Into the woods...I mean my unconscious

Oops, I forgot to post my entry saying that I was leaving for 2 weeks to go "up north." On May 20th I drove up to Dallas, picking up 3 girls in Austin along the way, for a 10 day Vipassana meditation course. Participants arrive on day 0 and leave on day 11, so it's really 12 days. There was no talking during the 10 days of meditation, except for minimal communication with the facilitators and teacher, and other than that: pure breath.

Each day we awoke to a bell/gong at 4am and then started meditating at 4:30. Breakfast was at 6:30. We took several breaks throughout the day, but 11 full hours were spent in seated meditation. I usually passed out around 9:30pm. Mind you, I was not able to focus the entire time, and probably spent hours trying to refocus my mind back to the breath after it wandered into the hills of Peru, to the chocolate I'd eaten before arriving, to that one thing my ex-boyfriend said to me one time, to something I'd been meaning to tell one of my friends, what I wanted to do next in my life's journey, etc etc etc. It was amazing some of the stuff I dug up from the depths of my relatively short human experience. It was amazing too how often I came back to the same thoughts over and over, and how much of our daily mind dribble is just the same record of habitual thoughts repeating relentlessly, whether we realize it or not.

It was very interesting to see how all the internal junk manifested externally. All of the yucky stuff we store deep down inside ourselves, not even anything so terrible necessarily, but maybe some aversion to a specific thing, say green olives, that you've reacted to hundreds or thousands of times with a negative knee-jerk reaction (that "Ick!" face or a shudder even), and then bury it over and over again. There wasn't one person who didn't become ill during the program as a result of all this dis-ease bubbling to the surface. The first day I thought I was going to throw up, and I wanted to leave. The second day I got a rash. Good thing I did ride-share, or I might have fled. My ego said No No No, this isn't for you, you're fine, you don't need to do this...RUN!!! Get away from this discomfort! But I just kept on sitting and breathing. It's so funny to think of all those people (there were about 90), who were by appearances calmly sitting cross-legged on their blue cushions, while inside their minds were going haywire and their bodies were screaming to be let out.

By day 2, for me at least, it was much better. The experience manifested differently for everyone though. I could hear people getting sick in the bathroom throughout the week. And it wasn't the food, which was the one bright and shiny part of the day: the food was incredible. Mmm, I got to be a little spoiled in fact in that respect. When day 5 passed I was relieved that I was half way done, but also felt terrified a little that I still had half the program yet to go. I'm going to die, I thought only 1/2 jokingly. And again how funny and dramatic is that? When all I'm doing is sitting there, in a wonderfully safe and loving and peace-filled environment...and when I've done so much seemingly more challenging things? Ahh but the physical feats are so much easier than the internal ones. Give me a volcano to climb, a mountain to scale, a foreign country and language to penetrate: lovely, but take away my journal, my communication to the outside world (as well as interpersonally), and make me sit cross-legged for 11 hours a day with myself, ah!! It's oddly terrifying. Though actually by the 7th day, I thought, oh no! It's almost over, and I still have so much work I could do. I want to stay meditating forever! It's so beautiful once you find peace in the flow of it all and uncover a sufficient amount of crap. Truly, it's blissful.

All in all, it was incredible and I recommend it to everyone. Above all I feel internally strengthened by the experience. I feel much less hurried and more at peace with myself and others. More patient. More aware. And better equip to handle anything that comes my way. I may have spent 10 days away from work and relationships, but I feel like doing that deep internal work has made me 10x more efficient and appreciative. And like I said anyway, though you might feel like you're missing out on a lot, all that's really going on in your brain for the vast majority of the time is a record of habitual thoughts. Sure there are the day to day variances and events and interchanges that arise, but mostly it's all the same. So better to fill that space with breath and be a happier and more peaceful person because of it :)

One thing I want to share that I was reminded of during the course, is that in each moment we are literally remade TRILLIONS of times. This is because all of our anatomical parts are made up of cells, which are made up of atoms, which spin around trillions and trillions of times every moment, which means that by appearances we are a solid mass, but in reality we are not held together by anything solid at any point in time.

We are just like candles: the flame appears to be continually burning, but in reality the flame is rising and then passing away and rising and passing away. It's also similar to our TVs, which appear to have a constant picture, but if you look in the window at someone watching TV in a dark room, you know that the image is just a bunch of flickers over and over again, and not a constant form. SO, what that means to me is that in every millisecond (indeed more often) you have the opportunity to change it all around. To change your mood, to change your day, to smile, to be something else, to not feel pain. Cool! So go on, smile! And then do it again! And just be! Be happy! :)

Happy June to everyone. I hope all are doing exceptionally.
Love, Rachel

To learn more about the meditation course I did or to find a center, see: www.dhamma.org
Courses are free and are offered all over the world. And they very purposefully have no religious ties, so they are for everyone!

Mexico, Mercados, and Meditation

My mom keeps pleading with me to not go to Mexico. What I think she doesn't understand is that there is really no difference between here and just over the border in my sister town called Progresso. I went to the market this weekend and asked my friend, what exactly the difference was between here and across the border, as I couldn't imagine any. "Basically just the pharmaceuticals." Touche.

At the market everyone was packed around us closely, jabbering in "Tex-Mex." People laid out tables selling everything you could possibly imagine--and I mean everything: live chickens and puppies, fresh fruits and vegetables of all kinds, music, DVDs, kitchen and household appliances, clothing: new and used, mechanic tools, cleaning products, furniture, school supplies, cowboy boots: buy some or just get yours shined, toiletries and over the counter medications, and probably anything else you can imagine. Some tables appeared to literally be selling garbage.

And who'd have guessed; my favorite part was the food (see my Peru entries detailing my reckless consumption of all street food all the time). At this market there were Tamales; Elote: big kernals of corn usually served with mayo, lime, and chili; Hochatas: a yummy and very sweet drink made with rice milk, sugar, and cinnamon; "Chitos" which are cheetoes covered in nacho cheese; enchilladas; breakfast tacos; fried potatoes on a stick with ketchup, mayo, and lime; big styrofoam cups of fruit sprinkled with chili; Aguas frescas: juice with fresh fruit, water, sugar, and sometimes some kind of flavoring or koolaide; Raspas: the snowcones I talked about earlier; and all kinds of little sweets.


The markets by far are my favorite thing ever.

Yesterday we had a big rain, which was incredibly refreshing. I had hoped that the drop in barometric pressure would have some babies dropping too! But alas, no births. We've got women due, but the midwife is going out of town for a few weeks this week, so I'm going to Dallas on Tuesday and hoping I won't miss out on too much excitement here.
Though actually, my trip to Dallas will be all about avoiding excitement. I will be doing a 10 day Vipassana meditation program. It's at a meditation center outside Dallas that offers free meditation programs in striving to make the world a more peaceful place. I am looking forward to the challenge and the opportunity to re-center myself. No talking, reading, or writing for 10 days. I'm carpooling with 4 other people from Austin, so it will be interesting to see how we react in the 4 hour ride back together.

Keep on breathing!
xoxo, Rachel

The Art of Living