Photography

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Transforming Your Relationship to Pain, Part 1

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Last year I did a few six-week series called "Transforming Your Relationship to Pain" with Dr. Gary Kaplan of the Kaplan Clinic in Mclean, VA.  They were powerful and juicy. Since then we've wanted to do them again, but we are both so busy it's been hard to schedule.  In this three week series on "Buddha and the Body" I thought I'd offer two talks on the subject.

Here's the blurb on the podcast:

Pain is inevitable.  Suffering is optional. Is this true?  This talk explores the fundamentals of how pain works and after a few minutes of energizing movement led by Jovinna Chan, you'll explore two pragmatic meditations for shifting your relationship to unpleasant sensations.

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On Diversity

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We had a powerful two days with Ruth King on Diversity.  She's a fireball.  If you'd like to learn more about her work, this is her link.  She'll be at the New Year's Retreat doing private interviews.

Our capacity for interpersonal transformation truly comes from our capacity to sense what another's experience is like for them.  It was in sixth grade when I first heard the expression, "Don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins."  It struck me then and remains true.

Or as I think Sri Nisargadatta put it, "To see self in other and other in self" ....

 

 

 

Cold Water Paddling

It's cooling dramatically, but we still get a few warm days here and there.  There are disadvantages in being self-employed, but one of the advantages is the creativity that comes around time-management.  I had a conference call mid-day and as it was going to hit 50 degrees around that time I brought my stand up paddle board down to the river, put on my waterproof gear and headed upstream.  About 45 minutes later I found a nice place in the middle of the river to stop and settle in for the call. Leaning up against a warmish rock, I plugged in my headphones, did the call and headed back in time for my next meeting.

Back, with images

About a month ago I was heading out for a pre-sunrise walk with my trusty Canon 60D and 70-230 L-series zoom, which has to be one of the most amazing lenses around. (A deep bow to Kevin McDonough, who traded it for all my video equipment a few years back.) As I headed across the parking lot at Riverbend Park I heard the sickly sound of the camera bouncing on the asphalt.  The camera was fine, but the image stabilizing motor took a hit and I had to send it in for repairs.  It's back and I'm inspired to get out more with this long lens.

Part of the hiatus was neglecting to post any images here.  I thought I might catch up with a little retrospective as I never really stop shooting.

 

The following is from Kripalu Center, where I led a three-day retreat earlier this month called "The Transformative Journey" with my friend and colleague Shobhan Richard Faulds, who is now back in the saddle as Kripalu's CEO.

Many years ago I walked up to one of the residents who was standing here and staring off into the horizon.  He turned to me and said, "I stop here every morning.  This my biofeedback device. If it isn't beautiful, I know there is something wrong with me."

That's the Stockbridge Bowl below and most of the land here is protected.  I shot the following with my iPhone 4s with the panorama feature.

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Kripalu Yoga Teacher Training in DC

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I've had a number of people from retreats and classes ask about the style of movement I lead. I spent almost 25 years immersed into the world of Kripalu Yoga as a practitioner and trainer and find the style is still a great match for me. Kripalu Yoga is about balance. How do you cultivate that delicate balance where you are here and now, grounded in your body as well as with a clear and open heart and mind?

That's what the practice is all about and as I say, "Kripalu Yoga is not about what you look like from the outside. It's all about what's happening inside.' This is a very intuitive form of movement and a powerful adjunct to meditation.

My friend and colleague Jovinna Chan will be leading a 200-hour Kripalu Yoga Teacher Training at Dream Yoga Studio in McLean, VA.

I'll be supporting the training from the perspective of teaching meditation and look forward to teaching again with Jovinna.

She'll be leading a daylong retreat on both December 8th and 9th and will have session for those interested in Kripalu Yoga and the training.

 

For more on the retreat and training    For more on Jovinna

 

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The 'Power' of Retreat

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Before the lights went out.

 

You would think 75 people hanging out in basically one room with no showers for four days and with their bedrooms essentially the same temperature as the outdoors would create some disharmony. In our weeklong fall retreat, we rode out the hurricane in shared silence and mutual support.

If anything, the sense of camaraderie  and interconnectedness helped each of us draw deeply inside and keep our hearts open.  Serving a retreat is quite engaging, leading the movement sessions, giving talks and doing about ten interviews a day.  This vantage point not only helps me sense the trajectory of individual transformations, but the evolution of the group as a whole.

I wanted to pass along a reading, as promised.  This was part of my talk on "Embodied Presence," how we receive signals all the time from our bodies wanting attention and promising a deeper, more intimate connection with life.

This, I believe, was written by a Chinese doctor:

 

Felt Sense Prayer

I am the pain in your head, the knot in your stomach, the unspoken grief in your smile. I am your high blood sugar, your elevated blood pressure, your fear of challenge, your lack of trust. I am your hot flashes, your cold hands and feet, your agitation and your fatigue. I am your shortness of breath, your fragile low back, the cramp in you r neck, the despair in your sigh. I am the pressure on your heart, the pain down your arm, your bloated abdomen, your constant hunger. I am where you hurt, the fear that persists, your sadness of dreams unfulfilled. I am your symptoms, the causes of your concern, the signs of imbalance, your condition of dis-ease.

You tend to disown me, suppress me, ignore me, inflate me, coddle me, condemn me. I am not coming forth for myself as I am not separate from all that is you. I come to garner your attention, to enjoin your embrace so I can reveal my secrets. I have only your best interests at heart as I seek health and wholeness by simply announcing myself.

You usually want me to go away immediately, to disappear, to sleek back into obscurity. You mostly are irritated or frightened and many times shocked by my arrival. From this stance you medicate in order to eradicate me. Ignoring me, not exploring me, is your preferred response. More times than not I am only the most recent notes of a long symphony, the most evident branches of roots that have been challenged for seasons.Hread

So I implore you, I am a messenger with good news, as disturbing as I can be at times. I am wanting to guide you back to those tender places in yourself, the place where you can hold yourself with compassion and honesty. If you look beyond my appearance you may find that I am a voice from your soul. Calling to you from places deep within that seek your conscious alignment.

I may ask you to alter your diet, get more sleep, exercise regularly, breathe more consciously. I might encourage you to see a vaster reality and worry less about the day to day fluctuations of life. I may ask you to explore the bonds and the wounds of your relationships. I may remind you to be more generous and expansive or to attend to protecting your heart from insult. I might have you laugh more, spend more time in nature, eat when you are hungry and less when pained or bored, spend time every day, if only for a few minutes, being still.

Wherever I lead you, my hope is that you will realize that success will not be measured by my eradication, but by the shift in the internal landscape from which I emerge.

I am your friend, not your enemy. I have no desire to bring pain and suffering into your life. I am simply tugging at your sleeve, too long immune to gentle nudges. I desire for you to allow me to speak to you in a way that enlivens your higher instincts for self care. My charge is to energize you to listen to me with the sensitive ear and heart of a mother attending to her precious baby.

You are a being so vast, so complex, with amazing capacities for self-regulation and healing. Let me be one of the harbingers that lead you to the mysterious core of your being where insight and wisdom are naturally available when called upon with a sincere heart.

 

 

 

 

This Weekend: The Questions That Heal and Set You Free: A Training in Body-Centered Inquiry

 

I'm looking forward to this Saturday's daylong retreat I'll be leading in Bethesda on a topic near and dear to me:

 

The Questions that Heal and Set You Free:

A Training in Body-Centered Inquiry

 

What if you could develop a consistent and reliable way to receive guidance from a deeper level than the thinking mind?  

We'll be exploring this topic through short talks and presentations, guided experiences, discussion and sharing.
There is a wonderful statement out there that says "The body never lies."  As far as I can tell, that's true.  Your mind may tell you one thing, but if you really listen internally there is usually a 'felt sense' of what resonates as true.
How do you access that sense of kinesthetic intuition?   We'll do it exploring three separate disciplines:
  • Insight (Vipassana) Meditation develops your capacity to pause, recognize what is present and see with increasing clarity into the nature of things.
  • Focusing is a mind-body training that helps you be intimately present to direct experience and cultivate new ways of being present.
  • Inquiry helps you access intuition and directs your attention to new possibilities.

 

The day will be a balance of internally focused disciplines of meditation and reflecting writing and exploration through what I call 'inter-personal meditation' and group discussion.

Body-Centered Inquiry is a profound way to untangle knotty issues, explore new possibilities and make important decisions in your life.

Bring an issue you've been wrestling with and we'll see what your body has to say about it.

Follow this link for more information and to register online.

 

Water

I can see why paddleboarding is such a popular sport. It's relatively easy to learn, but the curve to proficiency is immensely challenging depending on conditions. On Saturday we started from Penney Lock, on the Maryland side of Potomac. Some fishermen coming in told us to be careful, because the wind was gusting over 15 miles an hour. Paddling first under a stone underpass, we came out into amazing conditions. The wind was whipping straight down river.  As we turned our noses up river, we had an amazing battle.

When the wind abated I made some progress but as soon as it picked up again I was stopped dead. Nonetheless, we made our way to the base of Seneca Breaks, a granite escarpment with lots of whitewater.

One hour of hard paddling upriver was followed by about a 20 minutes return trying to stay upright with the wind flat at our backs. Way cool.

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On the Board Again

I never skate-boarded, surfed, unicycled or did much of anything in balancing sports, so I felt a bit cautious about stand up paddle-boarding. Being a tad over 6'5" and legs like a stork didn't seem much in my favor either. "Use it or lose it," I thought, so I've taken to the board and love this way of being on the water. I'm not hanging ten or anything yet, but I've only fallen in once so far.

 

You Can Go Home Again

I periodically get up to Pennsylvania to stay with my brother and his wife and visit my dad, who is in an Alzheimer's unit. It's always a poignant time and on the way there I get to cruise through the area where I was born and raised - in the heart of the Pennsylvania Dutch country. I grew up on an incredibly beautiful farm set back on what is still a dirt road. The barn was built in 1740 and the house not long after. My parents bought the farm the year I was born and eventually gave it up when it became too much to manage – about 40 years later.

Last week I left Washington, DC in the late afternoon, rolled into a neighbor's farm about 11:30PM and crawled into the back of my Honda Element, where I had my sleeping quarters all set up.

Before dawn I woke up and wandered around the farm with my camera for much of the morning.  I'll post some of the shots on my site as I get them edited.

This was a working farm, with a smoke house, chicken coops and while the barn never had running water, it's housed many generations of cows, sheep and pigs.  We had as many as 45 sheep and multiple horses, chickens, quail, geese, cats, dogs, rescued raccoons and hawks.