Chaos

Ahhhhhhhh….How glorious this quiet, sun-bathed morning is!

With a hyper-extended stint of unemployment, job-seeking and benefits behind me I’m loathed to even breathe a sigh of dissatisfaction over the all-consuming chaos that has recently taken me hostage.

I dreamt last night that I was a part of this futuristic society that was at war.  Bombs were being dropped, and people were screaming and scrabbling for shelter, getting crushed under collapsing walls.  I was a part of that chaos, and then I made a conscious decision to transform the fear and the panic into something else.  I stopped in my tracks, the noise dimmed and vision blurred, as I settled into half-lotus and began to meditate.  My last thought – an observation of the chaos, and then peace.

It’s not difficult to determine the nature of the dream, and its reflection of my life in this moment.  My Pitta and Vata are high – violence, chaos, running, fear…and that makes perfect sense.  I am stressed, and there’s an awful lot of travel, work, travel, work, travel, work, travel, tired, travel, work, broken sleep, travel, work – going on and I’m experiencing moments of utter bewilderment, and a loss of sense of self.

It would be such a shame to have invested so much time and energy, taking so many risks, to pursue an unconventional path, only to spin out completely at such an early stage of my dream becoming a reality.  And that fear, in itself, is what perpetuates that spiral.

Right now, I am conscious of an unraveling yoga and meditation practice; a lack of control over diet and rest; an ever-increasing, almost debilitating need for some solitude and silence.  All of these things, a direct result of this chaotic, yet necessary circuit I’m on, in order to get myself back on my feet and really make a go of this alternative livelihood.

My yoga update to Matthew is due in a couple of weeks, and a part of me is concerned about what to write.  How can I observe and comment on a practice that seems to have slowed to an almost stand-still?  But, it isn’t a lack of willingness, or a loss of interest behind this shift in everyday prevalence, its dramatic change in circumstances that have transfigured my daily routine beyond recognition.  And these things take time to adjust to.  Stamina, patience, confidence, well-being all instantaneously tested, and whatever falls to the wayside throughout these shifts, is irrelevant, its how we respond to it all, and what we learn about ourselves.

I am learning the fundamental importance of yoga, ayurveda and meditation, and what I’m willing to sacrifice and go through in order to find/create a physical, and existential space that enables and nurtures these practices in my everyday life.

I’m learning when to say no, and how important it is to guard my space and preserve time to heal and reflect.  There’s no point in feeling guilty or worrying about who you’ve hurt or let down, if in meeting expectations you’re ignoring that voice inside that’s screaming for some self-love and attention.

I’m learning that it’s ok to spin out every now and again, and perhaps let yourself surrender to chaos and uncertainty.  In time you find yourself naturally winding back to the path you were on, and it’s not so bad starting again if you need to.

I’m learning to not create unhappiness, or more, identify those moments that I’m generating negativity, and to step aside and watch.  The more I watch, the more it dissolves, the more I understand my role in how I experience everything.

I’m learning that there’s so much more, and there always will be.  That this is still the beginning, that this is still the hello to a brighter, and more honest existence, and if chaos is just one of the many ways that we make new discoveries, then why not embrace it and accept it, and let it be a part of who we are.

Staying present

It’s about a year ago that I found out Brendan had died.  I use “about” as if I only remember the approximate time of year, when in fact that 3pm facebook message that came in on the 20th July and cut my witty afternoon banter with Gary and Kelvin stone cold, will never be forgotten.

I’m not entirely sure how I kept myself together, as I stumbled towards the unisex toilets near the Trading division.  Lurched open the door, and crouched by the toilet bowl.  Wretched up half a chocolate muffin, and clamped my teeth down into my hand as I silently screamed.

There was very little thinking involved.  Just convulsions of disbelief, denial, and physical pain.  I knew I had to get home.  That’s all I knew…I had to get home.

Over these past few months I’ve learnt a lot about making contact with your emotions, with your body, to stay present, even through pain.  I wanted to ask in one of our therapy sessions with Matthew, how is it possible to stay present in moments when your body’s natural reaction is to completely shut down?

I lost my hearing, my throat was feeling too tight to breathe through.  I was in a tunnel.  Lights blurring together, and the sound of telephones rattling like a handful of coppers in a tin can.

I crept up to Eugenie’s desk.  Waited silently for her conversation with a colleague to end.  I couldn’t see them, I could just feel her presence to the left of me.

I told her what happened.

Calm and steady, she escorted me across the room back to my desk.  Deftly gathered my things and switched off my computer as I called Adam.

“Pick me up please.”  He didn’t even need to ask why, there must have been something in my tone.

I was about halfway down the winding  stairwell when I caught sight of a couple of concerned gazes, and felt the rush of uncontainable emotion.  I have to get home, became I have to get outside.  The lights were spinning and I held onto Eugenie’s arm.  “I need to get outside!”  Julie followed.

As soon as the revolving door sealed behind us, I let myself go.  Tears, gasping for breath,  “no. this can’t have happened!”  I broke my abstinence from nicotine, and lit a Marlboro with shaking, cramping hands.  Breathed in, and for a moment, for one breath, I felt calm.

It was a cycle.  Rising and falling, from presence to absence, presence to absence.  Moment to moment, crying and spluttering, to numbness and nothing.  Pain to nothing, pain to nothing.  My silences became longer, as I sat beside Adam on our way back to Iffley.  The silences scared him.  “Are you ok?  Talk to me.”  Car jolting as he turned to look at me.  I couldn’t speak.  My tongue was like plasticine.

I made some phone calls.  My dad, my brothers.  Childhood friends over this side of the ocean.

“Are you sitting down?”  starting every conversation.  My senses so acute, I could feel the spark of shock and swelling of grief down the phone.  Then I would go numb.  Head falling heavily into the window pane.

I remember the smell of the hallway.  The pendulum swinging faster and faster, and then slowing down whilst I uncorked a bottle of white and thanked my brother for the emergency stash of  cigarettes.  I went to bed.

Convinced myself I’d got it wrong.  The email was a mistake, a joke.  I’d read it wrong.  How embarrassing it was going to be heading back into work tomorrow.  All a mistake!  What a silly drama I’d created.  Anxious and impatient I wrestled with the log-in.  Draining a glass of wine.  Head spinning.  Heat unfurling across my chest.  Connection dialling…dialing…COME ON!

I pulled facebook up.

Of course there was no mistake.  I shut down completely and slept in my wine-soaked bed.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

This time – the anniversary of his death – has been creeping up on me over these past few weeks.  I wonder how I’ll feel when the moment arrives and an entire year has passed.  Why are anniversaries so significant to us?

I’ve been wondering what I’ll write, whether I would write at all.  I’m feeling particularly sensitive, and I’ve been listening to his music a lot.  Writing out the lyrics to some of his songs.  Heartbroken by the melancholy in some of them.  Looking through photos of us all when we were kids.  Wanting to reach out to them all, but never quite knowing what to say…

I’m half-way through the tenth version of a letter I’ve been writing for all these months to Brendan’s parents.  Fretting and editing, and starting again.  I figure that the words will come when I’ve made sense of all of this, and until then, I just keep writing my letter.  Pretty sure I’ve misplaced their address again.

I ask, why are anniversaries  so significant to us?  Is it attachment?  Not being able to let go?  You can’t deny the significance of it – the collective pain body has been stirring and building for weeks.  I can feel it, like I feel metta loving kindness..its a connection, a frequency that ties us all together.

Through these next few days, or weeks, I will be working my way through lots of pain, lots of  joy… the whole spectrum of emotion that comes with life, love and death.   Instead of asking why all the time, my hope is quite simple really.  My hope is that I can stay present.

Waking Up

7.30 – notepad by my bed.  I lift up my pen and hover it across the white paper.  I must have dreamt last night, I know I did, but I just can’t remember…I slept in, and I feel rested.  Yesterday was very different.  I couldn’t remember my dreams again, but I woke up at 4 – my hips raging.  My ayurvedic doctor said I’d made progress but there was still a bunch of stuff hidden away.  The remedies stir it up a bit, you process it all in deep sleep, when you’re ready, then settle into moments of calm.  Then when you’re ready to cope it comes up to the surface all over again.  There’s still anger in me.  Perhaps that’s why my Pitta has been so out of balance.  Its processing all of this mangled and rusty anger.  But, it’s not as volatile as it once was, it feels more fluid, and when it rises I walk it off, use my yoga to channel it.  In fact, my yoga practice is heavenly when I have all this heated energy swirling about in my hips.  Perhaps its the intense contact I feel with my body and its movement, perhaps its just a lot of upward energy….whatever it is, I’m noticing a steadiness in my practice that I’ve not had before.   Starting to bind in Marichyasana B.

Its a long way to go until I can press my nose to the floor but those hands behind me are clasped onto each other firmly!  I fear, those dratted boobs of mine are going to prove problematic as this pose develops.

My Navasana was steady.  Core muscles seem to be more engaged, and usually when I practice this pose, my legs, arms, entire body in fact begins to tremble.  You hold it for 5 breaths, cross your legs and do a little bum lift and then back into it for 5 breaths, bum lift, again for another 5 breaths…and ok, yesterday I stopped right there instead of doing the complete set of 5, but my extremities weren’t shaking at all, it was just a ripple of muscles spasms running up and down my core.  Studying Matthew’s book, I need to get those arms lower, chest up a bit, legs a bit lower….but that’s besides the point.  I’m getting there!

By the time I got to Bhujapadasana, I felt quite confident.  I knew my body could do it.  I just knew it.  My arms and shoulders tucking more easily behind the back of my thighs, confidence building as I place my hands flat behind my heels, I let my weight fall back into bum and hips, pushing down with my hands, feet lifting, lifting…there was a sensation of strength across my upper arms, and my core muscles burning ever so slightly, I was elevated for 5 full, unbroken breaths, and at the end of it all, managed to unwrap my feet and place them back onto the mat, without my usual ungainly, legs splayed, roll-back.
Into back-bends.  The moon sequence has been an absolute god-send for me. Back bends are scary.  It goes against our natural instincts to move our bodies in that way.  We’re taught of the fragility of our spine, and how careful we need to be.  Lifting your pelvis, pushing with your hands and feet and arching your back like that just doesn’t feel like its meant to be.  In moon sequence, every vinyasa warms it up a little bit, and by the time you get to the backbending sequence, (from a kneeling position, as opposed to this…) you just feel this rush of release.  Your hands fall back onto your heels, and you’re in control of it, arching, arching, looking further and further back.  Its remarkable really what you’re capable of.  It also means that by the time you get to back-bending in Primary, that nervous fear has begun to subside.  That stretching and heat you feel is meant to be there…you understand the sensations, focus on the front of your thighs, the psoas, the stomach…breathe.  My back-bends are messy.  Hands uneven, arms need to be straight, pelvis lifted, lifted, and by the time I got to my third (this was my first) it felt like I was getting closer to that…but for the first time really, its starting to feel good.  I’m starting to understand, my body’s starting to understand.

I struggled a bit through my finishing sequence, but my arms were almost flat in Halasana, knees grounded on either side of my ears in Karna Pidasana.  Sirsasana (headstand) is a funny one for me.  Considering most of the strength you need for that comes from your core, it seems counterintuitive that this particular pose seems to be getting exponentially clumsier and malformed.   First attempt was steady enough.  Muscles engaged, forearms pressing into the floor, cupping the back of my head…up on tip-toes, rocking rocking,and slowly, in a kind of foetal position my feet come off the floor, still tucked in balancing, balancing, inches from the wall…remembering everything Matthew taught me…pushing into forearms, it’s not about straightening the legs just yet, it’s not even really about the head…its the core…it’s all that strength in the core.  If I can just lower myself down with control, and quiet then the headstand will come in time.   I begin my descent.  Slowly, slowly…..AHHH! Thud, crash….toes crushed, a little bit dizzy.  Bugger.  Next time.  Next time.  Remember its all in the core.  Time to relax, to surrender my weight to the floor….Savasana galore!

Despite a truly wonderful practice the rest of my day continued to be a little bit fraught.  I had woken at 4 am to get an application in for a job I’d really like to get, but am all too aware of what a stretch it would be and how competitive it is out there.  I started work on my first freelance project.  Researching instructional videos online and best practice, for the series of tutorials I’ll be creating over the next few months.  I loved it.  Good to get my teeth into something again…but STILL I felt a little bit forlorn.

Cravings and aversions were coming to the surface, a resurgence of old habits I thought I’d let go of…I was dwelling in the past, fearful of my future, of being alone…I wasn’t living in the now, I was finding it difficult to stay with “this is my body and this is real”.

How bleak everything looked, and how withdrawn I felt, as I made my way across to a meeting hall in Brighton, to attend a talk about Buddhism.  I was afraid of talking to anyone, had my cardigan and coat all wrapped up around me, closing me off from the outside world.  I settled into a chair in the back row, slightly removed from the rest of the group.  A group of people familiar with each other.  I was the stranger.

But as the woman from the Brighton Buddhist Centre began her talk about the origins of Buddhism and what it means to Westerners in the 21st Century, I felt myself starting to warm…starting to open up.

She talked about ethics, meditation and wisdom.  Compassion, and awakenings.  Impermanence, equanimity and love.  All these terms that have become so familiar over these past few months.  She talked about the moments when you suddenly wake up and see the world in a different way.  That light inside you, and the light you see in everybody else.  My memories from Burma came flooding back, the beaming smiles from child monks,  a morning in Brighton last week where everything was beautiful and perfect, just as it was.  As she continued to talk I realised that despite  my self-doubts and “not-very-present” day, I’ve already woken up.  I’ve already experienced that glimpse into what our world is really like, opened that door to freedom.  But, and what I think resonates most from what I’m learning about Buddhism, is that these experiences are fleeting…it takes practice.  Practice, practice, practice.

Just like yoga, just like playing an instrument, or writing.  It takes practice.  Every day.  And eventually….”all is coming.”

Ayurveda: in dreams

Soooo, I went back for my two-week appointment, having ALMOST followed her guidelines meticulously.  There were a couple of days here and there where I deviated from the food plan and my dedication to crushing three teaspoons of coriander seeds into a glass of water every night waned, but all-in-all I was feeling like a good…I want to say student instead of patient.

I wasn’t sure what to expect.  Whether it would be a simple – check up and go – here’s your diet plan for the rest of your life, or a thorough reevaluation.

Having monitored my toilet breaks, written about my emotional ups and downs here on the blog, I’d felt prepared for both, but still, when our conversation got going and some of the more probing questions were introduced I was caught off-guard.

My understanding of the remedies and what they do, and how they make me feel wasn’t particularly acute.  In fact, it was all a bit of a blur.  I knew that one made me hiccup, some had more bitter tastes than others, but how had they changed me?  What were they doing to me?

I’ve decided that over the next two weeks (until my next appointment) this will be my primary focus.

Night Remedy.  1 tsp of dark brown powder mixed into small cup of hot water – “are you sleeping deeply?” she asked me.  I had to think for a bit.

“Yes.  Mostly I am.”  In fact, I’d been sleeping better than I had for a long-time, but every now and again I’d wake up in the night, or feel really groggy the next day.

“Have you been having dreams?”  She continued…and it was then that I drew a blank.  Dreams?  I usually pay really close attention to my dreams.  They’re often incredibly vivid and action-packed, so the fact that I drew a blank, made me assume, “no.  I’m not having dreams.”

It was then that she told me the night-remedy is about encouraging deep sleep, and its in deep sleep that we heal, that we recover.  I am aware of all of this from the yoga and meditation, but realised that now, with the changes in my diet and additional herbal concoctions, this point was particularly prevalent.

My ayurvedic treatment is, much like my meditation, about purging and letting go.  Letting go!  It’s difficult to believe how much stuff I’ve been holding onto.  The weight!  The unbearable weight of it all…and it just keeps falling.

The last two nights I’ve kept a notepad by the side of my bed.  Pen at the ready.  As soon as I wake I make a quick note of the main things I’ve dreamt of.

Friday night – it was traveling and train journeys, amends with estranged friends, and facing up to a far-too-obvious truth regarding an ex-of sorts.

Last night –

36 Henley Street.  Landlords.  Housemates.  Being back there.  New kitchen.  Eating the pizza – lying, making up excuses, feeling guilty.  Don’t lie in the first place.  Don’t eat the pizza!!

A bit random, perhaps, but it relates back to a similar break-through from when I was in meditation.  A traumatizing experience with the blue bucket.

Day 2 – soooo restless and bored (now that I wasn’t allowed to sleep in my rest breaks and private meditation).  Decided to give myself a make-shift pedicure.  Hmmmm….blue bucket.  Right, fill up the blue bucket with hot water and soap.  Place bucket on floor by bed, soak right foot, sit back and relax.  Ahhhh, this meditation malarkey isn’t so bad.  A few minutes have passed.  Time to empty the bucket…but my foot’s going to drip across the floor.  So, I cleverly decide to hop, and slide my feet towards the shower drain.  A LITTLE bit of pressure on the floor of the bucket, but ah well.  Sure it’ll be fine.   Now its time for the left foot.  Hot water and soap in the bucket, left foot placed into the bucket, lean back and relax….hot water everywhere!  Seeping, from a thin crack in the sky-blue plastic.  Fuck!

Now, any normal person would have mopped up the water, gone to management, told them about the bucket and requested a new one.

I, on the other hand, went through 4 distinct stages.

1) Denial.  Rest of day 2 – day 4.  It must have been there before.  I can’t believe they gave me a broken bucket!

2) Partial Acceptance  – day 4.  Ok.  It was me.  I broke the bucket…..now what the hell do I do about it?  Panic, fear, will they charge me for it, can I swap it with somebody else?

3) Make-shift Resolution – day 5 – shower-cap on the bottom of bucket = no more spillage!  Hoorah (short-lived).

4) Taking responsibility for my actions.  Day 7 – particularly intense day of meditation, in which I identified this whole bucket scenario as being symptomatic of a much much greater issue.  Recognition – Acceptance – Dissolution.  If I was going to start to combat this destructive pattern, then I’d have to face up to the bucket once and for all.

Day 9 – I marched up to management – bucket in tow, and in my noble-silence sign language admitted my mistake, made my apologies and held my breath waiting for the consequences.  She looked at me, confused as fuck…

That bucket, much like this pizza I ate in my dream, haunted and taunted me, creating so much guilt, and stress, that could have been avoided if I’d just throw my hands up into the air and say straight off the bat, “I’m sorry, I’ve been a dick and done something stupid”

Where has this crippling fear of making mistakes arisen from?  All I can do, and what I’ve learnt, is that it doesn’t really matter what the root cause is as such.  If you can break the habit in the now, then all the past stresses and weight unravels.  It gets stripped out of you, along with the root cause, and you are set free.

Since my return from Thailand I’ve been making a conscious effort to stop lying.  It’s usually about things like agreeing to things that I don’t really want to do, not wanting to hurt anyone’s feelings, or saying I like something when I don’t, covering up a spillage on the carpet, or hiding empty wrappers of chocolate bars…in breaking the habit its manifesting as the panic-striken yell of, “SUE!  I’VE MADE A MISTAKE!”  Bobbles from the window blinds sucked up into the hoover; declining an invitation to a party because I just can’t afford it;  no more elaborate excuses and just admitting to my Ayurveda dr I’d double-booked, any chance of rescheduling?!

It’s surprisingly hard, and I find myself going down the path of creativity and pulling myself back in again.  NO!  TRUTH Laura – TRUTH!  Plain and simple.  Perhaps it will get easier in time, and these dreams will leave me.  Perhaps even just admitting it, and being open about this particular struggle of mine will help me to let go of whatever it is.

Perhaps that’s why I’m struggling so much with this whole job-seeking thing…because as recruitment processes stand its going against this new-found determination.  I came across a job I felt excited about the other day.  The salary’s lower than what I was on before I went away, but it was the first company that invited people to apply – and be creative, be them!  How refreshing it was, and how fearless I felt in getting in touch and saying this is me…if I’m a fit – GREAT let’s chat, if not, it doesn’t matter.

It reminded me that its worth holding out to find the right job…the one that encourages balance in an individual – celebrates it.

Whenever I feel that fear creeping up, like when I’m standing at the till in the Oxfam shop, and have to press the buttons just right, I take a step back…look around me…if I make a mistake so what?  The manager behind me is smiling away, ready to help if I need her, the customer is smiling away too, probably thinking, “Ah, bless.  Volunteer on her first day!”  I think back to that wonderful TED lecture that Tamsin posted on my blog ages ago…Ken Robinson’s “schools kill creativity”.

If you’re not prepared to be wrong you’ll never come up with anything original….[in business] we stigmatize mistakes….[in education] mistakes are the worst things we can make…as a result we are educating people out of their creative capacities

(if the link’s broken – try this: http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html)

In Ayurvedic terms my constitution is predominantly Vata.  When in balance this is movement, creativity, generating of ideas and thinking quickly.  Then I am Kapha – which is grounded and caring.   Wanting to look after people.  But when we go through a competitive “Pitta” education system which gears us up for an even more competitive working environment, then where does that leave the Vata/Kapha types?  On a back foot…out of balance.

If I take an even bigger step back, I can see why this stage in my life, this point of transition is so fundamentally important.  Look around us.  The education system Ken Robinson pulls into question in such an inspiring manner, the  distrust we have in business, in the banks, in our politicians.  Our POLITICIANS!  I went to boarding school for two years, and watching them heckle and bully in the house of commons is about as inspiring as getting caught in the cross-fire of the absurd abuse of the Wargrave and Gonville boys in the Common Room when I was 17.  It’s a disgrace.

Where do we go from here?  What are our alternatives?

I guess we have to start from inside.  Each one of us.  My Ayurvedic dr says its important to stay true to yourself, echoing the advice of Matthew, of Goenka, of all these inspiring people who are helping so many others to find balance and happiness.

I can see my path, where I’m headed.  It’s the now, it’s the short-term that I’m struggling with.   And perhaps that’s because right now, I’m still out of balance.  I still have a lot of purging to do, and habits to break.  In being patient and holding out for a job that encourages creativity and individuality then perhaps I will break one of my most crippling lifetime habits of all.  In breaking with the system, I lose that fear.  I find truth and balance.

Ayurveda – Day 11 – This is my body…

I return to the Ayurvedic clinic in 3 days time to evaluate my progress and see whether all these potions and strict diet regulation has had its desired effect: has it brought down my pitta, and brought my Vata-Kapha constitution back into balance?

Anticipating the spectrum and detail of questions that lay ahead, I think I might start monitoring these next three days closely, and see where I’m at.

As an overview, I can say that physically there still seems to be some imbalances happening.  Trips to the toilet are still rather frequent and unceremonious, and my sinuses are playing up, (Pitta and Kapha traits), but my skin is clear and soft, where it was dry and flaky (Vata), and my eyes, whilst still a bit heavy in the morning, are no longer blood-shot (Pitta).  I have more energy, sleeping better, but my body is cracking and popping a lot in practice (Vata).  So what I’m seeing are elements of each dosha flaring up at different times and now I’m starting to be able to recognise that, it really is quite wonderfully liberating.  Ayurveda translates as life knowledge, and even if I’m not completely in balance, my awareness of my body and my surroundings is becoming more sensitive and finely tuned.  Maybe that’s not down to Ayurveda in itself, and more a combination of the yoga and meditation, but I think they’re all just incredibly useful tools, that when used in collaboration, are truly empowering.

So – take my practice for instance.  90 minutes spent with such close attention to my physical body, my breath and its movement allows me to identify any differences, changes…how am I responding to the intensity, the heat?  Do I feel energised or lethargic?  Would I prefer moon or primary?  Am I feeling dense and heavy, or light?  What’s the state of my mind?  Am I  focused and have my teeth clenched, or a bit scatty with a silly smile on my face?   Am I getting angry about the poses I can’t get into, skipping them all together just to get to Savasana, or dreading Savasana with crazy monkey perched gleefully on my shoulder, waiting with strumming fingertips to dive into my brain and create a whole bunch of chaos?  Each variant of the above tells me what particular dosha is in excess, or depletion, and even though I’m at the beginning of all of this, I am starting to get an inkling, or have ideas of what I can do to help to reign it all in.

Ayurveda isn’t just about diet (although I think that is where my greatest gap in knowledge is in this particular moment), but our surroundings and environment.  Is it a stupidly hot day?  (Probably not  – it’s the UK). But just imagine it is, then a really intense, faster paced Primary series probably isn’t my best choice.  If it’s a bit cold, and I need a bit of a jump-start then primary it is.  The people around us.  How are we reacting to them?  One of the first triggers that got me to the Ayurvedic clinic in the first place was an uncharacteristic irritability and misplaced frustration.  i was aware enough at the time (largely due to the meditation) that it wasn’t about anyone else or my situation…it was about me.  My inability to cope was an imbalance somewhere….and I needed help from someone to put it right.

Putting the physical symptoms and effects to one side, in just 11 days I’m a new person emotionally and mentally.  My circumstances haven’t changed.  Employment still eludes me, with an incrementally higher degree of pressure….(checked my bank balance yesterday), weather’s still shit, and I’m as single as I was when I turned 30, but I can process it.  Deal with it.

On Sunday I was travelling back from London on the train.  A rare blast of sunlight penetrated the glass and washed my face with heat.  I could have been in Burma in that moment, riding the bus from Inle Lake to Bagan, two monks sitting across the aisle, that light inside
me beaming away.   I opened my eyes.  This was England, and I can still feel that joy.

It’s not been easy coming back.  It still isn’t.  There are elements of my trip that I miss sometimes.  Such as the undercurrents of compassion and acceptance of a Buddhist society, the hilarious jokes about opening chakras and gate-crashing tantric workshops, that can only really be appreciated by the circle of friends I grew to love in Bamboo.  But there’s always skype, and for fear of pulling you into a world that really doesn’t make sense, when I close my practice with Metta loving-kindness meditation, I can feel other people doing it too.  It’s a connection above and beyond social media, its something that you feel right there in your centre.

I guess where I’m at, 11 days into my Ayurvedic treatment, and one month back from my incredible adventure, is back to a place of acceptance.  The lessons I’d learnt, I feared I’d lost, and yet with all these challenges I’ve faced and knock-backs, I’ve come back to  “This is my body, and this is real.”  How amazing it feels to know inside, without a doubt, that despite everything, I’m on the right path and I’m still moving forwards.

Vipassana – Day 5 – part one – Effervescence

The same day that I noticed significant weight loss, and a flat stomach, was the same day that I stopped caring about stuff like that.  It was the day that my understanding of what the physical body means was completely overturned.

By the morning of the 5th day, I’d already done about 45 hours of meditation, 3 of which had been “hours of determination” and my connection to my body had significantly deepened.  Remember that patch beneath my nose that I couldn’t feel for the life of me…well I didn’t even need to think about my breath anymore.  The sensation I felt there, moment to moment, was this warm, ceaseless effervescence.   It didn’t stop.  And at times, when I was in a comfortable position…such as The Phoenix, I could feel that same distinctive sensation in other parts of my body too.  When it happened a connection was formed between the two patches of skin, and it would have this kind of ripple effect through neighbouring body parts.  Without being able to talk to anyone I wasn’t sure whether this was meant to be happening or not…all I knew was that I was to keep scanning my attention in the same methodical, repetitive way…hmmm isn’t that interesting…the tip of my left index finger is dissolving, knuckle of  left index finger, dissolving too, and left palm…hmmm, isn’t that interesting.  Left wrist…pause a moment…don’t feel anything….pause a little longer…hmm..isn’t that interesting….pause.  If you were stuck in one place for a long time you were meant to observe it as it was, wait a little longer…a minute or two, and if still there wasn’t a sensation you move on.  There were blind-spots dispersed around the body.  Parts of you that you are, in that moment, unable to experience.  If you began to crave for that experience, that effervescence, then you were effectively distancing yourself further from complete self-awareness.

Craving – trying to hold on to, grasping, clinging, longing for or wanting whatever you are not experiencing, or do not have, so much that your mind becomes unbalanced.

It makes sense, that with attachment we experience unhappiness.  How simple.  Those positive sensations we feel like the effervescence in meditation, or the great surge of pleasure when we take that first bite of a rich and creamy chocolate cake is wonderful, in that moment, but like any other moment, it will rise and fall, it will appear and disappear.  If we become attached, we start to crave for it, which takes us out of our present moment and that pleasure becomes pain and misery.

Aversion – negativity, hatred, anger, fear.  Trying to get away from or to push out of your mind whatever reality you are actually facing.

I read these definitions that had been put up on the board alongside our daily schedule, with great focus and concentration.  Whilst I already understood the meanings of these words intellectually, it was a very different thing indeed to start to make sense of them  on an experiential level.  I was beginning to appreciate the significance of Vipassana training, what it was that we were trying to achieve.  In learning to experience and understand sensations and feelings in our bodies, without craving or aversion we were training ourselves on how to live in the present, how to live life moment to moment, and effectively eliminate unnecessary misery…Creating all this space for a simple and pure happiness.

But, that was only one side of it.  In the first minute of  the second hour of Adhitthana (strong determination) on that fifth day I took one final glance around me and felt envious of the three young boys in the back row…how much closer they must be to enlightenment.  In order to reach this state of purity, we must first re-experience the backlog and root causes of all the cravings and aversions we ever felt.  I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and started with the patch of skin on the crown of my head…already the volatile nature of that right hip of mine, packed so tightly with all that anger, all that pain starting to seethe and stir.

Ayurveda – Day One – the diagnosis.

I cheated, and actually started with my remedies last night.

1/2 tsp of beige powder before dinner, stirred into hot water.  Had a bit of a kick – but actually quite tasty!

Dinner.  Virtually EVERYTHING I had in the fridge had to be surrendered to the rest of the house…no tomatoes, cucumber, bananas, oranges, mango.  No salmon, bread, peanut butter, marmite.  No porridge, green tea, coffee, honey.  Just to name a few…

So I went back to the shops and ended up having a rather delicious tofu stir-fry with whole grain basmati rice, peppers, garlic and spinach.  Followed by…

1/2 tsp of a greenish powder.  Not so tasty!

Then I crushed 3 tsp’s of coriander seeds in a petri dish, poured them into a glass of water, and placed it on the side table to soak over night.

Finished my day with 1 tsp of night remedy, to which the pressure at the bridge of my nose suddenly lifted, nasal passages bursting open.  Made a right old mess, but ahhh, what a relief…even if it was only temporary.

Morning.  Drain crushed seeds out of glass of water.  Consume.  So cooling and refreshing – need to pee!

Now I’m working my way through a 1 tsp of yellowish powder, 1 tsp of pinkish powder mix…and the insides of my mouth are burning, just a little bit.  Something’s happening in my stomach.  A deep, hot-tempered rumble…movement.  I imagine I’ll have to go to the toilet again in a minute….

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

So, the burning question….what is my dosha constitution?

First off, what is a dosha constitution?  I view it as a kind of health/nutritional horoscope.  Vata – air, Pitta – fire, Kapha – earth.  We’re all born with either one of these, or two, or – I think very rarely – three in combination as our prominent dosha type- and that is our mental and physical constitution.  It’s who we are, and doesn’t ever change.  Then there’s other factors in our ever-fluctuating environments that play a role in all of it too.  I could waffle on and not do any of this highly regarded, ancient system the justice it deserves…or you could (and I highly recommend you do) take a quick read of this overview:

http://www.theayurvedicclinic.com/index.php/about

The three dosha’s and the 5 great elements they are composed from (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The first step with all of this life-knowledge stuff, is to establish what your basic constitution is.  I’ve had a bit of a nightmare with mine, and I guess the best advice I can give is to do some research.  Read a good book, take some online tests to get an inkling of what you think you might be.  What resonates?  What do you read and feel in your stomach – yes – that’s me!  That is so me!  Then take more on-line tests, do some more reading, and if you decide that you do want to deepen your understanding then book yourself in for a consultation.  They say you don’t need to prepare anything, but I would spend a couple of days paying attention to your daily routine.  How well do you sleep, when do you wake up, how do you feel when you wake up?  Do you go straight to the toilet, or have to drink a coffee first?  When you get to the toilet, well, I suppose this isn’t something that we do normally either, but pay attention to that too.  Like I said before, it’s better to get comfortable talking about your bowel movements and the likes, otherwise you might get a bit flummoxed and prudish, “Oh – I say!  I don’t poo!”  Which is blatantly untrue, so just put all that social etiquette to one side, and get on with it.

Think about what you eat, how regularly you eat, and what type of foods you fancy.  Chocolate, crisps, or a spring roll?  You can only choose one….what are you going to choose?  I ummmed and ahhhed for a good few minutes…I LOVE chocolate, but generally I prefer savoury…and a spring roll – well that’s a pleasant surprise, and would fill me up.  But how I enjoy a packet of monster munch…”You can only have one!”  She nudged me towards making a decision.  I went with the spring-roll.

Anyway, you’ll be answering all those types of questions, including the emotional stuff that I mentioned yesterday, and all the while she’s observing you…how you respond to things, what your body language is saying.  The way your eyes dart around the room when you touch on a topic that’s sensitive to you, or your left hand clamps down on your right shoulder…unconsciously massaging it while you try to articulate an answer.  God knows what else she or he will be paying attention to, but at the end of the consultation they’ll know what your constitution is.  They probably knew before you got through your first sentence…

Just to be sure, they take your pulse.  Breathe in deeply, breathe out.   Breathe in deeply, breathe out.  Ok.  Now stick out your tongue.

I have a good tongue apparently!

She pauses, and you can’t help but feel the rise of anticipation…what am I?  What am I?

For me it was particularly significant because this was my second consultation.  Before my first one, I’d done some reading…not much, but enough to feel a resonance with Vata.  Not physically perhaps, but in the way I feel and think and respond to things like stress and grief.  So when I was told I was Pitta-Kapha it completely spun me out.  I went away, spent sleepless night after sleepless night fretting and stressing about it…it was as disorienting as if I’d been told I wasn’t a Gemini afterall.  Had been a Taurus all this time.  Ok – I know some of you may scoff at the astronomy stuff…but the thing that’s important was that sense of identity.  I went back and challenged.  Having done more reading and self-observation it still felt wrong…

I mean there are parts of us that resonate with all the doshas.  I have a Pitta-look.  Blue eyes, reddish skin, freckles.  I have some of the Kapha symptoms – suffer from congestion and have a tendency to comfort eat, but then my mind is Vata through and through.  Difficulty sleeping, flitting from topic to topic…if I’m upset about something I become extremely anxious and highly-strung…not explosive like a Pitta, or reclusive like a Kapha…Anyway – you can see where some of the confusion comes in.

My constitution was reaffirmed as Pitta-Kapha, and I decided to sit with it for a while.  Either this was a case of me being attached to something and needing to accept that and let go, or it was a case of learning to trust myself above and beyond what teachers or experts  tell me.

I’ve been wrestling with that ever since.  Which is where I think Matthew was such a wonderful fit for me as a teacher.  He knows best…you know that.  His experience, his integrity as a teacher…but does he?  He wanted us to challenge, to have faith in our own convictions.  I remember when he was helping me and Thea (my fellow less flexible than the rest of the group yogi) get into lotus.  Groaning, and grunting, and cursing, we were part encouraging, part forcing our  legs into position, when he suddenly said, “come out of it!”  We released and he told us we had to listen to ourselves…know ourselves.  If a teacher, even if its him, is pushing us into something and the pain is too much, or something doesn’t feel quite right – then you ALWAYS listen to yourself…above and beyond what teachers or experts tell you.

So.  Here I am, second time round.  Sitting on the sofa, waiting for the diagnosis….What am I?  What am I?

Vata-Kapha, with a massive Pitta imbalance.

My response?

Initially – so, I’ve gone from a fiery-tempered fatty to an airy-fairy fatty…Brilliant!  Really pleased its the fatty bit that’s remained consistent….

A bit later on, as I head towards the seafront for a walk- hmmm, isn’t that interesting…an air and earth polarity?  Fatty isn’t so bad.  It’s about being more caring and nurturing.  Wanting to look after people.  I do want both…to fly away and lose myself in the air, but have a home and settle down.  I don’t get angry very often…I never have done, etc etc… Perhaps, for all this time, it wasn’t the Kapha I was resisting, but the Pitta…

When I headed back to the station, three hours later, Vata-Kapha was starting to feel right.

I’m going to sit with it for a while.  Continue to read and learn, and self-observe.  Stick to my remedies and diet plan for the next two weeks and see how it goes : )

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Here’s a ink to a fun quiz if you’re interested: http://www.whatsyourdosha.com/quiz/quiz.html

Related articles

• Determine Your Ayurvedic Constitution. ~ Brian Leaf (elephantjournal.com)
• AAAAAAHHHyurveda revisited (lauranamaste.wordpress.com)

English: Dhanvantari (धन्वंतरी), known as an avatar of Vishnu is the Hindu god associated with Ayurveda. The above photo was taken at a recent Ayurveda expo in Bangalore titled ‘Arogya’. ಕನ್ನಡ: ಧನ್ವಂತರಿ. संस्कृत: धन्वंतरी. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So, way back, before I’d been on the Vipassana course, before I even knew what Vipassana was, I had a brief fling with Ayurveda.  I say fling.  It was a one-night stand that spun me out of control.  It turned my life, my sense of identity upside down, and so I decided I wasn’t quite ready for it, and let it rest.

Now, I’m back in the UK, have very little to do other than maintain my practice (it’s actually REALLY hard) and apply for jobs all day, I figured it would be the perfect opportunity to revisit that blue hole.

I hope you don’t mind flitting from meditation to Ayurveda like this.  It just seems to be the way it works.  You get the taste of something, and that leads onto something else, and that goes hand-in-hand with this and that, and eventually you’ve gone full circle, and its time to add another layer onto what you learnt the first time round.  For me, this type of process is wonderful.  Absolutely wonderful.  Because I love learning new things.  Especially when it all has this ancient and magical resonance.

With the little bit of Ayurveda I’ve been exposed to, I knew, without a doubt, that despite no real physical symptoms I was out of balance.  Paying attention to my sleeping patterns, my response to things, my coping mechanisms, my appetite, trips to the toilet (if you’re interested in Ayurveda, then it is essential that you have a good sense of toilet-humour), and perhaps most telling of all – my yoga practice, I’d kind of started to self-diagnose which dosha was in excess, and why I was feeling the way I was.

So.  I did my research.  Brighton’s great for this kind of thing.  I knew I’d find someone respected in this particular field.  It’s a risk, paying for something like this.  But, when I sat opposite her and answered her first question, “why are you here?” My immediate response, “I don’t feel like me, I feel lost.”   reassured me that it was a risk worth taking.

Let’s revisit my priority list:

1) Spirituality

2) Health

3) Friends and Family

4) Work

If I’m going to take this seriously, adhere to the things I learnt, and really, genuinely try to turn my life around, then I have to listen to my body.  And right now, my body’s confused and completely out-of-whack.

So there I am.  Sitting on that black leather couch, across from the kindest, jolliest dr I’ve ever met.  Within two minutes I’m at ease with her and laughing about family life, travelling, the English demeanour.  I trust her.  There’s an openness that’s very rare.  She drew me in.  Thirty minutes, without knowing how it’s happened, she knows everything about me from my first period, to now, and I’m crying my eyes out over a flipping break-up that happened years ago.  Jesus!  Am I still not over that???  What’s wrong with me? It took her a bit of probing to get me there, but once she hit the spot, that was it.   The whole sorry chain of events that happened after that came spilling out, until I took a breath, sat back and said…”sorry.”

She was leaning in, ever so gently, and listening with every part of her body.  I realised then, that the reason I was crying, is because no-one has ever asked me those questions before.  We don’t do that do we?  Sit across from a friend and ask and ask and ask, until the tears come spilling out.  No.  We buy drinks for each other, pat each other on the back…there, there.  Happy to listen, of course, but if it gets emotional, we all get a little bit uncomfortable and sigh with relief when somebody makes a joke.  It’s not because we don’t care.  It’s because we don’t feel equipped to deal with it.  It’s not in our culture.  My Dr said that treating Westerners is an entirely different process from treating people back in her home, Sri Lanka.   She can treat stomach issues with her patients directly, whereas with westerners, she has to go in two stages….first the head, then the stomach.

So many of our illnesses and injuries are psychological.  We are so in our heads all the time, and have so few channels through which we can release it all, that we get all uptight and blocked up.  If we do make contact with it all, and let it spill out of us, where can we go for support?  We don’t have temples and compassionate monks, and even the family dynamic is not what it used to be.  Not in every case, of course, but I think its safe to say that most of us go it alone most of the time, and bottle things up.

So, I guess that’s one of the many reasons that I’m drawn to Ayurveda.  You see, she recognised, probably the second I sat down, that there was a lot of stuff going on back there I didn’t want to talk about…that I was hiding from.  Her job is to cure the source of illness, i.e. imbalances within us.  In lots of cases that’s repressed emotions.  Unspoken anger and hidden fears.  Pains we don’t admit to, and just that exhausting tension of constantly, forever lying to ourselves that everything’s ok, when deep down we’re really fucking hurting.

The fact that I still – after all this time – carry those things inside me is frustrating.  I’ve worked really hard at all of this.  I’ve faced up to so many things, and when I progress with my Vipassana story you’ll see how intense that all became.  So how much more can there be left in me?

I guess now’s the time I find out.

She diagnosed my imbalance, which I’ll address in the next “Ayurveda” instalment,  administered numerous sachets of powders, provided me with a list of foods I’m to favour and to avoid, and sent me off with a loving and warm embrace.

Tomorrow I start the remedies.  Let’s see if this particular risk pays off….

Well over 100 hours of solitude

4 am – the bells toll.

I leap out of bed, completely forgetting where I am.  Its pitch black outside, and I can’t see the moon…

Shower on…water’s fucking cold…I clamp my teeth down on my tongue and start jumping on the spot, hands flailing about, nails scratching the walls….mustn’t let that word bellow out.  Silently I scream…fffuuuuuuuuuuuucccccccccccckkkKKKKKKKK!!!

4.20 am – the bells toll.

I scramble about my room trying to find appropriate clothing.  Long-sleeve, high-neck top, bottoms that cover the knees.  It’s not even daybreak and already the humidity is stifling…

4.30 am – meditation hall is nearly full.  They look like shadows, silently creeping to their allotted thrones, a mere two seconds to transfix into stone.  I breathe in and close my eyes.  Today it is all about the breath.  Simply breathing.  Relax and breathe.  In and out, through the nose…just breathe…

4.40 am – OMG I’m sleepy…can barely sit up right…come on…stay with it.  Breathe.

6 am? – Have no idea how much time has passed, but have planned the rest of my trip, made 3 to-do lists, and decided that thing I said to that person 3 years, 5 months and 2 days ago, probably was a bit uncalled for…when are these dratted bells going to toll again? (it’s actually 4.50)

4.55 am – OH MY GOOD GOD….right….breathing, breathing, its all about the breath.  Breathe in, breathe out…unbearable itching on my leg.  That’s a bug, it must be a bug…I can feel its little hands climbing up the inside of my thigh….brush it away.

5 am – bug on my face!  bug on my face!  that has to be a bug on my face…brush it away.

5.05 am – pry one eye open, and look about.  Relax my posture and start reading the mottos on the back of people’s’ T-shirts.  4th girl in, 5th row.  A yogi for sure.  Back so straight…sanskrit across white cotton on her shoulder-blade.  First row, fifth girl in…my oh my – she’s beautiful.  Not traditionally Thai looking, black hair has an unruly kink, gold nose-stud, Indian looking.  Meredith, model-esque Dutch girl across from me, shifting her weight from side to side…she’s struggling.

When are these dratted bells going to ring?

5.07, 5.11, 5.18, 5.20….Every bloody minute that passed my mind scrambled up some rocky path, eager, energetic, boundlessly curious, like a puppy being let off his lead… I couldn’t,  just couldn’t, for the life of me, do what I was supposed to do.  Just breath.  Breathe in, breathe out, pay attention to the breath.

AHHHHH!

5.30 am – Just as I thought I was going to collapse into the floor-boards and disappear for ever through sheer boredom, the stereo began and jolted me up right.  When, oh when, did the teacher come in???  What a sly little thing….

Goenka was in full mantra flow, undulating through his song, but with no apparent tempo or tone…not like the mantras I’d heard before.  His voice would dim into a gravelly silence, and my heart would lift…FINALLY…finally we could leave….I started to shift my crooked legs, massage heat back into my dead toes; and then that voice would start again.  Cracking, seething, rasping, bellowing…silencing….can we go (I cautiously hoped)…..and again he’d resume his song.  It went on and on and on and on, until the light had faded from my eyes, the sparkling observations gone…but at least, in that time my mind had started to focus on exactly what it was meant to….Breathe in, breathe out.  Anything but listen to that terrible song.

6 am – Goenka paused, the silence dragged out….bells tollled – it was breakfast time.

The first hour…

A deathly quiet fell over us as we entered the netted hall.  It was 7 pm, and the reign of noble silence had just begun.

I dared not look at anyone, for fear of communicating with my eyes and expression.  Adrenaline was thumping, and I was beginning to sweat.

We entered the hall through the drapes of a mosquito net.  The smell…I recognised that smell.  It was the same smell as the fabric of the bridesmaid’s dress I wore to my uncle Gary’s wedding over twenty years ago.

The meditation hall was large with high ceilings, but the flooring and panels were dark, and the slanted shutters resisted any sunlight. The room was, once again, divided in two.  A large block of navy blue cushions on one side, a  smaller rectangle of sky-blue cushions arranged in symmetry on the other.  A single row of low benches aligned the left wall.  The cushions were a deep brown, complimenting the orange robes of the monks already settled there.  I felt a rush of excitement when I saw them.   Their presence added a layer of authenticity that I hadn’t expected – it was a privilege to have the opportunity to witness their discipline.

I scoured the name tags, from row to row.  There were about 45 women on the course, and there I was – no. 38.  Next to Izabel, the lovely German girl I’d spoken to a few minutes before, but was now, under this new reign, a stranger.

I sat cross-legged, perched comfortably on a smaller brick-sized cushion, and rested my hands on the top of my knees, pulled in my stomach, straightened my back, just as I had sat for all that time during the month-long intensive on Koh P.  My right knee was still noticeably higher than the left, and I knew from experience that within a short space of time, I would start to feel a bit of tension in that right hip, and the tingling sensation of pins and needles in my feet.  I wriggled out of my pose, and looked behind me; spied a plastic container of numerous navy blue cushions in varying shapes and sizes.  The room was still quietly active as meditators located their places and so I nipped to the back of the room, and picked up another brick.  I needed to get my hips higher than my knees to keep the blood-flow…well….flowing.

I wasn’t sure what the rationale was behind the order in which we were placed, but judging by the manner in which those two celestial beings glided past me towards the front row…I was pretty confident that I’d landed myself in the familiar Beginners’ Back Row!

A stillness washed over the colony of seated meditators, perched so gracefully upon their blue thrones, as the teacher emerged from the darkness of a hidden room.  All in white, he could have been a spectacular vision, but he was so unassuming, so humble, it was only by chance that I’d noticed him.  He didn’t speak, but pressed play on the sound system, and a great booming voice echoed off the hollow walls.  It was Goenka’s opening mantra.  A Sanskrit song that we closed our eyes to.  Ten days of meditation ahead of us, we surrendered to the first hour…