new year

Attended a healing gong meditation event last evening with 40 healers. I was in the center of the group with three other people and we were all getting rid of something. What I wanted to get rid of was the cancer.

As I was laying there I noticed that my mood lifted and that the tenor of my thought became much more healing and positive. THe people involved were healers ,part of the Sikh /3HO tradition and searchers for a positive outcome to the events of their lives.

THey are inspired focused and positive and their energy feels wonderful when down . THey lead to lots of life affirming decisions and are good in their way. Well disciplined and focused.

Spent new years eve with a friend . Started by going to the Sikh ashram and realized that I was out of place and uncomfortable called a lady I know found that she was doing nothing and visited her for a time . We sang kirtan to Dave Stringer and I loved it. Left early since Ira and I were going to a vajra rogini empowerment on New Years Day.

New Year's day was an opportunity to listen toe tapes that my prima amiga had sent me .. Spiritual Madness by Caroline Myss. A woman who has faced quite a bit in her life and made very good choices because of the wisdom that she has gained. The modern mystic was the theme for the tapes. Learning how to deal with the establishment of a functioning I and the the dissolution of the I which is the mystic path.

I resonated with those stories that spoke of suffering , loneliness, and abandonment and learning to give thanks for plenty in the midst of lack, being grateful in the most difficult of times for if that can be done then when the good times return as they do that then there is more to even be grateful for.

I thought of one instance that one has to balance this idea . THe other story is of a woman who was a poor swimmer who left a boat because of her seasickness. The boat was blown away by a sudden wind but several of her fellow passengers jumped in the water to comfort her. THey were good Buddhists and as the Buddhists are want to do talked to her about what she would want in this moment suggesting such things as love, kindness, compassion and equanimity. Her response was that she wanted the boat back.

Another part of her talk was of a small boy who had a brain tumor that made a bargain with God to heal himself of it. He had a child's vision of how to do it stuck to the bargain that he made knowing that it may not work and had no guarantees and and one point when he was busy fighting the tumor let go of the struggle and let God control. He was successful in defeating the disease.

For me I have had enough of loneliness and abandonment for the time being and am working on human contact ,friendship, inspiration ,learning and letting go of a non-social life.I am not versed in in yet but am loving the people who are around me and giving me their time , and companionship. My heart tells me that healing lies more in this direction than more austerity. Enjoying life has more appeal at the moment than giving up hope and fear but oddly as I write this enjoying life may be the way to give up hope and fear.

Another Day

Routine report from the pits, worked out at gym, met the ex at a new doctors office an oncologist in Glendale. Got the PSA numbers explained so that the concern now is to keep the number low for as long a period of time as possible postponing the need for chemo for ever lengthening periods.

Qualified good news. Arranged financial world differently and coordinated financial life.

Going to a party with a group of healers tonight and staying with a friend to keep staying sane.

Planning on going to garchan rinpoche's varjra rogini empowerment new years day .

Head & Heart

When I spoke to Ram Dass I came away with one overriding understanding and that is to follow my heart. My heart will lead me because it encompasses the head and not the other way around. The head can announce the vision once the heart decides, but if the head announces a visionary direction and the heart is not in it nothing will come of it. My heart is in the place of healing. I can actively involve my entire being into healing myself or the effort is unfulfilling and unsuccessful. The heart must become committed.

When I learned of the Shamatha Project my heart was committed and the head saw the way to go and everything that I did was designed to get me into the project. I went to every retreat that Alan taught within a reachable distance of my home from Hawaii to Mexico City to Montana to California in different locations and Shambala center in CO. If Alan taught shamatha I was there. I went to retreats in New Mexico at Upaya Zen center with Natalie Goldberg to learn to write. Believing that I would be writing reports about what I was doing I felt that it would be wise for me to write as well as I could so that what was written would be read and used by the people studying the material. I went to other retreats done by other teachers such a Yinguer Rinpoche on the subject of Shamatha looking for a way to better the practice that I had. I attended work shops with fellow associates of Alan to get different perspectives on how this should be approached. Everything is designed to get me conversant and into the Shamatha Project. Whenever there was anything that was official for getting signed in I was always among the first to have the papers filled in and turned in. I met everyone I could associated with the project. Going to DC to attended the Mind and LIfe gathering to meet anyone I could who was associated with the project or anything ancillary to the project. I took courses in dream and sleep yoga since they were relative to the basic stages of shamatha. I exercised rigorously to get in shape for being at the retreat. All of the major efforts that I had in my life were centered around getting into project.

It worked . The gods smiled upon me and allowed me to do this most important project . I was somewhat disappointed that I was not in the study group but rather the control group but that ultimately turned out to be for the better since I was in the group that actually was a little more prepared for than the first group. Now I am in the process of healing my soul and body. The body which has this aggressive disease has to be attended to with the utmost care and preexistence and love. The soul is the vehicle. The soul for me is the vehicle of the heart. It is the way that my heart will express itself in caring for this body, my life ,my work, my prima amiga, and everything that is worth living for.

The goal is to heal, the method is to learn that I already am healed and how to express that.

I went to the Oasis of Healing this morning and received a very warm welcome and support from staff which I got to talk to. My initial contact was with a woman who was a patient. A lady in her thirties with teenaged children who she was trying to manage with a blackberry by sending text messages . With that she was only partially successful, however she had come to the center in Sept with cancer in the bones and in the lymph and had gotten the results of her tests recently to discover that she was almost completely free of the disease. It was most heartening and uplifting.

I then toured the facility with another lovely lady who brought me into the facilities of the nutritionist and the other people in the process and it was something that I definitely am going to have to consider. They have a process called IBT in which they give chemotherapy to a patient after having them fast and then have an transfusion of insulin. At the most propitious moment they give an injection of glucose and chemo which in theory leads to the cancer cells which are starved for sugar ingesting large amounts of chemo while minimizing the dosages of the poison.

Sounds very promising. Doing my research.

Salvation Army

For two glorious hours I served meals to people at the salvation army Christmas dinner. The job that I had was putting rolls and butter on plates of hot food that were given to the people who had come to eat. We in the serving lines were given the opportunity to give food to our fellow human beings in a gesture of compassion.

At the end of the meals, I was the last person to cease serving , we packed up and left. I was so high from the experience that I did not want to leave that emotional state and when the clinging was complete I cried.

Part of this is my own state of mind and I was reminded that the drugs that I am taking cause hot flashes and with them I believe mood swings.

Went to a Christmas party with a group of buddhists, an oxymoron I think, and we had good food that I could eat and plenty of conversation .

Broke up with an agreement to go with one member to a Vajaragini empowerment in Prescott Valley on the 1st of the year.

Equanimity

Continuum a line leading from one end of a range to another.

Depression runs along the line to elation. In today's adventure I worked with the literal using of a physical line to experience the sense of depression to elation. It is easy to feel either. By standing on one end of the continuum and moving to the other I allowed how a change could work through the emotions. From a concave chest slumped appearance a flow of thoughts of despair to chest high, standing proud and a flow of thoughts of elation. Something of a tour de force. Another tool of observation.

There are many other continuums which to explore, all of which hold more insight into the mind that I am dealing with. Living in the future or the past can put me into either end of the continuum. I f the flow of thoughts are uplifting and I am not tired then the results are elation. If the flow of thoughts are downcast and I am tired then the results are obvious. It is interesting to realize that these emotions are merely something that can flow through a life and not be the I.

When I was nine years old my father took me the baker to pick up a birthday cake. As a rambunctious child I was bouncing up and down in the back seat and my father yelled at me to sit down and be quiet. Quite disproportional to the offense . My father was angry and hurt. I later discovered that on his birthday his older brother committed suicide. As a nine year old I could not even guess what the depth of the problem was, but as a defense I learned that by being quiet to the point of depression that I would not be made to feel worse if I did it to myself first.

There is a line that suicide is hanging your skeleton in someone else's closet. It certainly happened in my family.

I do not feel depressed or elated in writing this but rather equanimous . There are revelations aplenty in this journey and this is merely one of them.

I have been accused of reaching for one end of the continuum and fleeing the other and this I do not deny. I have observed that the process of fleeing the depression catapults me into action that is often frenzied and stressful. From overeating, ill planned actions, and incomplete thought to denial of the existence of things, events, or situations that I do not want look at.

It is better at this time to learn of these conditions that I may not let them have the intense rule in my life that they have had.

A friend who is Catholic tells me that confession to the priest absolves him of his sins and when I asked him about where those sins came from he said that they came from a stone tablet written thousands of years ago. Mine are perhaps as ancient.

I believe also that confession is good for the soul, and this is my confession from which absolution comes in the form of peace, understanding, and acceptance.

Celebration Postponed

The expected joyful arrival of a new member of the family has been postponed by the very sobering news that the child has significant difficulties and that mom went through a very long and trying delivery. I spoke to grandmother my cousin/sister this morning and after the initial shock followed by tears we talked at length . My c/s was exhausted and so after getting the initial information we just gradually wound down our conversation until she had let go of enough nervous energy to let her crawl into bed and get some sleep.

The second daughter did yeoman service staying with her older sister for the entire delivery of twenty hours. She deserves all the praise that she can get and I feel that she is a reflection of the strong sense of caring and love that she received from her parents. She has been through very trying times and has measured up remarkably to the challenge.

Mom is exhausted and sleeping at the moment, she to has remarkable courage and will meet the challenge that her new daughter will give her. All of them are in my prayers for healing and strength.

Staying Healthy

My cousin/sister is about to become a grandmother for the first time and we are all anxiously awaiting word. This is the other big news in my life today.

PSA or Prostate Specific Antigen is chemical in the blood that marks the aggressive tendencies of prostate cancer. The higher the number the more the process is progressing. It is not a marker for the elimination of the cancer but rather how docile it has become. When the marker is going up then the disease is more aggressive when low or declining it is a good sign that the cancer is contained. Before the Luprin and the other drugs and therapies vitamin C transfusions, Reiki, herbs, shaman treatments etc. the number had risen to 57 from 33 , four weeks earlier. Below 4 is considered safe for a body the age of mine. The results of Friday's test is that the number is 2.4.

This is very heartening and gives me cause for joy and relief. What I am doing is the right thing for the health of the body and I am doing better without that particular stress of a high PSA.

It is recommended by the prostate medical oncologist in LA that I indulge my body in a treatment of Chemotherapy with the drug Taxatore. The side effects are exhaustion, depression, hair loss, nausea, and even fingernail loss. The rationale behind this is that the cancer that is killed by the chemo will give me a better chance to live longer by killing some of the cells that have the potential to return as an aggressive cancer after the effects of luprin and the other two drugs are no longer viable.

Since the medical oncologists are strictly hard scientists it is appropriate to judge them using that criteria. Using that criteria there is no existing empirical evidence that demonstrates what their hypothesis suggests. It is logical that what should follow is what they are recommending but lack of empirical evidence is what lots of different treatments that are being suggested suffer from. If I followed that chain of thinking then it seems to me to allow for lots of different processes that might be as effective or more so without the deleterious side effects.

It has more heart that a body that is healing would begin to feel better and have better results from the therapies imposed upon it than the opposite result.

An opinion from a different specialist that is much more sanguine. He did not want to see me until February and told me that the general trend was more important than a single blip. Good to remember as the month by month results continue.

The argument of feeling good leading to feeling better has a tremendous appeal. If there was great suffering being endured then some of the more aggressive, injurious , and risky steps might seem much more viable. But that is not the case.

I have been a meditator all of my adult life and not to use that tool in the process of healing is a wasteful use of a life skill that has been practiced for many years. One of the paths that I am considering in this adventure is creative imagery. Using the mind to actively heal the functioning of the body.

Stories of people changing themselves are rampant. One of the biggest stories is something that is not even seen as such. The drug companies spend an inordinate amount of time and money attempting to eliminate the placebo effect. Which is nothing more than the belief by an individual that a inert substance heals them and when they take it , it proceeds to do so.

I know of a study in which it was observed that people who make an appointment to see a doctor feel better than those who have not yet done the scheduling. Merely making an appointment improves health? Rather than negating that , should not one consider embracing that idea?

Science is replete with stories of people who do not know what they are looking at and only after changing their awareness do they begin to accept what is in front of them. There is a story of two researchers at Bell labs in the 60's named Penzias and Wilson who built a ultra sensitive receiver that had a noise that they could not identify. After a year of research they were able to understand that it was cosmic background radiation that gave strong evidence of the big-bang theory of the origination of the universe. Is the placebo effect that same background noise that we are unable to look at with different understanding? The buddhist in Tantra yoga allude to an understanding that allows for creation of new forms outside of the rational and closer to the stage of belief , but not calling it such.

My prima amiga is a Vipassana meditation teacher of very high caliber and she puts forth the thought of healing energy coming through the acceptance of the vicissitudes of the mind, it's hopes and fears including that of dying. She has also repeatedly demonstrated to me that it is critical to accept what the moment offers and to live in the present. All healing takes place in the present moment.

My response is that to learn to use the imagination in the moment can also affect healing. Using the placebo effect or perhaps allowing it to happen might be more accurate. A story from Andrew Weil of a young teacher who had a student who loved to daydream and when punished for this activity would literally raise his body temperature so high that the law mandated that he be sent home illustrates something of the mental powers that are available to anyone. Interesting anecdotal observations.

It seems logical and feels right to me that a body that is healing would begin to feel better and have better results from the therapies imposed upon it, than the opposite . Vipassana seems to me a passive way to deal with a situation such as medical afflictions. It heals the soul(a non-buddhist term). I am told of great lamas of Tibet not healing themselves of life threatening illnesses . For which I have only the greatest respect. They have motives that include a view of this life as merely one in a series of which they are helpers to those of us who need their guidance and strength of character in the face of death ,that is of inestimable value.

Is it possible that others have used meditation to heal the bodies? Is it possible to use the meditation to heal and put off the date of death until a more full span of time ? Is it wise?

These are some of the questions that can be asked that I think are reasonable.

The first condition is safety. Is what I am doing gone to harm me ? That harm which is being done by not attending to the disease in a way that highly qualified specialists are recommending? That certainly needs to be investigated. There is a group called US 2 who are a prostate cancer support group and I will field the question to them. I will ask about those who have chosen and those who have refused chemo.

The second condition is life and living. To sacrifice a healthy today for a longer period of time of ill health tomorrow does not appeal. If years of misery and suffering, arrrrrgggh ,are the prospect what is the use of advancing the suffering?

The third and most important is what is good for my spiritual practice? The word sadhana is in sanskrit and generally refers to the path of learning that one is on. Wikipedia defines it is as " a means whereby bondage becomes liberation." The body binds the soul on the earthly plane. How does liberation come ? Through passive acceptance of the situation or actively changing the circumstances of suffering.

It seems that it must be a balance between to two.

Every moment is a gift that is why it is called the present.

The tiger and the strawberry

Once, a young monk was sent forth from the monastery to carry a message to another monastery far away. As he walked through the dense forest, he caught glimpses of orange fur in the dappled shade and heard low growls. Surmising that he was being stalked by a tiger, he quickened his steps, but the large cat easily kept pace with him. Fear gnawed at the young monk, and he began to run blindly through the trees, leaving the path he knew in an attempt to outdistance the hungry cat whose panting breath he could feel upon his neck.

The monk lost his way, and to his terror, found himself at the edge of a great precipice. Behind him, he heard the tiger stop, and begin pacing back and forth among the trees, its golden eyes glinting among the leaves. Shaking, the monk looked down and saw that there were vines clambering over the jagged rocks and he determined to try and climb down them. Just as he swung himself over the cliff, and began clambering down the vines which creaked under his weight, he heard the tiger roar, and saw it stare balefully down at him from above.

From below cane an answering roar, and the monk startled and looked down to see a second tiger, pacing along the stones that lined the bottom of the cliff face, waiting for him to descend.

Shuddering, the young monk closed his eyes and clung to the vine, his only means of support. The sound of nibbling teeth caught his attention and he opened his eyes to see a mouse chewing at the vine that held him suspended between the hungry cats.

Next to the mouse, he saw a flash of red.

A wild strawberry grew in a crevice of the stone, and a lone fruit shone invitingly.

The monk reached out, and plucking the crimson fruit, held it to his nose. The sweet fragrance rushed into his nostrils as the last bit of the vine gave way and the monk began to fall. As he plummeted toward the tiger, the monk popped the strawberry in his mouth, and the flavor was the sweetest thing he had ever experienced.

This sums up today.

Another Day

Spent last evening doing a meditation that was specifically designed to promote healing. It was from Andrew Weil and Howard Rossman. And was on a CD that I had downloaded and was a gentle meditation that quickly cut the the sense of feeling good and left wonderful sense of well being. It was good during the evening when I awoke and found myself at 2 in the morning unable to sleep I could use the meditation and not review the situation in my mind.

It felt good and am going to be doing more of these meditations . I have ordered his book from the library and look forward to adapting much of what he talks about into my own practice ad this seems the correct path the one with the most heart.

Tomorrow I go in the morning with several people to the Minguyar Rinpoche group to a shamatha meditation talk or conference that I will use to make contact with other who are in the meditation community and learn what there is available locally in the way of support and inquiry into the power of the mind.

Today was a trip into the world laboratory testing. The local lab where my ex-wife was a doctor took sample that a physician in LA proscribed to determine what effect the drugs that I am on have had. Whatever the results are will help determine what the next course of action will be.

Called the LA doctors to find out the state of the insurance and will not know for another 30-45 days.

Another hour on the phone getting my prima amiga a gift from her side of the country so it will make it to her before she leaves for India.

Work out at the gym in the afternoon and will go to a chanting group this evening.

Prima amiga

Two weeks ago I was given me the opportunity to be with my prima amiga.

The week with my prima amiga was pure play with a beautiful being with whom I share a deep intimacy and with whom I am learning to allow for barriers of my own making to dissolve.

The play is both childish and profound. From the mere physical pratfall to the deeply intimate revelations of the soul. Dancing together, merging our bodies as a single being. Trying on different persona both dark and light and seeing it as divine play. Laughing and crying at our predicaments and our infirmities. Enjoying the subtlety of the mind or joking about the gross emanations of the body. The nature of being who we are, tempered with the setting of boundaries for defining self. Finding the balance. Realizing that the balance is only in the moment and that the next moment calls for a new balance.

Seeing the breadth of desire on my part with her to have things stay just as they are and yet wanting to have things change. An impossible situation which makes life and experience so achingly beautiful.

Learning to let go is difficult but that is what death teaches and that makes for a beautiful set of moments. Letting go of pleasure and pain and becoming less attached helps me transcend myself. That transcendent awareness is so fulfilling that a new set of attachments grow. Those new attachments are more subtle with new desires. Letting go again transforms all of this into deeper and more subtle awareness and the cycle begins again.

The desire on my part to keep this from never ending yet fully aware that with proximity that change will take place and that it is all in the illusion of time. The new balance is being sought.

Meeting the Guru

The bhakti path

The bhakti path...

The bhakti path winds in a delicate way.
On this path there is no asking and no not asking.
The ego simply disappears the moment you touch
him.
The joy of looking for him is so immense that you
just dive in,
and coast around like a fish in the water.
If anyone needs a head, the lover leaps up to offer
his.

- Kabir

Neem Karoli Baba is my guru the presence in my life that inspires, plays with, elevates, carries me through hard times and teaches me . For the last four days I have been in the physical presence of those people who are my spiritual family. Those of us who see Maharaji's miracles in our lives. Those of us who depend on that presence for life, sustenance, and health: spiritual, mental and physical shared a few days together and renewed our faith in Maharaji. I had a long talk with Ram Dass about the situation and he first gently destroyed my ego's various desires. The first one being hope.

1. Don't wish for perfect health. In perfect health, there is greed and wanting. So an ancient said, " Make good medicine from the suffering of sickness." 2. Don't hope for life without problems. An easy life results in a judgmental and lazy mind. So an ancient once said, "Accept the anxieties and difficulties of this life". 3. Don't expect your practice to be clear of obstacles. Without hindrances the mind that seeks enlightenment may be burnt out. So an ancient once said, "Attain deliverance in disturbances". Zen Master Kyong Ho [ 1849-1912], in Thousand Peaks

This quote captures the essence of what was transmitted. The grasping mind will conjure up a plethora of things to attach itself to and the grasping is what gives the suffering. I am not speaking as one who has perfected anything but rather as one who is observing what the mind can do with a small amount of information that may not be true combined with a very vivid negative imagination.

The disease cancer that is in bones and lymph comes with a very scary scenario of pain and suffering and without the teaching of the Ram Dass and faith in the presence of maharaji fear of suffering can become into a reality without effort. Add in the very short days and long nights that winter gives combined with cool temperatures, an empty home, and the pot is waiting to be stirred.

My biggest fear is of losing faith, without that faith the chasm of despair and anger is very deep.

At the Shamatha retreat, after a month of practice, the first morning meditation was a gift from the divine. The next was a meditation that was skillful and complete. The next few were ordinary and by the end of the day all meditational qualities that had taken years to develop were gone, my faith was lost in my self, the practice, and my guru. It was a true hell. I was frightened and angry. There was a sense of losing all relationship to any form a sanity and that it was a permanent situation.

I felt great sympathy for the Dante's "Lucifer" in the Divine Comedy since he of all the angels had been God's favorite and now was banished. The reason Lucifer was so angry was that he had known the love of God, without that knowledge the anger is only of the human form and therefore incomplete because God still loves but without God the devastation is total. My guru is my way of understanding the divine which is as close to the divine as I currently understand.

The faith is in the changing nature of thoughts and emotions combined with the identification with the skylight nature of the mind. Maharaji for me enters as the nature of divine love. To be immersed in that love is more breathtakingly fulfilling an experience than can be imagined. The soul, mind and body are loved by the infinite, always have been, are now, and always will be. That love is all that can be depended upon since all else is of a transitory nature. Forgetting that love, becoming unaware of its magnificence, is to allow the soul to die. Identifying with that love that eternal unchanging being is to have grace.

Focusing the mind is helpful, doing this post is exceptionally helpful. The act of writing out what fears are there brings awareness to feeling and allows for the release from grasping. Hence less pain. Being aware brings an initial sense of aversion followed by a deeper sense of acceptance. Behind the acceptance is the letting go into grace.

I am drug averse and have had root canals without Novocain but the fear of something can exacerbate pain without its even being present. Mental pain is present when there is no awareness. When loving kindness is present the pain is allowed its moment of transitory reality to be replace by another transitory reality but behind these transitory states is love and when it becomes unfettered by the grasping mind Maharaji arises bestowing grace.

All of my training with the few simple abilities that I posses with working with the mind are being called upon in these moments and will be further taxed to their limits and beyond. This will strengthen my practice for the preparation for finals.

Decisions

The quality of decisions that one makes reflects the quality of results that are achieved. If the mind is at ease, rested, and balanced then the decisions will reflect that . If that mind has all relevant data discussed at length then the decision will reflect that and the consequences will have been foreseen. I am weighing the option of using an aggressive traditional medical approach to a more sanguine approach of allopathic and homeopathic. While no one has suggested that I consider a straight homeopathic approach many have suggested that I rely completely on allopathic.

It does not reflect my background. My mother was a Christian Scientist and while not strictly faithful to the tenants of the religion she nevertheless was a life long believer. During the early spiritual seeker stage of my life she was immensely supportive seeing what was like in what I was doing compared to her faith and not dwelling on the differences.

My father was a chemist who believed in none of that stuff but was tolerant and loving towards me although he did not understand.

My ex-wife is an M.D., a pathologist, and after the divorce drifted in the Sikh religion where she finds happiness being the assistant to a Reiki Master Teacher and a Reiki master herself. She has been advising me and is going to the doctor with me on the 17th. This will be interesting.
This makes for my unique way to approach that with which I am dealing.

I will be needing to make difficult choices relating to the therapy that is available.
I am gathering information to discover both what is available, what choices that I have and how I am going to approach each of these choices and also what combinationof choices that will make the mix of what I am willing to do and more importantly whatI believe will bring me to healing.

The belief that something will heal is important to me. Drug companies have to eliminate the placebo effect in which people get well by taking nothing more than an innocuous inert substance. So what they prove is that the mind can have a profound effect on the body irrespective of the drug. It comes to the nature of belief. I have to find that place where what I believe -- be it allopathic or homeopathic -- is balanced in such away that the soul, body, and mind are healed.

On a lighter note a wonderful friend has been visiting me for the last week and we have been enjoying each others company as two playmates . She is a spiritual seeker who comes by to play with me and teach me profound lessons in meta-cognitive awareness, mindfulness, and healing.