it is fully spring here at the Center of the East and West Gate the small things are budding the rabbits are abounding the weasels are killing rabbits and sucking their blood then eating their flesh to their delight and the trees let go of their leaf casts and burst forth into the air like kids leaping off a dock into the lake
the lilacs are blooming and the trash is receding the dogs are shedding much to the young birds nest makers delight
it has been an extraordinary weekend which is to say that it has been and is everyday itself
this weekend the first student has finally come to the center and together we have visited and explored the opportunity of the days as they unfolded
we have built a bathroom cabinet and installed the sink in the downstairs bathroom which is really nice and will help with the functionality of the house it was for me a really nice experience to work side by side with a person who is easy with self respect with exchanging the ideas of examining and following through on the mechanics of planning and assembling the cabinet and installation of the sink I was able to be myself and take care of my part in the process within the limits I have. it was a joy to be equal and witness the skill and active gift of an others hands and heart. to have no worry about needing to watch over the work of another and thus was able to enjoy both of us as we are in this weekend I have been blessed with the opportunity to enjoy the new Mary that sprung forth from the garden and compost of her past. what a blessing to have grown up a little more through falling down the stairs of my life, as Po did over and over.
I want to thank each and everyone who has been in my life and brought to it the seeds and lessons that are blossoming even when we thought we had failed in our attempts in the garden I want you to know that we did not fail and I love you the more for knowing you
At the end of the day when I'd reached the end of what I could do the partner of the day, I was so wonderfully surprised to find out and get to experience the fruit of, had the understanding and followthrough to clean up both the house, the tools, the kitchen and the remains of our tea. what a gift to find this morning when I awoke, it was like christmas. not because I had expected it or not expected it but simply in the nothingness of neither thing being written beforehand
finding the gift of it having been given without preamble and without the discounting shadow of expectation. how cool that my coworker/student/teacher had acted on the habit of cleaning up restoring the tools and the house to the beginners mind and place of opportunity in the simple and clean transition of closing one day and letting it rest so that the next it was ready to begin again not from the place of needing to clear up or clean up or reset before things could have a fresh start but from the place of original opportunity. there already clean organized put away ready to come out if called into the process was today
it gave me the opportunity the choice of using the first of my morning to make a gift of tea to be warm and ready when they came down from the evening respite
how lovely the rhythm of care as expressed by the life of an awake adult who seeks to not return to the irresponsibility of the child's status but seeks the freedom of the skilled and gentle wherewithal of the spiritually mature adult. it is a wonder to see this house begin its life this spring not according the the script I wanted but according to its own story its own giveaway and beauty which is beyond this authors ability to compose I am grateful to this house and the Spirits that own and run it Grateful for their love Wopila Taku-cnas-cnan Wopila Thunder Beings Wopila Ancestors Wopila Three Maidens Wopila Unci Maka Wopila Tunkcashila Wopila Pilamayaye Waste' Nina Waste' for this person who journeyed to be in your care, for this house that is here to receive and welcome , to the existence and perseverance of this body that you loaned me and the heart and mind that strive to be in your grace
we also this weekend of course watched the Kung Fu Panda and together we explored the mysteries of the allegory the mysteries of the teachings that help us resolve what troubles us that help us reawaken our own sense of who we are and choose to be
one of the things that we have discussed which is a teaching that I would like to gift to you relatives from the work and play that we have shared this weekend is that of the storyteller
being a Storyteller is an amazing gift Salman Rushdie is one of my favorite storytellers his books about Horoun and the Sea of Stories, Luka and the Fire of Life are wonderful they are about boys whose life unfolds in the embrace of their fathers life as a great Storyteller
so what is it that makes a storyteller great? what is it that can change a storyteller into a dictator or a propagandist? it is a good question relatives what is it that takes us from the opportunity of love into the bigamy of betrayal? what is it that carries us from the shore of inordinate wonder in an introduction into someones life into the choppy and storm ridden seas of fear and the course that leads to an island of abuse where a stalker of the heart and their victim are marooned? hmmm what is it that changes the heart from one of exploration amazement and perhaps adoration into the bitter desert of regret?
it is whether or not we can learn to be great Storytellers or whether we develop into an egocentric egomaniacal script writer it is on the one hand where we choose to crush the grapes of our life out of our own and others fruit, fermenting it into the whine that we sip
or we develop the garden and let it grow in observance, taste the fruit and make the sweet wine of work and patience to share over a table of gratitude it is the difference between a crushing grip of control or the open palm that is held steadfast and gentle enough that the wild at heart can find a place to land without fear
this is the difference in the Storyteller and the Scriptwriter oh and relatives there is a big difference.
remember the words you read and hear may be strong, they may sound harsh and over done but it is murder when you chop the head off a lettuce even as if it were a lamb it is murder nonetheless and thus as humble students at the gate of the teachers in this world we accept the brutality and the simplicity of the lesson even as our feet are bathed in the blood of our past
even as we murder so that we may consume and live, the difference in the life-giving essence of the breath of a Storyteller, and the fog of confusion that belays the life of another at the end of the short tether of a life-takeing noose of the script writer. the difference is whether or not when we arise at the beginning of the day our life is uncarved as is that of those around us or if it is already destined to be a sculpture of our own egos. we are the artists relatives it is in our hands how the world turns
we eat the crop of the harvest of our own hands and when it is found to be bitter and not life giving do we make the choice to return again dedicated to slogging through the lessons of learning to become Master gardeners or do we continue to toil and seed and sow a harvest of loss? it is up to us whether or not as rabbits we grow into the little vessels of blood and flesh that feed the weasel and her family so that balance is kept do we give our lives as they are into the continuation of the great cycle of life or do we cower in our warren of tightly controlled opportunity seeking to not risk being eaten by something more powerful than we imagine something more beautiful in the give and take of life and death do we limit our tale? or do we go out and blossom into the great Story of this time? hmmm ?
how is it that we fall in love and then once it has, as we so often erroneously think, ended its foray into our camp how is it that we do not pine over our loss? how is it that we free ourselves and those upon whom we placed so much dependance on our wellbeing how is it that we rest at night relatives? how is it that we do not assign the as of yet unwritten pages of our own story to the overshadow of our past? how is it that we do not erase, shut out , and cut off from our selves those with whom we have shared the beauty of love, the exploration of friendship, the intimacy of a shared project, when at what has appeared to be its deviation from our own scripted expectation left us in the lurch of our own making. how is it that we do not make our lives smaller and smaller by design?
is it by chance stumbling on the next person whom can wipe away our memories? is it by jumping the pages of our own miserable story into that of one greater that can hide from us our previous pain and regret? do we pull the rug of indifference over the knots of our past conundrums? do we look out on the billions of people around us and think that perhaps because in the short time of our life we will not outlive the vast opportunity that exists and in so doing think that we can afford to lose our connections?
I will tell you that there are not enough books of fiction in the library let alone the world to erase the memory of one poorly held script. there are not enough characters in what is written to afford the loss of a single relative. would you choose if I must carve away someone that I shared care with for me to carve you away from my beingness relatives? would you think that it is something that I can afford?
I think not I think that each life is so beautiful each life so unique that its loss is only to be grieved and honored not pursued and discarded like property that has outlived its usefulness.
and that is it isn't it we are not each others property are we?
the Storyteller recognizes that each day each moment each life and encounter is and must be held in its own uniqueness. No matter where a journeyman/woman takes the thread of the life that is being witnessed into the dark and out again to receive the birth of a new day. A new life, born of the dawn of realization that organizes itself in our night. The Storyteller recognizes that each one, each being, will create a more unique telling of the tale of life than could be scripted. Why is that the scriptwriter cannot see, that no matter how the director looks at a life, it is and always will be limited by the lens that is held to the minds eye. The lens of the scriptwriter is so very different than the glasses of the Storyteller.
when I met you when I engaged with you, if I told myself a story about who you are and were and would be, as long as you remained within the confines of the pages of my fairytale, I could arrive at my happy ending.
It was when you wandered off the page things began to go awry. it is here that we have the first Ink-ling that we are writing a script rather than recording a tale. At first I revised my script taking into account magnanimously your essence which still intrigued me not for the sake of you as a beauty way of creation but as only held through the lens of my own self aggrandizing storyline. I chose to persist in the story of my life as I wanted it written. and you were but a character to enhance the design of my own morality play.
when you ripped yourself from the grasp of the pages of my past I could never release you from the blank shadow of my unwritten days and nights. why is that relatives? why is it that I could not have peace in this one thing?
it is because that in the everyday things in the mundane in the brushing of my teeth or hair. in the greeting of my coworkers and in the movie like projection of the mindlessness of the everyday story of my life I am practicing, strengthening, the habit of writing scripts about everything that I encounter.
a great Storyteller knows that what moves a tale forward through the uncharted sea of possibility without marooning it on the desolate shores of a desert island is the details, the small turns of a phrase, the tiny adjectives and verbs that propel the nouns into depth of character and keep the plot original and the reader engaged it is in the details of my life that I am entrapping my entire world and each occupant like slaves chained to the galley of a great ship at sea.
so it is that my love was chained inside the habit of scripting my own life
so it is that my own soul was enslaved to regret that the poem was wrecked on the cliffs of originality which you climbed to get away from my dictating unconscious way of life. so it was that even though you save yourself I kept you pinned and lifeless even as I drain away my own opportunity to enjoy the nuance of what we unfolded together as well as apart.
it was in the details of my day in my habit of scripting
the students here this weekend we thought this through and opened up the opportunity to reexamine our choice to be writers or Writers and we thought we would share with you the giveaway that we found.
practice not writing the script of how water tastes as you swallow it
drink it in its original nuance and let it flow into you as it is as new life with every sip
practice not predetermining how a potato feels, smells, tastes and moves through your mouth as you eat it
taste it feel it celebrate its life even as you consume its originality for each bite is like none other
practice letting each moment be original in itself
have it as it is do not grasp and mold it
forget about the predetermined goal that we cram our life into everyday only thinking that if we arrive at the scripted destination that we have indeed arrived
be in the gift of each moment accept the present of something that never has existed until it happened
the journey is the destination
it is the thing to behold over and over again in the original moment in which we can rediscover our own original selves that of the potato of the water
change the predetermined thought into the opportunity of an original idea and let it flow in the minutia of the fabric of your every day life
if my friends you can do this one small thing then you have become a Storyteller of your own life
you will find that you have freed your love from their chains you have indeed kept the world intact in all of its ugliness and glory and you will find that it will amaze you moment by original moment as it unfolds into the great Story.
do not regret the preamble do not see the development of your character as a loss it is but the steps that brought us to today keep writing keep an eye out for the narrow lens and begin again and again the new chapter
if you have the chance to release with tobacco and love at last those whom have been locked away in the cellar of your regrets animosities longings fantasies or past glories then relatives you will have freed also your own character from its prelude to life
I wish for you the understanding that comes from these words and i wish for all of us to enjoy and hold without grasping the wild at heart so that she can fly not only so that we can witness her beauty but the beauty of our open hand
I am grateful for having the opportunity to be able to see for a moment of her time the beauty of her flight and the steadiness of my uncharted love
blessings to you my friends
love love love
mb
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