondrous transition of seasons with so much obvious beauty and wonderment around us.

And yet.

And yet.

Things—things are so wrong. I don’t even want to talk about it, but……

I’m exhausted. I’m so exhausted by things, by life, by news and midterms and wars that make no sense, and AI coming to get us and on and on.

I’m so exhausted that I could crumble into tiny-dried-odd-sized-shapes-of-exhaustion. Aruni-in-pieces-of exhaustion.

I’m tired of the greed, unchecked.

I’m tried of the lies, unchallenged.

I’m tired of the disregard, uncensored.

I’m just tried out, which I know is part of the plan.

As a child of the ‘60’s, I am also heartbroken. Exhausted and fully heart-broken. By the total disregard for the law, for constitutionality, for simple truthfulness.

This is true. This is real. This is happening. Our county is changing; it has changed. Laws are not here to protect us in the same ways.

Then I look outside and I see:

The bluer than blue sky.

The greener than green growth.

I feel:

The softer than soft wind.

EVERYTHING. Everything—all of it– exists in the same nanosecond.

Exquisitely perfect.

And

Despicably wrong.

All true.

All sacred.

All inevitable.

How do we be present?

How do we do this?

What do we practice?

How do we get through these days, these contradictions?

For me?

For me, the practice is being right here.

Right now,

Is the best I can manage.

~~~

Yesterday I was driving out of the car wash.

(I’m a car-washing-fanatic—it’s an inherited gift from my dad, Mr. Auto, Sidney F.)

I was driving out of the parking lot, coming to the road, ready to make a right turn,

And a woman was walking unusually on the very un-used sidewalk, down the road.

She passed in front of me.

She saw me, I saw her.

I stopped.

I motioned for her to continue walking.

She nodded. Made eye contact. Smiled.

I nodded, made eye contact. Smiled.

And I thought:

Thank you, life. If this is all I do today to contribute.

If this all I do today to support another,

Thank you,

Thank you,

Thank you.

This woman has stayed with me.

She gave me the opportunity to be kind.

My practice?

As best I can—

To show up for the moment

And

To meet it with kindness.

AS I AM ABLE.

And when I cannot,

To find some sliver of kindness,

A gentle breath,

Something

To bring to myself

~~~

I’ve become committed to Eva Cassidy. A friend, no longer alive, shared Eva’s music with me a few years ago. I didn’t find my way to Eva then. Recently two friends sent me her album, Songbird.

And now, I am awed. I am beyond-awed by her music.

Brilliant, eclectic, without professional success in her young life, Eva died at 33 in 1996. Since then, her music has been discovered and exploded across the planet.

I shared one of her songs a few weeks ago. Here is another that absolutely opens my heart, full-open, full-available.

There is nowhere else I want to be but wrapped in this song with Eva.

For More Info about Eva

~~~

Friends,

May we be present.

May we be whole.

May we ride the waves

Of our lives.

May we live in peace

No matter what

We

Are

Given.

May all beings benefit from our shared words.

Blessings,

Aruni