Kaya Madhya Sutram (KMS), Tiruvannamalai, Jan 2018 - Reflections
Even while planning for the programme this time, I was planning with a lot of space. Usually I pack a lot in my planning and tagging several items in the sequence as ‘optional, if there is time’. This instance I straightaway noticed that my inclination was towards keeping the minimum required for it to be a KMS event. A vinyasa where each activity led to the next in natural logic. This actually gave me a lot of space to work in and flow and play and allow the same for others as well. I realised while planning and while executing, how much I have been cluttering my space with overplanning and overthinking. (I am not going into the roots of the overplanning and overthinking here, not within the scope now). Without that clutter, the pressure for it to happen, and happen in a certain way was absent and I was completely aware of this. What freedom!
At the recent ECC (Exploring Contemplative Conversations) workshop, a reflection that came up in one of the early morning theatre sessions:
I have never been able to feel Veeryam after any other Rasa but Roudram. I necessarily had to get in touch with Roudram in order to experience Veeryam. Pre-planning and during KMS, for the first time, I was in a quieter space and a sense of courage and conviction that was flowing out of connection and quietness, manifesting in action at the event. I am afraid and cannot give the quiet space any rasa name categorically for I don’t know what is lying further underneath in deeper layers of the mind and being. Nevertheless, for this layer, there was a quiet breathing that I was connected with, and there is a Friend that I seem to be continuously in touch with. Feelings of clarity, fear, tentativeness, a definitive conviction and awareness of what I am doing at the moment, were all seemingly being held simultaneously.
A nuance of holding space that I got in touch with in the sessions mentioned above: during the pair dancing (with palms or fingers touching and no talking), the experience that when I actually stopped trying to lead and fighting the resistance (even when it was my turn to lead), and simply left my palm there, it became the other’s responsibility and effort to hold on and follow. My palm was simply there and the process started shifting from leading-following to simply a natural dance and co-holding of space. I was holding this awareness within me as I went into the event. Thank you Ganesh for demonstrating this beautifully during ECC programme.
I am also aware that the action and conviction, the sense of quietness will not stay just this way all the time. This sort of a being is also due to the external influences and satsangam of, KMS at Hyderabad, Parenting Retreat, ECC, circles and conversations here in Tiruvannamalai, and individual interactions with several of you**. So much is happening on the outside to keep this going. And a couple of other things that I have been doing / practicing (including asana-py-bhavana- of course), which have started the important work of establishing some of these new movements within me firmly. There are and will be times when all the external support systems are not there and I am by myself, and those will be the test of how much I have been able to stabilise this ground and will tell me where I need to intensify efforts, what I am missing from the whole picture and so on. What I hold here is also the dance between community / support systems and standing alone, which seems to be especially important for us as practitioners, (training to) hold space for others to explore / discover / understand in different formats.
I got in touch with what feels to me as a significant factor in the ways I have been listening and what I need to pay close attention to. I am realising that I saw it perhaps because of that space of quietness and awareness that I carried with me into the event. This was allowing all my senses to be so wide awake and I was both listening to the outside and inside at the same time. Ok, cut the hemming and hawing already. It has been and probably still is difficult for me to stay with and even look at my vulnerabilities, leave alone sharing them, putting them out on the table, unless the other is expansive and strong enough to hold space for me to do this in a safe and comfortable way. However I am inclined to intense feelings, passions and able to inspire and evoke others to touch their passions, deepest desires as I have often experienced. What has been happening in the interface is that, I evoke this in the other just as I do for myself, but then run away or get into escape routes just as the going gets intense, and I leave the other perhaps hanging or colluding. The intensity of the evocations touches my most vulnerable spot every time – the tension between who I am and who I am not. I am always guarding who I am, and afraid that who-I-am-not will change or invade who-I-am. This is also why when the other provides a ‘safe’ environment, (which for me is, not threatening my sense of who I am), I can let go and be ‘myself’ and end up indulging the ‘who-I-am’ and not stepping back and examining this process. I had been unable to stay with this tension between the I-am and I-am-not, and so whenever the exchange starts getting into this tension area, it gets intense (if it already was not!) , I would quickly jump into my fortress and deploying, possibly, all kinds of weapons from there, just varying degrees of potency. And I can get intense about the batting of an eyelid!
The sad part of this process is that because of years of practice of building up the fortress, it has become a habit. So even in moments when there is actually no real fear, simply the force of habit takes over. I am feeling immensely sad because of all the pictures that are coming up for me just now when I have allowed a particular moment to wilt or not bloom to its full beauty and authentic expression because of the guard. I am realising that the sadness is from a mixture of love (of the other and people and discoveries and unfolding) and anger (at myself that I have not given this space for myself and my world).
I am seeing the friend sitting here with me, just now after some breath-watching and shifting focus to some immediate domestic chores for a few minutes. She is holding a lot of kindness for me and is reminding me of the magic of this entire process and to keep at it. I remember this sutra that Raghu brought up during ECC, which took off like a flashbulb inside me: Smrti-parishuddhau svarūpa-shunya iva artha-mātra-nirbhāsā nir-vitarkā (YS 1.43). I experienced tangibly with the veeryam (mentioned in the 2nd para), how just the act of giving attention to something can momentarily shift the entire picture. And then it’s ‘just’ continuing to give attention! J
Today is the first day of the Tamil month of Thai. A proverb goes, “தை பிறந்தால் வழி பிறக்கும்” (rough translation of the essence in this context: with the month of Thai comes a new beginning). A tangible bhavana / exercise / activity that I need to do as preparation before every event is: walking out of the fortress and into the gardens, fields and forests out there, and meet and walk with friends under the open sky. The giripradakshina around Arunachala comes up for me as a space and time when I feel open, vulnerable and strong.
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** - friends (co-practitioners and colleagues)
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