For the past week my mind had been obsessed with soul, what it is, what it does and how to unleash it. A fundamental part of my current understanding was interdependence, not just the intellectual understanding of it but the expression of it. However, the more I closed my mind in on the subject, the less I interacted and connected with the people around me. Ironically enough, this focus on interdependence and mind isolated and blocked my soul from other - the exact opposite effect I desired. So, I entered my six-day yoga retreat at Sadhana with mixed emotions and many questions. Will this retreat help reveals the mysteries of Soul and Mind? Do these secrets even need to be understood? And more practically, can I do yoga without looking like a complete idiot? Thankfully, concern over these questions proved to be pointless. For a few days into the retreat, I realized the focus lay less on the Soul and Mind and more on eating and chilling out. Just what I needed.
While we did practice yoga and meditation for 5 or 6 hours a day, most of the real action occured during our huge breaks inbetween sessions. Mainly this was due to the fantastic people. Of course there was the cyclical discussions of where you were from and what you were doing in Nepal, but with quite a few people I was able to move a bit past these formalities and engage in some solid, meaningful discussions. More importantly, we were able to have goofy, meaningless conversation which always seemed to erupt uncontained laughter at the most inappropriate times. This may sound like a simple pleasure, but for the past week I felt like my mind had been spinning and flipping around on a solitary alien planet. After a while, not pleasant. On the other hand, talking and laughing grounded me back in reality and relieved the vertigo of a mind wandering a bit too far. Of course, this was pleasant.
As it normally does, simply being happy and content opened the door to memorable experiences. One morning, a few girls and I walked up to the Yoga Centre rooftop and slapped mud all over each other's bodies. None of us could quite figure out how covering your body in mud was beneficial to your body and mind, but none of us could quite give a shit either. It was fun so we did it. Dancing to the Sun Gods like a bunch of swamp hippies taking ballerina lessons was fun too, so we did that as well. Not exactly high-class culture, but I've always held higher regard for absurdity than normalness anyways.
I suppose it's good that I prefer absurdity, for there was an abundance of it during a conversation I had with a shopowner down the road. It went something like this. "How old are you?" 22. "Are you married?" Haha, no. "Do you have a girlfriend?" Not at the moment. "Do you like Nepali girls?" Ya, they're pretty nice. "Would you like to marry one?" Uhhhh... (awkward silence)... what? A few inquiring questions later I learned there was a young Nepali woman named Santi up the road who was quite keen on marrying a foreigner. I explained to the shopowner that in America, two people usually knew each other and dated for years until they married, and then asked how it worked in Nepal. "You meet Santi now, and probably later today you get married. Maybe tomorrow." He then went on to describe how if we married, I could buy a small plot of land up the road, build a house and farm there, and come and go from America as I please. For a brief moment I looked out upon the lake, the idyllic hillside and joyous children playing around. I imagined working seasonally in America for four months, travelling for two months and living on a quiet farm in Nepal the rest of the year. Not a bad idea I thought. Then I thought just a tad bit harder and realized this was the stupidest idea I'd ever had. I darted back to the Centre, ignoring the pleas to wait and meet my potential Nepali wife.
Considering I momentarily considered marrying a stranger, it should come as no surprise my judgement dictated it wise to drink beer during a yoga retreat. Such it was, when a few of my closest yogis-to-be left the course and had one more night in Pokhara, I skipped afternoon meditation and yoga to replace peace with chaos. It started with a beer and Nepali jenga down by the river. Then there was some food. Next came some singing. Naturally, entranced dancing followed. Mixed inbetween there were public sun salutations and shameless smack talking. Moreson that any one particular event though, it was our glowing radiance of fervered insanity that made the night special. We carried around the auroa and grace of a wrecking ball. No thing or person around us was safe. Honestly, I'd probably consider our group a no-good bunch of rambunctuous jackasses if there wasn't so much sincere laughter and good spirits.
I should take a break from these stories and say this about the Yoga Retreat. It did involve yoga. Amazingly, I was able to retain some level of dignity despite my feeble attempts to stretch and contort my body. Even better, I feel like I learned a valuable tool for developing two tremendously important traits - awareness and presence. Through my daily life, my awareness is frequently held hostage by trifling thoughts and attachments. Like meditation, yoga helps me free my awareness and bring it back to the present moment. Once there, the inevitable times of suffering don't seem so frightening when they're stripped of the excessive worries and negative meanings I place on them. Moreso, the dull and boring moments are invigorated with the true colors and life they hold. Awareness and presence in the moment. Truly so crucially important. So important in fact, plenty of my exhausting mental explorations into Soul before the retreat were concerned with this. So important, I made myself look like a fool practicing yoga for six days in an effort to strengthen it
.
Yet, what I'm finding is that yoga, meditation and contemplation only account for a fraction of what I'm searching for. The rest of it lies elsewhere, and it seems to be found performing an activity I have aptly titled, "Living Life." During immersing conversation at Sadhana, I was connecting with other people. I may not have been cogniscent of it at the time, but I was experiencing interdependence. Making an ass of myself in public with drunk yogis may not be an acknowledged step on the path to enlightenment, but at least I was living in the moment. Throwing oneself into absolutely absurd situations was on neither the Kopan or Sadhana schedule, but sometimes it's when I have to ask myself "What the hell am I doing?" to actually be aware of exactly what the hell I'm doing.
Meditation, yoga and contemplating the soul have certainly proved to important parts of my spiritual path, but let's be honest here. I'm not going to be a religous scholar living in a library or a driven yogi living in a cave. I'm a simple human being who lives in a breathing world, and interdependence necessitates that this world is just as much a part of me as my sense of identity. So if I'm truly going to find the Nature of Soul or Enlightenment, the world and all of it people, chaos and absurdity are going along for the ride.
While we did practice yoga and meditation for 5 or 6 hours a day, most of the real action occured during our huge breaks inbetween sessions. Mainly this was due to the fantastic people. Of course there was the cyclical discussions of where you were from and what you were doing in Nepal, but with quite a few people I was able to move a bit past these formalities and engage in some solid, meaningful discussions. More importantly, we were able to have goofy, meaningless conversation which always seemed to erupt uncontained laughter at the most inappropriate times. This may sound like a simple pleasure, but for the past week I felt like my mind had been spinning and flipping around on a solitary alien planet. After a while, not pleasant. On the other hand, talking and laughing grounded me back in reality and relieved the vertigo of a mind wandering a bit too far. Of course, this was pleasant.
As it normally does, simply being happy and content opened the door to memorable experiences. One morning, a few girls and I walked up to the Yoga Centre rooftop and slapped mud all over each other's bodies. None of us could quite figure out how covering your body in mud was beneficial to your body and mind, but none of us could quite give a shit either. It was fun so we did it. Dancing to the Sun Gods like a bunch of swamp hippies taking ballerina lessons was fun too, so we did that as well. Not exactly high-class culture, but I've always held higher regard for absurdity than normalness anyways.
I suppose it's good that I prefer absurdity, for there was an abundance of it during a conversation I had with a shopowner down the road. It went something like this. "How old are you?" 22. "Are you married?" Haha, no. "Do you have a girlfriend?" Not at the moment. "Do you like Nepali girls?" Ya, they're pretty nice. "Would you like to marry one?" Uhhhh... (awkward silence)... what? A few inquiring questions later I learned there was a young Nepali woman named Santi up the road who was quite keen on marrying a foreigner. I explained to the shopowner that in America, two people usually knew each other and dated for years until they married, and then asked how it worked in Nepal. "You meet Santi now, and probably later today you get married. Maybe tomorrow." He then went on to describe how if we married, I could buy a small plot of land up the road, build a house and farm there, and come and go from America as I please. For a brief moment I looked out upon the lake, the idyllic hillside and joyous children playing around. I imagined working seasonally in America for four months, travelling for two months and living on a quiet farm in Nepal the rest of the year. Not a bad idea I thought. Then I thought just a tad bit harder and realized this was the stupidest idea I'd ever had. I darted back to the Centre, ignoring the pleas to wait and meet my potential Nepali wife.
Considering I momentarily considered marrying a stranger, it should come as no surprise my judgement dictated it wise to drink beer during a yoga retreat. Such it was, when a few of my closest yogis-to-be left the course and had one more night in Pokhara, I skipped afternoon meditation and yoga to replace peace with chaos. It started with a beer and Nepali jenga down by the river. Then there was some food. Next came some singing. Naturally, entranced dancing followed. Mixed inbetween there were public sun salutations and shameless smack talking. Moreson that any one particular event though, it was our glowing radiance of fervered insanity that made the night special. We carried around the auroa and grace of a wrecking ball. No thing or person around us was safe. Honestly, I'd probably consider our group a no-good bunch of rambunctuous jackasses if there wasn't so much sincere laughter and good spirits.
I should take a break from these stories and say this about the Yoga Retreat. It did involve yoga. Amazingly, I was able to retain some level of dignity despite my feeble attempts to stretch and contort my body. Even better, I feel like I learned a valuable tool for developing two tremendously important traits - awareness and presence. Through my daily life, my awareness is frequently held hostage by trifling thoughts and attachments. Like meditation, yoga helps me free my awareness and bring it back to the present moment. Once there, the inevitable times of suffering don't seem so frightening when they're stripped of the excessive worries and negative meanings I place on them. Moreso, the dull and boring moments are invigorated with the true colors and life they hold. Awareness and presence in the moment. Truly so crucially important. So important in fact, plenty of my exhausting mental explorations into Soul before the retreat were concerned with this. So important, I made myself look like a fool practicing yoga for six days in an effort to strengthen it
.
Yet, what I'm finding is that yoga, meditation and contemplation only account for a fraction of what I'm searching for. The rest of it lies elsewhere, and it seems to be found performing an activity I have aptly titled, "Living Life." During immersing conversation at Sadhana, I was connecting with other people. I may not have been cogniscent of it at the time, but I was experiencing interdependence. Making an ass of myself in public with drunk yogis may not be an acknowledged step on the path to enlightenment, but at least I was living in the moment. Throwing oneself into absolutely absurd situations was on neither the Kopan or Sadhana schedule, but sometimes it's when I have to ask myself "What the hell am I doing?" to actually be aware of exactly what the hell I'm doing.
Meditation, yoga and contemplating the soul have certainly proved to important parts of my spiritual path, but let's be honest here. I'm not going to be a religous scholar living in a library or a driven yogi living in a cave. I'm a simple human being who lives in a breathing world, and interdependence necessitates that this world is just as much a part of me as my sense of identity. So if I'm truly going to find the Nature of Soul or Enlightenment, the world and all of it people, chaos and absurdity are going along for the ride.
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