Last night, after a beautiful day spent singing to the Guru, having lunch with Sat Inder Kaur at Baljeet's Korma Sutra, and a sweetly delicious Women's Yoga class where Adi Shakti Kaur got to do the 'warrior princess' la-la-la-la-la-la-la!! she had been longing for, during which my neck pain released, I had another quietly transformative experience. This time it was outside the Gurdwara. As I sat to eat a piece of raisin toast in the ante-room outside my bedroom here at the Ashram, I felt a presence of deep love and caring. As if someone were holding me, but without arms. I could see light around the fireplace and above. When I looked up, there was a picture of Guru Nanak! For a fleeting instant, I felt as if we were just married, and I was in my bridegroom's special room. But then I thought, "well maybe I am just feeling old ghosts here in this house, or getting nostalgia for my childhood...maybe remembering the peace of my home in Chattanooga, and the homes of my godparents, the Bertrands (Annabel and John) and Landis Gunn."
Maybe it was all of the above, and maybe it was Guru Nanak, but I felt such deep peace and love from my own heart. I began to feel as if my beloved were sitting on the sofa, cradling me in his arms, like a mother. I felt safe.
I tried to go into my bedroom and sleep, but I missed the presence in the other room. I fell asleep on the sofa for an hour, awash in a feeling of utter bliss. When I got up and went to bed, I felt lonely.
This morning I sang with Sat Inder Kaur and Karta Purkh to the Chardi Kala CD, which really expanded my voice! At the end I heard my voice as if from a distance, and it sounded like the voice of an Indian woman. We then took a Hukam, which Sat Inder Kaur read: page 452. I went back to read from that later, and it was such beautiful language that I could not seem to tear myself away...
I was scrambling again to leave. Trying to get a sub for my class tonight was of no avail, I had to leave the Guru and come home. All of a sudden life exploded me out of my bliss. Lynn's mother had died, and a relative of her husband's as well, and she was telling me all about it while I had to leave. Then Joe told me Kyle had had an emergency appendectomy, and was still in excruciating pain. Then the gas pump poured gas all over my car and tire for the second time, and I went from a state of peace to berating the station attendant and the customer service representative for BP.
By the time I got home, with a borrowed copy of the Guru wrapped in cloth, I had recovered from my frenzied state somewhat. I taught my class though, and it didn't go well. For the first time in years I felt arrogant and overly sure of myself. While I was lamenting privately the fact that I now seemed to be behaving as I have Sat Inder Singh behave on a few occassions...I thought, "Oh my! I am in Shakti Pad like he is! This is so hard!" I had no idea what he was up against, what with the ego expansiveness one moment, and a horribly deflated ego the next. What a roller-coaster. It sucks. I feel for him, and I do not look forward being in this stage of growth. How has he handled it with as much grace as he has thus far? It's rough. I forgive him for being such a monumental jerk at some times.
Thinking all of the above WHILE I was teaching, I was only vaguely aware of a student's discomfort with the flow of a class too intense for her, and yet feeling very frustrated with students who come to take a more advanced class when they aren't ready for it. I felt that she expected me to tone it down a bit, but if I did, the other students would have complained. I resented being called to teach a relative beginner in an advanced class where she did not belong. I knew it was not fair of me, and I was not, even in my state of having an inflated ego, able to seamlessly teach, as I have at times in the past, to more than one level...probably because my ego was so expanded. Jeesh!
She actually walked out on my class. That should have come as no surprise, but it floored me. I was devastated. I have never, even in the years during which I taught aerobics, had a student walk out. I pride myself, paradoxically, on teaching with a level of humility that allows me to approach teaching as a Seva ~ an act of service to others. A gift. A blessing. Tonight, I had changed. I had thought I was 'hot shit'.
I was wrong. I have been teaching by the Guru's grace and the Grace of God, until now. I guess I am not the only one who needs a little 'Ardas Bhaee' in my life to help me through Shakti Pad. God help me if I am ever an ass like that again. And yet, if I stay the course, it is almost certain that I will, yet again, be an ass. I truly do not want to be though. I hope people will forgive me. That is why I try to forgive them, even if I don't want to be in their vicinity while they themselves act strangely.
I am thinking of a quote of Guru Amar Das Ji:
"The path they take is sharper than a two-edged sword,
And finer than a hair."
No comments:
Post a Comment