a note from Carl:
We heard about the tragic shootings in Orlando on the last day of our recent retreat in California. There is a particular rawness in taking in that kind of news after a week of working with meditation and embodiment practices – somehow it seems more viscerally heart breaking.
When my heart cracks open, I recall how Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche spoke of this raw, tender place in the chest as always being present for someone who is authentically waking up in the world.
“For the warrior, this experience of sad and tender heart is what gives birth to fearlessness. Conventionally, being fearless means that you are not afraid or that, if someone hits you, you will hit him back. However, we are not talking about that street-fighter level of fearlessness.Real fearlessness is the product of tenderness. It comes from letting the world tickle your heart, your raw and beautiful heart. You are willing to open up, without resistance or shyness, and face the world. You are willing to share your heart with others.”
Erin and I have both been so moved by Francis Weller’s profound line:
“The work of the mature person is to hold gratitude in one hand and grief in the other and be stretched large by them.”
At times like this, there is a profound, painful stretching into the grief direction. And how important it is for me to remember to include the stretch of the hand of gratitude as well. The billions and billions of moments of human caring, kindness, and appreciation that did not make the news. The wrestling with my son, the light shining through the morning flowers, the joy of our family hand-holding gratitude ritual before dinner… As Martin Prechtel describes in his beautiful talk on
Grief and Praise, they are essentially two sides of the same coin.
Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars
of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,
the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders
of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is
nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned
in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side
is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.
Wishing your raw and beautiful heart well,
Carl
p.s. A few updates:
1. Don’t miss signing up yourself and a friend for Erin’s newest online offering: Flourish at the Speed of Life. Class begins
on Monday!2. Would you like to join Erin and
Nan Seymour in Santa Fe for an amazing Embodied Life Retreat
Walk In Beauty –that will feature brilliant Feldenkrais lessons to support walking with grace and pleasure, morning meditation (sitting and walking), powerful Embodied Life practices, and afternoon River Writing sessions, along with plenty of free time to stroll the gorgeous and inspiring streets of Santa Fe? Spaces are filling! We have a wonderful group of people gathering for this one-of-a-kind
Embodied Life retreat in Santa Fe. The discounted room block at our boutique hotel in Santa Fe is available through June – so please sign up and book your room very soon! We’d love to have you join us. Men and women are warmly welcomed. It is going to be aaahhhmazing! We can hardly wait! Currently there are 5 spaces left.
3. Erin is exploring places and times for an embodied Listening class which she’s hoping to offer in July. We’ll keep you posted!
4. We are delighted to host morning sitting meditation in our home studio/office on Thursdaymornings from 7-8am. We will begin on Thursday the 23rd of June. If you’d like directions on where to come, just email me. We’d love to sit with you. Offered by donation.
