NOW IS THE TIME...

Apprenticeship to Love: Meditations on this Path to Authentic Relationship, November 30, 2023

• Today’s questions: Do I feel right? In alignment with the man I am? Do I even have an inkling what that might feel like? Do I even have an inkling of what it feels like to be out of alignment with myself?
• Today's suggested practice: Day 21 of this month's practice, to notice & receive (see my "Short Practice,” below)
• My practice today: 4:30am: 60 minutes: yoga, mantra, Pranayama for the Five Elements, and Meditation for the Lower Triangle
• My vulnerability practice: I feel so close to losing it, this delicate and subtle and hard-won feeling of peace. It is only a "slip" away...

★ I'm preparing a panel of "Why Marriage?" for an upcoming Apprenticeship to Love Virtual Workshop. Free for Premium and Premium+ subscribers. LMK if you're interested in being part of the panel. Please see note on the bottom of this chapter...

TODAY'S MEDITATION

I am no stranger to confusion. I know the attraction of the "entertainments" of this life that tempt distraction. I know how well these entertainments have protected me from the lessons that needed —still need!— learning, protecting me from this experience of apprenticeship.

In my case these entertainments have names like: sex, drugs, alcohol, work, "purpose & mission," the fantasies of family and marriage, the narrowness of my understanding of my sexuality. Deadlines (not only the self-imposed ones, but the ones that seem to come from others and therefore have an "involuntary" aura about them. These too I choose). Shopping for "newness" and novelty, in all things —from food to clothing to online dating. Analysing other's behaviours. Thinking that psychological or sociological or theological labels mean anything. All of it. These are nothing more than entertainments. Distractions.

How do I manage (or, to use the current jargon: regulate) myself? Or, to use an older way of imagining it: How do I "hold onto myself" when so many things invite me to fly away from myself?

One word: practice.
And a choice: to love myself more than these distractions.

I choose to tune in to the man I am. And, tuning in, the noise of distracting thoughts and feelings and behaviours lessens, is tuned out. I become my highest vibration. My highest frequency.
...
Let's be clear: I do not, at this time, receive what some consider the familiar or even "normal" or "necessary" gifts in this relationship with my beloved. Those I got, in abundance, years ago. Still, there are those near me who think I am a little crazy for my devotion. And, at times, I too find myself wonder...

But Nietzche advises that, When marrying, ask yourself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this person into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory.

Tuning into the man I am I am released from the fog of doubt and neediness & I remember how lost I was, lost in the worst way because I did not know I was lost. Then she chose me. Then she shook me awake, and waking alone I began to know how lost I was, and how to hold onto myself in the midst of the flood of feelings that come with waking.
...
In recent months I've realized that I am, finally, in the relationship I need. Yes, need, not want. Here & now I am in a relationship with a woman who truly is my Oracle and my Siren, who allows me to love her, receives my devotion, without conditions or demands on either side. I am free to know her as she is, and she is free to be herself, and to feels herself free to test and deepen me, simply by being the woman she is.
...
I have, as Guru Singh and Guruperkarma Kaur call it, "opinions & interpretations" about her ways. As per these teachers, these are more "entertainments." Distractions from what is real and true here, which is my deepening awareness of love. With her, through her, I become aware —and, profoundly content, even happy, in this awareness.

I have not forgotten the beautiful and delicious entertainments that marriage my include (I say may include, because most marriages I've observed and experienced do not sustain these sweet moments very long). I am still subject to wanting these distractions and enjoyments. But, at least for today & yesterday & perhaps tomorrow, I am experiencing a deeper satisfaction & nourishment: I am in tune with myself; I am called to be ever deeper as myself; I experience myself opening to her calling, even as my habit to close & distract is so ready at-hand.

I am here. Now. For these moments I am he who is so deep in his breath and posture that I am as one teacher encourages us to be, "he who must be trusted." And standing so firm in this posture, so rooted into this earth, I am able to hear her Siren song, to allow all that is unnecessary to be broken open and discarded.
...
I tune in and I become myself.

As myself, I allow this shattering of all that protects me, revealing a depth and quality to myself that I cannot imagine.

Her Siren song reveals to me that I am the treasure I am seeking. I am the riches I yearn for. And I am grateful. Content. Loved, and loving. Held in this ocean of love. Holding onto myself. And, gently, holding my beloved.

TODAY’S INSPIRATIONS

🌀…now is the time to tune in and tune up; to create a morning practice that aligns your instruments of life and inspires others to do the same. (Guru Singh and Guruperkarma Kaur)
🌀 The Conscious Warrior is committed to developing strength of the mind, physical body, and nervous system through dedicated physical, yogic, and meditative practice. (John Wineland, Precept 6)
🌀 Our “work” is to receive. The rest is preparation. (Leroy Gordon)
🌀I test you. (My beloved, my Oracle & Siren)

TODAY'S SUGGESTED SHORT PRACTICE

Day 22 of this month's practice, to move and to notice, and to receive:
Please read through first, then ...

• Today, set two alarms, one for the early part of your day, one for mid-late afternoon when you may be feeling low energy.
• When the alarm sounds, wherever and however you are, take five minutes to do this short practice:
• First, ask yourself: What do you need? What do you want? Can you tell the difference? And, can you give yourself this thing, exactly this thing that you belive you most deeply need?
• Then, follow the short practice here:

• When you’re done, sit or stand for another minute or two, breathing gently, slowly filling and emptying your belly. Here, as you breathe into your fullness, ask yourself, Do I feel right? In alignment with the man or woman I am? Do I even have an inkling what that might feel like? Do I even have an inkling of what it feels like to be out of alignment with 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 until the next alarm sounds, and repeat.

★ In 2024 I will be hosting a series of workshops and retreats with feminine colleagues, for couples. Please see the upcoming events site for more information. For some of these there will be discounts for Premium and Premium+ subscribers.