SO LET US GO DEEPER (Pt. 2)

• Today’s questions: How can I bring what I need into my life, right now, for myself?

• Today's suggested practice: Day 1 of this month's practice, to practice for yourself, your wants, the things you yearn for (see Kendra Cunov’s short “Notes Towards Self Practice” below)

• My practice: 2:30AM: 45 minutes: A series of mantra meditations, then Breath of Fire

• My vulnerability practice: I feel my yearning, allowing these desires to be as open-ended, not needing to be quenched, needing only to be experienced as beautiful portents of what is already near at hand…

★ My full conversation with Kendra Cunov about Men & Women & the “No-Man Diet” is now on the podcast at sacredbodies.ca/podcast

Hans Peter Meyer

TODAY’S MEDITATION

When I last wrote I was remembering how tango teaches me about life. But today I was thinking: No, tango is, for many of us, not like life or love. For those of us who resist the call to obliteration, the end of the self that we know —or believe!— ourselves to be, there is less to learn here on the dance floor than we might. If we —if I— were that brave.

But, remembering last week’s tango tour: Three milongas; three very different experiences. The first, an awkward reconnecting with myself in the dance, with enough frisson in the tandas to make a second milonga inevitable.

And that second milonga! What words can describe what happened there? How about this: Breathing into the man that I am, I am a powerful masculine presence, and I can stir others into their powerful feminine flow. In the presence of this flow, sometimes experienced as radiance, there is a pull to disintegration. I breathe, and I am the centre of Her storm —the woman in my arms, the life I live, the woman I love, however She is manifest. I breathe, and I am the ground on which She dances. I am drawn to dissolution, to becoming my own feminine flow and beauty. My strength and my gift, in this moment, however, is to see Her, to know Her, and knowing Her, to guide with firm and gentle hands and heart, to be nourished, and to be so much more than myself.

In this second milonga I discovered another Oracle, and she called me to dance in ways I haven’t danced in too long. These tandas stirred so much —so many feelings! So much desire! And yes, so many moments of art, moments where I could feel myself knowing with unreasonable knowing what her body yearned to express. A whole evening of this! Which, of course, prompted me to extend my stay in the city so that I could dance again, at a third milonga...

Here, in this third milonga, here is where I was given the meal that I am still digesting. A lesson that bears mastication of the slowest order.

An almost-empty hall. A beautiful, dimly lit by the falling light of the evening. But few dancers. And fewer still that I felt myself drawn to dance with. Hubris. Thinking there is little or nothing here for me, certainly not after the experience of the second milonga! What, I wondered, What was I doing here?

I want the world to give me what I want. I don’t think I’m so different from others. And like others, perhaps, I fail to see what I have.

“She gives me everything, and tenderly.” But what She gives me, so tenderly that I often fail to notice, is —even when I do pay attention— rarely in forms that I understand. Especially when my mind has already latched onto what and how and when this desired thing or experience will be. As far as the tango goes, I wanted a milonga that would stand on the shoulders of the one that came before. Or, at least to walk beside it.

Instead, this third milonga was a reality check. My body was both unable and unwilling to do what was required in the moment of the music, in the moment of whatever woman I happened to be dancing with. I struggled. Stumbled. The effortless holding space for magic of the previous milonga replaced by a turgid swampy grasping after an escaped elegance. There was little or none of the follow revealing a deeper beauty.

So yes. I stumbled. Literally and figuratively. Humbled. Saturday’s illusions, not without truth, but certainly not realized or remembered except as a dream.

Checked, I —again— breathed and remembered also: this is what we do here in this life, in this dance, in this thing called love: we stumble towards each other; occasionally we hold each other, occasionally with open hearts; we allow Her to be the art of this moment, and we —I— see my desires, my dreams, my heartbreak, and my hubris.

As I dance this life, I want only this: to let the energies of attraction and desire tear me apart, and bring me together, again. And again. And again.

This is, I believe, my work & my joy in life, and in the love, the marriage, I aspire: to surrender and to sacrifice, to know myself more than I imagine, to know her more than I imagine I can know her, to know this together, in our solitudes, as the holiest of my work, the holiest of my joys in this life.

(More in Part 3)

TODAY’S INSPIRATIONS

🌀…When someone is extremely powerful and benevolent, you experience a boost of energy….
…remain steadfast with your daily practice – know that you are powerful enough to withstand all malevolent influences around your life -- use this to create a mega-aura (electromagnetic field) and shield yourself...hold your position...hold your purpose and intention...remain steady in all environments. (Guru Singh & Guruperkarma Kaur)

🌀There are so many others. But you see me, you hear me, you know me. (My beloved, my Oracle & Siren)

TODAY'S SUGGESTED PRACTICE

Day 1 of this month's practice:

Please read through first, then ...

Today, set a time —at least five minutes, perhaps 15— when you can be alone and in stillness.

• Stand or sit or lie, with a beautiful and straight spine, firm but relaxed, feeling your feet or your sit bones or hips heavy and connected to the earth;

• Close your eyes;

• Inhale deeply into your belly, letting it become soft and round;

• Exhale by gently and slowly, much more slowly than your inhale, pressing your navel to your spine,

• And listen to Kendra Cunov’s few minutes on practice:

When you’re done, stand or sit or lie for another minute and breathe gently, slowly filling and emptying your belly. Here, as you breathe into your fullness, ask yourself, How can I bring what I need into my life, right now, for myself?

Notice if your body-mind feels somehow changed. And whether you notice a change or not, be content with yourself, exactly as you are in this moment.

Continue with your day, open to the gifts it brings.