Happening Upon The Shire; "Retreat, Re-Treat!"

If you have been following my previous blogs, you will have inferred that 2004 was a watershed year for me.  I made many discoveries where many seeds were planted that are still bearing fruit ten years later.

I happened upon another great find on July 4, 2004 when a friend introduced me to Harbin Hot Springs, located about 2-1/2 hours north of San Francisco.  Perhaps you know of Harbin, perhaps not.  I wrestled with the idea of writing about it because it is such a special place, and I do not wish to carelessly bring attention to Harbin for the wrong reasons.  But if I am to fully reflect on the spiritual influences in my life over the past ten years, a discussion of and homage to Harbin Hot Springs is essential.

Harbin has a rich history.  In times past, it was a gathering place for Native Americans to partake of its natural spring waters.  In the late 1800s to mid 1900s, Harbin had morphed into a summertime resort for Bay Area families.  Following a trend of transformation driven by social change in the 1960s, Harbin as we know it today was born in the early ‘70s when a visionary purchased what had become a very run-down and neglected property and, over the course of the next 40 years, would shepherd the evolution of Harbin into the New Age retreat community and village that it is today.

My first visit to Harbin stirred feelings of surprise, wonder, and keen curiosity.  I was charmed by its Tolkienesque setting, with various pools of natural spring water of varying temperatures and sizes amidst a beautiful natural setting.  Twice more that summer and early fall, I asked my friend to take me back to Harbin.  Enchanted by this place, I know I wanted more of it.  In retrospect, it is perfectly synchronous that I met Harbin during a year of reflection, exploration, and expansion.

 

Through a foray into Yahoo online dating in late 2004, I encountered a profile that mentioned Harbin Hot Springs, which led to a phone conversation where Harbin was one of the highlights.  Over the next two years, we made many trips to Harbin together.  It was the highlight of our relationship.  Our visits were an almost-monthly ritual. 

As has been the case, I’m sure, for many, over time, visits to Harbin took on new significance.  While at first I saw Harbin as a brief respite from work and urban life, I gradually began to feel that Harbin was an essential and integral part of my life, a counterweight balancing the faster pace and stress of Bay Area living.

I have soaked and swam in the waters of Harbin, hiked its hills and paths, marveled at its natural beauty, camped on its grounds and enjoyed its rooms, attended yoga classes and music performances, browsed and bought many books on consciousness and spirituality, and there, have met many interesting and amazing people from all over the country and the world.  At Harbin I internalized body acceptance and became more attuned to the sensual aspect of life.

Upon reflection, I am gratified that I discovered Harbin when I did and not earlier when both Harbin and I were less mature.  While my history may not be quite as colorful as Harbin’s, my appreciation for this “Shire” perhaps would have been less enduring at an earlier age.  Each visit to Harbin has been a meditative marker, a reflective pause along my path.

Get Thee to the Zendo; Idiopathic Origins

We’ve been hearing a lot in mainstream culture recently about the virtues of meditation; its health benefits, calming effects, as a means of centering ourselves.  I began “sitting” at the end of 2003 not only in response to a mind that had gone completely “monkey,” but to a spirit that felt broken.  Despite my psychic pain, I knew deep down that I was my medicine.  

When I began meditating, I sat on a couple of pillows, focusing on a lit candle.  It felt like a complete joke.  I could not keep my eyes focused on the flame, they were fluttering about so rapidly.  It was all so very uncomfortable.  Looking back, I now recognize that the observation of my discomfort, the awareness of my eyes, was an essentially progressive aspect of the meditative experience.  Back then, I had to operate on faith (and no small hint of desperation) that practicing meditation consistently would lessen the discomfort over time.  And for the time being, any aspiration of enlightenment had to be shelved (LOL).

So, guided only by myself, I simply sat every morning for 15 minutes on the pillows in front of the candle.  Well, maybe not every morning.  And, well, maybe not always for 15 minutes.  But I kept at it.  For a while, I continued to observe my feelings of discomfort.  Thoughts of all kinds came and went, fast and furious, and I would react to the “heavy traffic” with frustration.  But I did not – and this is important – allow the discomfort and frustration stop me from sitting.  From something I had heard or read somewhere, I know breath was important, so I began more and more to focus on my breath.

As time went on, I gradually noticed a shift.  I actually started becoming more comfortable with the discomfort.  I accepted it.  Sort of surrendered to it, I guess you could say.  Essentially, I stopped judging it…and I’ll bet you can guess what started to happen, Grasshopper…my meditations became more relaxed; more peaceful.  The “content” didn’t necessarily change at first, but as my response to the content changed, the content then DID begin to change.  Thoughts came less frequently (though, of course, they still came), they were more fleeting, and I was able to maintain my focus on my breath for longer periods of time.  Side effects of my meditation practice began to make themselves known.  I was more relaxed in my daily life, and less reactive to negative events and situations in general.

In the spring of 2004, I decided to reward myself with a dedicated meditation cushion, so I headed down to the San Francisco Zen Center to purchase one.  Upon entering the doors of the Zen Center, yet another world opened up to me.  In the process of acquiring my zafu (the Buddhist term for a meditation cushion), I spent an hour in the bookstore, intrigued by all of the titles related to Zen Buddhism, Zen, meditation, spirituality, etc.  I acquired a schedule of public sitting at the Zen Center and decided that I would take my meditation “up a notch.”

My first sitting in the Zendo (a Zen Buddhist temple of meditation) was surreal, mind-blowing, and somewhat brutal.  I sat for 40 minutes facing a wall.  After about the first 15 minutes, I was in full-blown observation of my monkey mind and increasing physical discomfort.  But there I sat.  Despite feeling thrashed and my foot going completely numb from sitting cross-legged, at the end, I felt triumphant, as though I had persevered through a major rite of initiation.  So interspersed with my sitting at home, when my schedule allowed, I would occasionally sit at the Zendo.  The energy of collective sitting with seasoned meditators is quite sublime.  There is a wondrous, pure silence and ethereal power when minds collectively go “within.”

I have not sought out meditation “how-to’s.”  I keep it to observing my thoughts without judgment and mindfully returning to my breath.  I have adhered to my intention of keeping it simple and making it mine, and this has served me well, as it did when my father was diagnosed with a blood condition of idiopathic origin in the late summer of 2004.

A Native in a Strange Land; the Magic of Breadcrumbs

Let’s face it:  No blog is complete without a discussion of yoga (LOL).  Seriously, for me, yoga truly was a soul saver in the year after my marital split.  I had always had an interest in yoga, though hadn’t partaken in any meaningful way, sampling only a few Bikram yoga classes that I found too extreme and "commercial" (the room is heated to like 100 degrees).  Upon the recommendation of an old school friend turned dedicated yogi, I discovered a school of yoga that I found deeply satisfying and refreshingly non-mainstream known as Sivananda Yoga.  Interestingly, the San Francisco Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Center was located only about a mile from where I was living. It is named after Swami Sivananda, an influential Indian spiritual teacher of the 20th century.  In 1957, Swami Vishnudevananda, on instructions from his guru Sivananda, came to the West to bring the teachings of yoga.  The culture of Sivananda Yoga is authentically Indian, preserving a several-thousand-year-old tradition.  For accessibility, Swami Vishnudevananda simplified the yogic teachings down to five points, showing specific ways to develop physical, mental, and spiritual health through right movement/postures (Asanas), right breathing (Pranayama), relaxation (Savasana), diet (vegetarian), positive thinking (Vedanta) and meditation (Dhyana).

There was an ego-free, yin quality to the practice, which quieted my mind, expanded my body, and centered my focus.  I awakened to the importance of yogic breath and began a meditation practice.  For a very reasonable annual fee, I had not only unlimited access to the Center’s yoga classes, which were held three times a day, but I could attend evening communal vegetarian meals for which the Center charged nothing, yet accepted donations.

I was a native in a strange land.  I had found a little ashram located in the Fog Belt of San Francisco, where I was born and raised, but had had no idea previously of this place.  It was my first “breadcrumb” on the trail of my midlife spiritual path.  I cherish the community of folks I connected with that whole year of ’04.  I was feeling very alone when my marriage ended, and the Sivananda Center was a sanctuary for my heart, body, and soul.  There I learned about ayurvedic medicine, attended kirtans (singing/chanting sessions), and listened to many talks on various health and spiritual topics.

Sivananda Yoga was my first major spiritual diversion off the highway I had been coasting on automatic pilot on for 40 years.  It prompted a deeper study of yoga on my part, leading me to a Yoga Studies series at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS), also located in San Francisco (how lucky I am!).  Immersing myself in the study and practice of yoga introduced me to the concept of nondualism.  Christianity is a theology of dualism; a paradigm of polarity; divinity being separate from the secular.  Yoga, as the term suggests, is borne of a nondual philosophy.  Divinity imbues all; everyone, everything, all life.  All is one, in union with (what Christians term) "God."  New awareness of nondualism exposed my mind (and heart) to a new "operating system."  Yoga, I came to learn, is really any practice (i.e. action, devotion, body poses, and meditation) that "yolks" us to our divinity within, as well as to the cosmic divine.  I was awakening to the power of belief and how the paradigms of our beliefs shape everything in our lives; how we live, how we engage in life, our perceptions, whether we operate by a perception of choice or a perception of fate.  With that awareness, I came to understand yoga (and myself) in a broader, deeper, more universal sense.  It is a practice and awareness that informs me to this day.