Friday, August 10, 2012

Bodily changingness

Inside a sculpture
Substances that my body produces, liquid or solid, smell sour and toxic to me, and burn. It's strange that my body can be at once so familiar and so unfamiliar.

I think: This is only the first half of it. What next?

My legs are numb, and my face.

My eyebrows fall out and lighten. Which isn't that big of a deal in itself. It's just that human beings tend to have eyebrows, so it makes me look like something else, unless I wear makeup, which then gets into and irritates my eyes (now that I think of it, probably because there are only a few eyelashes left to protect them. I didn't used to think of hair as protection...)

Flickering sensations of pain: stabbing, sore joints.

Outside a sculpture (Hayes Valley)
The tension collects in my heart, like a sentry that gets called every time I start to relax. Lying in bed at night, drifting off, then a small jolt in my chest.

It causes me to pay attention to my heart and unify myself, when it is not dividing me.

Sometimes with the changes in my body, I feel utterly alone.

Still, at least I have more energy than I expected. No sores in my mouth. I am vigilant about thoughts, usually predictions, that start to drag me down.

I had a great walk and chat with Nancy, talking about how we deal with our bodies. Then Misha, and a reiki session with Tania. One of the things that came to her during the session was that I am not alone. She said she saw me surrounded by guardians, protectors...

I didn't take any sleep aids last night for the first time in about six weeks.

From Ajahn Sumedho:
Notice how irritating it is just to be able to see, hear, taste, smell and touch. There’s always something that isn’t quite right...Just consider how sensitive we are in relation to words and thoughts. One can say things and upset everybody just through a certain tone of voice...We get a lot of guilt and remorse or self-aversion because of mistakes, failures or unskilful acts in the past that we remember...
Being born as a human being is a real challenge in terms of how to use this experience of birth, human experience, this sensitive state that we’re living in...It can be so utterly depressing that we think it’s better to kill ourselves. Or, as the Buddha encouraged us, we can wake up to it, learn from it, see it as an opportunity, as a challenge, as something to learn from. We can develop wisdom in terms of the conditions and the experiences that we have in this life — which are not guaranteed always to be the best. Many of us have had to experience all kinds of frustrations, disappointments, disillusionments and failures...Of course if we take that personally, we want to end it all very quickly. But if we put it in the context of knowing the world as the world, we can take anything. We have incredible abilities to learn from even the most unfair and miserable, painful and nasty conditions. These are not obstructions to enlightenment; this issue is whether we we use them to awaken or not.

3 comments:

  1. "We have incredible abilities to learn from even the most unfair and miserable, painful and nasty conditions. These are not obstructions to enlightenment; this issue is whether we we use them to awaken or not."

    I don't care about obstructions, I care about suffering. Sometimes I find stuff like the above quite annoying (and I don't learn from my annoyance, so there). A part of me wants to smack him. Do you ever feel that way?

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  2. I just take it as a suggestion that I am welcome to ignore, which I often do, but I'm happier when I don't.
    My favorite part is:
    "Notice how irritating it is just to be able to see, hear, taste, smell and touch."
    xx

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  3. Yes, that part I like. And so very true.

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