117-119/219/222/226: Made it out of the wilderness

Last week, it felt like I was lost in the wilderness.  I didn't make great decisions, was swallowed by indecision, swamped at work, letting it get to me and using old coping mechanisms.  I just was not thinking rightly.  I struggled with my body and the achilles tendonitis was worse than it has been but I admit that how you think about a health condition does make it worse or better depending.  I rested as much as possible.  I got depressed. 

I went to see Eat, Pray, Love Friday night along with every other female in Boston though I must say they were all excessively PERFUMEINNATED - a new word.  Ladies, really, when going out with your gal pals you DO NOT need to wear an entire bottle of your strongest perfume. The movie was sold out with only 2 men in attendance.  Lots of estrogen in the room.  It was strange going by myself with everyone dressed in their Friday night get-up and imitating the clothes from the movie particularly from when she's in India.  I don't know why I just thought this was silly to me.  I guess I've just got my own style these days and to alter from my own style for anything seems weird.  It actually was a great movie to see by myself and I walked away feeling like the experience was another wrench in the transformation wilderness.  The liked the use of the word attraversiamo (to cross over) and how it was used at the end after Ketut's line "sometimes... to lose balance for love is part of living a balanced life" in which case she realizes that her word is attraversiamo and that she is ready to crossover into a relationship with Felipe. Having one word that sums you up is difficult and frankly I'm one of those girls still in search of one.  Maybe it is seeker but the Italian phrase used in the movie "dolce far niente" - the sweetness of doing nothing is a highly appealing concept and allowing myself to rest has been my summer theme though most of the time I fail miserably and have a constant dialogue in my head of "shoulds" while I am "Resting" though I am coming to terms with it.  So with all this percolating in my head, I scootered away at first feeling very uplifted and happy and then started crying because uck - where am I, who am I, why am I here, and I want freedom.  That's the gist. I'm an emotional girl - maybe I "should" be Italian! LOL.

The next day it was a lovely morning and I woke up deciding I really wanted to drop everything and go to the beach.  My husband needs coaxing for this for whatever reason and we ended up going for breakfast and leaving rather late for a beach day particularly one where I insisted we must have a change of scenery and drive somewhere we've never been before.  Inspired by the traveling in the night's previous movie I suppose.  We finally got to one after oodles of traffic and detours, parked, settled down and then tide came in so we had to move.  Then couldn't find parking at the other bigger beaches so ended up going home and went to our usual Southie beach which frankly was better anyway, just doesn't really have lapping waves like the one we drove to but you really couldn't hear them anyway over the annoying teenagers next to us fighting over something not sure what. Ugh!  Anyway on the ride back to Southie, I had a meltdown.  Just crying and not sure really why.  I considered the time and getting back in time to make it to a yoga class where frankly all I could think about was killing myself in the mirror.  The idea of being really mean to myself in the mirror and pushing myself beyond my limits so I could prove myself a failure was incredibly appealing.  I warned you that I wasn't thinking rightly.  I am so glad my husband veered towards the Southie beach rather than towards home or I would have ended up doing that.  Instead, I settled down and both of us remarked at how actually - our beach in our back yard does the trick. I realized laying on our blanket how easy it is to use anything to punish myself.  Even the healthiest things such as walking, healthy eating (did you know there is a named disorder on obsession with healthy eating) and yes, even YOGA can be used as a weapon.  It explains how I have developed achilles tendonitis.  Anyway, realizing one's flaws in thinking is the first step and frankly this percolating thought was the first step on the path out of the wilderness.

More movie fest continued the rest of the night and into the next morning.  Rather than meditate in the afternoon (why do I avoid this and procrastinate?), I decided to watch another movie but thought hey let's at least see if I can find one about yoga.  I ended up watching Enlighten Up which is a documentary about this writer who follows a subject's journey exploring yoga for a year.  I liked it and it was incredibly interesting to hear this novice talk about yoga and ask questions of some of these gurus.  I was most impressed with Swami Gurusharanananda and of course BKS Iyengar.  Visually I loved that as he was leaving India there was a shot of him with a sign at the airport behind him that said "leave nothing behind."  Though I'm pretty sure it wasn't intentional, it struck a chord with me.  What does it mean to leave nothing behind in your practice?  As we peel off the layers, what are willing to leave behind?