A slap in the face, prophecy of a dessert lite...

Hi ladies and gentlemen,

I apologize for the long absence.

The retreat was very difficult, meaning it was very good. My back was persistently sore, in one area for 35 hours, and then the pain moved to another area for another 35 hours. It was not directly related to sitting unsupported with a straight back for all these hours, it was other, less obvious reasons. The first 3 days the pain was centered between my shoulderblades, and it was undoubtedly related to the issue with my cerebellum, the membrane surrounding my brain and spinal cord. It has been on and off tight and sore for a few years, and I started to notice it when I started to practice Yoga. How did it happen ? It could have been related to the hit I took playing tackle football without gear from the 210 pound Armenian’s head which contacted my heart region and drove me straight into the ground. The osteopath did a bit of this and a bit of that and said perhaps all the problems in this body are caused by this imbalanced cerebellum, pointing to the C1 on my spine as a source of disalignment, along with the parts of my skull behind and below my ears. Apparently he realigned my body, and I assume all the pain during the practice was the hangover effect (or karma) of me overstretching this membrane with frequent intense neck and trapezius and spine stretches, coupled with serious back workouts on the farm. The pain then migrated to the right side of my middle back, and felt as if it was a rib problem, which was contacting my lung. This I don’t have a story for, but of course I can make up a story (I can do that). It is not the side which is directly behind the point of aggressive football impact, that place has had pain inbetween the shoulderblade and spine on and off since I started working physically hard. So what is it on the right side ? It is surely psychosomatic, and so it is exciting. I really tried hard to keep long stretches of nothought, and was quite successful, I don’t know how many 1 minute bursts of mind totally preoccupied with bodily sensations I pulled off. Nothing compared to the 5 second bursts, but still, an improvement overall.

It was Stephanie’s first sit, and she said she found it very valuable, and not as hard as she would have previously imagined. It was interesting to see eachother again after the ten days. First contact was very shy and timid. We managed quite easily not to touch eachother or communicate lust or attachment for the whole tenth day. As we drove home, I told her how nothing mattered, when considering possible futures, that seemed to matter before, such details as what sort of land and countryside and projects and travels. This was where my big suppressed thing was moving around inside, and I totally misinterpreted it.

The next day, bright and early, to the acupuncture/osteopath lady. I had been fatigued after hardly 12 hours a day, easily cold, mentally exhausted. Steph’s dad suggested there was a problem with my energy, and that I see this well-renowned doctor in the area. I lied down on her patient’s bed and she poked and prodded a bit. She proceeded to make me more transparent than perhaps I have ever been able to by my own efforts, and any other guru or meditation master has been able to.

« The winters here are particularily humid. Your energy is very contracted, hardly reaches beyond your skin. This is why you are so cold. »

«You’re problem is that you

«You’re problem is that you’re mind is disconnected from your body, and busily preoccupied with the future. You are afraid, and so you make too many plans in your head for possible future outcomes. » (I begin to think to myself how ironic this is, the doctor says that my main problem is the same problem that I have tackled day after day for years, believing that I was quite adept at managing this human problem. My self-image rears its ugly head as it is hit with a hammer.)

«You are exhausted and are having psychosomatic reactions to these flurries of the mind. People who have this anxiety problem usually cope with it in two ways, either they turn to some addiction like smoking, chocolate, alcohol, or they subvert it into a metabolic transformation. »

«You had a radical change in your energy body when you were around eight or nine. Then again when you were around seventeen. » (My mind races back to the hazy history of my preteen years. This is just a few years after my parents divorced and my mom brought my brother and I to Canada. Around seventeen is when I finished high school. Big changes, surely could cause anxiety.)

«You’re energy is working here (she points to a certain region of my body). Now it is working here (another region). You seem to have a problem with your throat gland (I forget the scientific name).

(All of a sudden, I put two and two together and realize the symptoms I experienced at eight and seventeen were metabolic. I started to become overweight around the former age, and then mysteriously lost fifty pounds around seventeen and entered the range of normal weight. It was surely a reaction to anxiety, which was a reaction to my parents’ divorce, and being so far away from my father year after year, seeing him only 1 month a year.)

«The events surrounding these energetic events and the possible causes are not important. It is what the body did energetically that is important. » (Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu.)

(ego having been hit with a hammer, make it a sledgehammer, with my high pain tolerance and brawniness. I began to want to cry, but tears didn’t flow. I thought about my practice, doubted it’s effectiveness, doubted my teacher’s wisdom. Was blown away at how deep and thorough this energy imbalance is. Moreso, how adept I became at supressing it, convincing myself and thus others that I had the present moment no worries thing down pact. I had a master’s degree in it. Master’s degrees mean nothing. However here in France, people haven’t caught onto the realization that academic feats are not correlated positively or correlated at all in most cases with real-world professional performance. I had a brief, weak, barely conscious thought : all this inner work I have done all these years, regardless of my significant self-delusions, has brought my deeply rooted imbalance up to the surface finally, and with the help of a doctor I recognized it, realized that I had been experiencing the weather anomalies it has been causing in my body, finally !)

«I have helped to effectively reprogram your head so that you will stay more in the present. (Ummm, what are you, Dr. Frankenstein ? !) For the next three weeks, you will continue to have fatigue, and the head chatter and fear will perhaps increase. After this period you will have a great shift in your energy. Is it possible to meet again in six weeks ? (hmmm, I am skeptical, Goenka and others said you have to liberate your mind yourself. Let’s see, and try not to turn this into a grand case of placebo effect, either. I am wary of the power of suggestion.)

(Actually, whether it is placebo or not, if this big change takes place, it doesn’t matter the cause. This is the pragmatic, Chinese view of things, and for me it is supreme.)

And, since then, the French paper grind has continued. I had a flash of insight now as I am writing this as to the cause of the mass deforestation of France. I am now officially able to work in France, I have health insurance officially, I am officially looking for a job in France, I have officially applied to the carpentry school (which is currently full, so I should seek other schools or other things to do in the meantime while I am on the waiting list).

Next steps : Driving school (yeah been there, done that, but the government will pay for almost all of it, and I haven’t driven these petit European streets before…), job hunt (as there is nothing else left to hunt in this land where nature has become, save for places of highest altitude and a few parks, totally humanized). Monday I begin my two weeks volunteering with a carpenter. We all agree it will be good for my anxious head, and I know it will be good for my body.

One aspect of my life that hasn’t been compromised by my psychosomatic, childhood traumatic miss my daddy, or the relentless, severely obese, readily accepted although grunted about here and there French bureaucracy is my sexual performance and my ability to help maintain a harmonious relationship largely liberated from traditional sexist roleplaying. The ability to observe sensations equanimously during pleasurable experiences gets a big WORK IN PROGRESS stamp.

My digestion and diet has improved. I used the ten day retreat to develop some serious self-discipline around diet. Two meals a day. Max three ladels full of oatmeal and two fruits per breakfast. Maximum 1 plate of food for lunch. After Day 1, absolutely no bread, dessert, sugar, fried food, dairy, or caffeine. The only sugar, actually, is that in fruits and that in honey, which I ingested liberally for my various symptoms of a common cold. Since returning on Sunday, I have kept a strong determination to not ingest caffeine or sugar, very little bread and cheese, and to not overeat. It is fantastic to walk away from every meal and still be able to comfortably eat more, and to be able to lie down without feeling crappy immediately after a meal.

I have discovered a few white hairs. It confirms that I, too, have been running towards death since I was born.

I know, the title of this blog is about sustainability in Europe, and before you judge this blog as falsely advertised, remember all those novels who have all that pre-climaxic detail that bores the readers of a lesser caliber of patience and persistence, reserving the real good meat and potatoes and blissful dessert for those readers who deserve to distract their minds from their lives, from their bodies. Un desserte sans cafféine, sans sucre…

Cheers,
Maurizio