Yes, it’s true. This takes place in the year 1995, which was, I believe, 172 years ago.
~~~
I tremble.  I sweat.  I have never done anything like this before.

I have never led this program, this Big Program before.

This is the Biggie, the Inner Quest Intensive, Kripalu’s first program.  Only the biggest of the oldest of the coolest of ashram senior teachers lead this program.  They are all gone now, because (long story!) the guru fell loudly and publicly from grace this past year.  Most of the senior people have left, off to open their own yoga schools in wonderful places, off to acupuncture school, or whatever.  Wherever it is that cool and super smart people do go when their guru proves to be a flawed and vain human.

I obviously hold these esteemed teachers in high and unapproachable regard.  I see them as “the cool people”.

I do not see myself as a cool person.  

I am the One Left Standing.

I have taken this program as a guest.  I have assisted this program, one among a staff of twelve.  I have never, ever stood here, microphone in hand, facing three 13-hour, intensive days of offering this core legacy program.  

I have taught Kripalu programs before, always with a co-teacher.  More manageable in size and length, I found my way through those.

This experience offers me another level, an entirely new category of Tremble.

The tremble lives deeply inside of me.  I sweat wildly, undergarments and brow already awash.  It is September and the Main Hall is already steamy, with 67 guests and 10 staff breathing in heat, in anticipation of the unknown.  

And me, my trembling, adds to the steam.

And me, my sweating, adds to the heat.

Over the past months of trembly, sweaty prep, I have written every single word I imagined I might need to say during these three long days, mapped all the transitions between activities, memorized all the past program overviews of teachers before me, and put all notes on large, rectangle index cards.  I hold tonight’s double-sided, 5 index cards shakily against my side.

The cards are wilting, drained of life in the intensity of the moment.  

I glace down at the top card, color-coded, my large boxy print meets my eye.  They appear to be written in a foreign language.  Nothing.  My eyes recognize no words.

Useless to me now, I toss the soggy cards all onto the beige thick rug.  

They almost bounce back.

Oh! To be able to fall with them.

Oh!  To have that rug catch me and rock me to sleep.

Oh!

Okay, back to it—focus, focus.

I have opened the program.  This is good.  Guests have somehow been led into the room ceremoniously and silently.  This is good.  They sit in their back jacks or chairs, frighteningly attentive, as if a collective breath is being held.

I, too, hold on to my breath.  I am holding on tightly, to my—something?  Everything?  My life before this moment?  Oh, to be home right now, watching mindless television on the comfortable, white-patterned sofa.  Oh, to have no, zero, none, no responsibilities.

That seems fitting on this September Thursday night.

Okay, back to it—now, I know what’s next.  I know that now I lead a meditation.  Now, I guide the people in looking inside.  In softening.

I take a few breaths.  

I can do this.

I bring my microphone to my lips.

I dig down for my deepest, most spiritual Meditation Voice.

I dig deep.

And I say,

“Ah, let yourself relax.”

Good, good start.

“Settle inside.”

Okay!  I’m rocking.

“Let your eyes be softly closed.”

I got this.  I’m rolling.

I turn to cue the audio guy, sitting on the rise behind me, as we planned, my cues for each background song to be perfectly synchronized with the content I’m offering.

I see him, Todd, crunched over the audio deck, in his chair like a sea captain, ready to chart us onto the oceans of meditative flow.

I catch his eye.  I give him The Nod.

I come back inside my own experience, shutting my eyes hopefully.

The music jerks alive with a savage assault, a rock beat, louder than loud, searing the silence with sound beyond frantic.  The room is saturated, filled with more rock and roll than one would ever want, with eyes OPEN, yet alone, closed.

I shudder with terror, assaulted by the music.

The Wrong Music.  My mind scrambles for an explanation, for an understanding.  Yet I am thoughtless.

And then, my first feeling solidifies—I want to die.  

Please, help me to die now.

Dying is obviously the only solution.  I must die now.  Truly.  

I somehow silently acknowledge that death is not a possibility. I look up at Todd.  I am speechless and frozen with desperation.  His attention is elsewhere; he is elsewhere.

Yet behind him and his impotent audio deck sits the solution; a wide-open window.  

That’s all I see.  I see the window.

I feel myself, I see myself running up to the window, flinging myself out of it, landing safely two flights down and running as far away from this moment as I can. 

I see myself literally escaping through the open window.

How long do I engage with this fantasy?

This delicious escape from the moment?

A long second or two, while blasting, blaring rock music fills the Main Hall?

I am frozen in place while sweat bathes my body, all in the same moment.

I cannot tear my eyes away from the Open Window.

Oh!  That open window.

While Todd, clueless in Lenox, sits on his captain’s chair, steering us down the wrong channel, I flounder.  I sink, I bob, I sink again.

I don’t know how long.

It seemed—

Forever.

Somehow from the depths in me I finally can muster this, saying into the mike, for the entire world to hear:

“Todd, put on the next selection.”

And—he does.

He changes the music.

That’s all.

It’s the Other Music.  The Right Music.  Meditative Music.

Shaking from the core of my being, I can finally tear myself away from the Escape Plan.  I discover the mike, still in my trembling hand.  Shakily I hold it to my lips.

“Let your eyes be soft.”

“Breathe and relax.”

Somehow the words come to me.

Somehow the Rock Music from Hell is banished from our experience.

Somehow the next moment comes.

And the next.

And the one after that.

Really?

All that I had to do was say: “Todd, (do not publicly call him a shithead), Todd, put on the next selection.”

Six words.

Changed it all.

All I had to do was speak the truth of what was happening, rather than deny it.

OHHHH!  Maybe this is what they mean when they say:

Notice what’s happening?
Vs.
What am I making it mean?

All that was happening?  It was the wrong song.
What did I made it mean?  I must exit and run and die.  

Life!

Inner Quest!

How you teach me.

Life!  Inner Quest!

After all these years, how you continue to teach me.

~~~

One of the remarkable things about the Inner Quest is how we all grow, both individually and collectively.  After teaching this program for 30 years, I have learned that being able to model imperfection is a huge gift and a massive relief for everybody, EVERYBODY in the room. In my humble and getting-longer life, I think this program has been my greatest teacher.  Whatever my issues are, they present before me.  And then I recognize my choice:

To jump out the window?

Or…

To do the next best thing?

Kindness.  This program teaches me kindness for myself and kindness for us, all.

And I grown.

And I continue to grow.

(Oh, the schedule is no longer so intense.  Kindness prevails throughout the structure as well as the content.)
~~~
I love this song and video and want to share it with you.  Over 75 Cubans from all over the world gathered on Playing for Change, to sing Guantanamera.  This is a Cuban patriotic song, is based on a poem by the Cuban poet, Jose Marti.

I found this to be a cultural delight.  Oh!  To go to Cuba…!

Let’s go now.

~~~
Dear Friends,

With gratitude,
With possibility,
With wise hope—
Hope that gives us the courage
To be right here,
Right now.

May all beings benefit from our time together.

All blessings, 
Aruni

~~~
To the contrary of my experience at 13 years old,

What are the elements of a blessing?

• Warmth
• Connection
• Protection
• Care
• Invocation
• Benediction
• Fluidity
• Reciprocal, in the giving, receiving

And the master of blessings, the wonderful John O’Donohue, priest, philosopher, poet—deepest of souls.  Here is his Blessing for the New Year:

Beannacht*
For Josie.

On the day when
The weight deadens
On your shoulders
May the clay dance
To balance you.

And when your eyes
Freeze behind
The gray window
And the ghost of loss
Gets into you,
May a flock of colors
Indigo, red, green
And azure blue
Come to awaken in you
A meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
In the curragh of thought
And a stain of ocean
Blackens beneath you,
May there come across the waters
A path of yellow moonlight
To bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
May the clarity of the light be yours,
May the fluency of the ocean be yours,
May the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
Wind work these words
Of love around you,
An invisible cloak
To mind your life.
~~~

Dear Friends,

May we be safe and well.

May that place of serenity
Deep inside
Be
Alive
And
Available,

Regardless
Of
Externals.

May we find our way home,
Outside home,
And
Inside
Home.

Stay blessed,
Aruni

* the Gaelic word for blessing