A Time to Heal

HELLO, MR. WILBER?" I was sitting on the deck of our newly rented house in Mill Valley, staring peacefully but rather blankly into the dense redwood trees, for which the area was famous.

"Yes."

"My name is Edith Zundel. I am from Bonn, West Germany. My husband, Rolf, and I are doing a book of interviews with a dozen or so avant-garde psychologists from around the world. I would like to interview you."

"I appreciate that, Edith, but I don't do interviews. But thanks, and good luck."

"I am staying with Frances Vaughan and Roger Walsh. I have come a long way and I would really like to be able to talk with you, please. It needn't take long."

Three squirrels were jumping back and forth between two enormous redwoods. I was trying to figure out if they were playing, mating, romancing, what?

"Here's the thing, Edith. I decided a long time ago not to give interviews or in any way appear in public as a teacher. The reason, other than the fact that I get nervous doing that, is that people tend to make me out as some sort of master or guru or teacher, and I'm not. In India they make a distinction between a pandit and a guru. A pandit [American "pundit"] is a simple scholar, or possibly a scholar-practitioner, a person who studies such topics as yoga, and possibly practices them as well, but who isn't enlightened. A guru is an enlightened master and teacher. I'm a pandit, not a guru. When it comes to practice, I'm a beginner like anybody else. So I've given maybe four interviews in the last fifteen years. I'll sometimes answer written questions, but that's about it."

"I can appreciate that, Mr. Wilber, but the synthesis that you have developed of Eastern and Western psychologies is uniquely yours, and I would like to talk to you as a scholar, not a guru. Your works are very influential in Germany, you know. You have had a major impact, not just on fringe areas, but in mainstream academic circles. All ten of your books have been translated into German."

The three squirrels had disappeared into the dense woods.

"Yes, my books are big hits in Germany and Japan." I decided to see if she had a sense of humor. "You know, the two peaceful countries."

Edith laughed for a long time, then said, "At least we appreciate genius when we see it."

"Mad genius, maybe. My wife and I have had some pretty rough times."

I wondered if there were such a thing as a squirrel call. Here, squirrelly squirrelly....

"Frances and Roger told me about Terry. I'm very sorry. It seems so utterly senseless."

There was something completely endearing about Edith, even on the phone. Little did I know at the time what a crucial role she would play in our future.

"OK, Edith, come on over this afternoon. We'll talk."

Treya and I had moved back to the Bay Area, to the small town of Mill Valley, back to our friends, back to our doctors, back to our support systems. The entire Tahoe move had been a disaster, and we were both still recovering. But the corner had been turned. Even in Tahoe – once we made the decision to leave – things had begun to improve. Treya, in particular, had begun to regain her amazing equanimity and strength. She had started meditating again, and, as I said earlier, we both had started seeing Seymour for couples therapy, something we should have done on day one.

And so the simple lessons started coming home to us, beginning with acceptance and forgiveness. As the Course in Miracles put it:

What could you want that forgiveness cannot give? Do you want peace? Forgiveness offers it. Do you want happiness, a quiet mind, a certainty of purpose, and a sense of worth and beauty that transcends the world? Do you want care and safety, and the warmth of sure protection always? Do you want a quietness that cannot be disturbed, a gentleness that never can be hurt, a deep abiding comfort, and a rest so perfect it can never be upset?

All this forgiveness offers you and more.

Forgiveness offers everything I want.

Today I have accepted this as true.

Today I have received the gifts of God.

I always liked the Course's reliance upon forgiveness as a way to remember the true Self. This is a somewhat unique approach, found in few of the other great wisdom traditions, which usually stress some form of awareness trainig or devotion. But the theory behind forgiveness is simple: The ego, the separate-self sense, is not just a cognitive construct, but also an affective one. That is, it is propped up not just by concepts but by emotions. And the primal emotion of the ego, according to this teaching, is fear followed by resentment. As the Upanishads put it, "Wherever there is other, there is fear."

In other words, whenever we split seamless awareness into a subject versus an object, into a self versus an other, then that self feels fear, simply because there are now so many "others" out there that can harm it. Out of this fear grows resentment. If we are going to insist on identifying with just the little self in here, then others are going to bruise it, insult it, injure it. The ego, then, is kept in existence by a collection of emotional insults; it carries its personal bruises as the fabric of its very existence. It actively collects hurts and insults, even while resenting them, because without its bruises, it would be, literally, nothing.

The ego's first maneuver in dealing with this resentment is to try to get others to confess their faults. "You hurt me; say you're sorry." Sometimes this makes the ego temporarily feel better, but does nothing to uproot the original cause. And, as often as not, even if the person does apologize, the likely result is now hatred of them. "I knew you did that to me; see, you just admitted it!" The fundamental mood of the ego: never forgive, never forget.

What the ego doesn't try is forgiveness, because that would undermine its very existence. To forgive others for insults, real or imagined, is to weaken the boundary between self and other, to dissolve the sense of separation between subject and object. And thus, with forgiveness, awareness tends to let go of the ego and its insults, and revert instead to the Witness, the Self, which views both subject and object equally. And thus, according to the Course, forgiveness is the way I let go of my self and remember my Self.

I found this practice extremely useful, especially when I didn't have the energy to meditate. My ego was so bruised, so injured – I had collected so many insults (real or imagined) – that forgiveness alone could begin to uncoil the pain of my own self-contraction. The more I got "hurt," the more contracted I got, which made the existence of "others" all the more painful, which made bruises all the more likely. And if I felt I couldn't forgive others for their "insensitivity" (in other words, the pain caused by my own self-contracting tendencies) then I used another affirmation from the Course: "God is the love with which I forgive."

And as for Treya, she began a profound psychological shift, an inner shift that began to resolve what she felt was the most central and difficult issue in her life, a shift that would reach fruition about a year later when she changed her name from Terry to Treya, a shift that for her meant: from doing to being.

Hooray! my period returned. Maybe I can have Ken's child after all! Things are certainly starting to look up. My energy's back to where I feel like running again. The moments of real exuberance and joy seem to come more often, more like before, but at the same time I also feel myself to be much calmer than before and particularly much less reactive to general situations. Life seems to be evening out....

Of all things. Turns out Ken has some sort of viral infection that he probably caught last year in Incline. Dr. Belknap discovered it in an extensive blood panel – the same doctor that discovered my lump. Ken was skeptical – he thought it was major depression – so he had two other doctors check it out, and they all came up with the same diagnosis. Ken stopped interpreting his exhaustion as depression, and almost overnight his outlook changed, as you can imagine! He still has some anxiety – he's pretty burned by the whole ordeal – but the major depression just disappeared with the correct diagnosis. He still has the virus – apparently it's not contagious – but he's learning how to manage it, so his energy's coming back. God what he must have gone through, having that thing and not knowing it! Told me how he came close to suicide, which really scared me. The only reason I have ever been afraid of cancer is that I don't want to leave Ken. If he had done that, I don't know what I would have done. Maybe followed suit, that's how I felt at the time.

One of the good things that has come out of last year is that I find my perfectionism has died down considerably. It's a clown that has given me a lot of trouble and plays a large role in my scorpion of self-criticism. I'm always working on myself – a "gaining" idea that certainly implies I'm not all right the way I am. Somehow seeing that aspect of myself at work in the material world – like doing the Tahoe house, all the little details that had to be "just right" – and seeing how much trouble it's given me has helped diminish that self-destructive drive. I'm much more willing now to accept things as they are. All the grief I've gone through because of my rigidity, the idea that things should be just right, just so. So, so what? Life in this material world, not to mention the psychological, is fraught with difficulties, if we can get things to be OK, then that's enough. Perfect only leads to problems. If we tried to make everything perfect", then very little would be done. We'd spend all our time on details (one of my propensities) and lose sight of the broader picture, the meaning of it all. So I strive less for perfection, more at seeing how I can help things work out to be OK, and more for acceptance and forgiveness.

I'm also feeling more humility lately. I'm seeing more clearly how the things I'm dealing with in my life, the problems that come up in my friendships and in my marriage, my interpersonal problems, my doubts and fears, problems with money, questions over how to contribute to the world, uncertainty over what my calling is, wanting to find meaning in all the pain we go through... how all of that stuff is almost exactly like the things everyone else is working with. I think there's always been a part of me that felt like the little girl in the white house on the hill, that somehow the rules weren't meant for me, that I was different. What I'm discovering through all this is how I'm not different, how my issues are archetypal issues that other humans have been working with for centuries. And the feeling that comes from that is a new kind of humility, a new level of acceptance of things as they are, a new sense of okayness about things being as they are. And – which is nice – a greater sense of connectedness with others, like we're all parts of one being working on these issues and growing through that process. Like I'm not different also means I'm not separate.

It's like my focus has narrowed in some sense to just living for now. I feel more relaxed about doing what I'm doing, even if it doesn't satisfy my achiever subpersonality. I'm getting into simply doing what there is to do. Just letting some of that impatience drop away and chopping the particular stack of wood that's in front of me, not chasing after another one, and carrying water from the stream nearby, not traveling in search of another. Giving myself time to heal. Letting an open, quiet space develop and seeing what might eventually emerge from that.

Going for walks and hikes has been important – anything that's put me back in touch with my strength, has challenged me physically, and reminded me of the delicate beauty of sunsets or the soothing sound of the breeze in the trees or the satisfaction of watching the sun glint through drops of water.

Lately, putting in my garden has been the healthiest thing I've done. I've been out there almost every day, double digging the beds (which means digging out all kinds of rocks), planting lettuce and cauliflower and peas and spinach and carrots and radishes and cucumbers and tomatoes. Each seed looks so different, some are so tiny it's hard to believe there's so much genetic information in them, some are such odd shapes it's hard to believe they're seeds. The planting has been spread out over weeks – some things I've probably put in too late to get much in the way of a harvest – but I don't even care what it produces (did I say that! me the producer!), it's just a delight to watch seed leaves begin to poke their way through the carefully prepared soil, and then to watch the next set of leaves that proclaims the plant's identity, and to watch as each plant becomes so specifically itself. The peas with their little curling tendrils attaching themselves to the chicken wire – that may be my favorite plant to watch. Granted all the double digging was hard on my back, but the satisfaction of preparing good soil for the plants and then seeing them respond is incredibly healing. I feel back in touch with life through the garden, and it feels good to be taking care of the plants instead of needing such taking care of myself. It's good to be able to give instead of needing to receive. To see the fruits of my labors appear externally instead of being the one labored on. To start to take care of Ken, instead of needing so much care.

I remember all my years of trying to create purpose in my life, searching for that, thirsting for that. The effort of it, the strong desire. The image that comes up is of me reaching out, stretching, grasping, desiring. And the lesson of that, for me, was that it did not bring me peace or wisdom or happiness. I believe that's my lesson. Thus my path for now is predominantly Buddhist in flavor (but I'll study anybody). But I am not searching for enlightenment. I would not join a full moon group, which consists of people who have made the commitment to reach full enlightenment in this lifetime. I know that that kind of commitment is dangerous for me; it is either too soon or not the path for me at all. I need to learn how to not want to get anywhere. How to chop wood and carry water in fullness. Not grasping for more, craving for more, not desiring purpose. Just to live, and to allow.

I find that lately I am meditating regularly, for the first time in a while. And I think it is because of a change in approach. When I sit now I do not secretly wonder if I will have an interesting experience, if I will see light, if I will feel that rush of energy through my body. I do not sit with the purpose of "progressing" in my practice. I do not hunger for something to happen. Well, that is not entirely true. For the hunger and the desire do at times arise. But I notice them, release them, and return again to my current focus. When I wonder why I sit – and of course this question comes up regularly – I say to myself that I sit to express myself as I am in this moment. I sit because there is something in me that wants to give this quiet time of discipline as a kind of offering of myself. It is even a kind of affirmation, rather than a kind of seeking. Perhaps later purpose will come clear, free of the grasping I used to experience. Perhaps purpose is already here, unfolding as I let go.

With Kay Lynne that evening. Kay Lynne was saying that she sometimes feels very envious of others and doesn't quite know what to do about it. I imagine she was thinking of John, and of her brutally ended chance to share in that kind of future [John was tragically murdered the previous year by a robber]. I also imagined that seeing Ken and me together brought this up for her even more. She did mention a friend of hers who was coming to visit and noticing in herself a strong desire for a relationship, even though he's made it clear he's not interested in a committed relationship.

"This makes me really unhappy. I keep trying to make it stop but I can't. Any suggestions?"

"Ah, good old craving and aversion," I said. "Of course it makes you unhappy, it's just what the Buddhists say is the cause of all suffering. My only suggestion – and what I think works – comes straight from my vipassana meditation experiences. Just notice it, watch it, experience it fully. Right now, for example, you're aware that you're feeling that way, that you're feeling unhappy. That's good, that you notice it, that you observe it."

"That already feels better," she said. "I don't know why I have to learn that over so many times. I already feel relieved about it."

"My personal theory about this is that you don't have to make an effort to change or stop a certain behavior or thought you don't like. In fact, the effort gets in the way. The important thing is to see it clearly, to observe all its aspects, to just witness it, and every time it arises you see it, it doesn't catch you by surprise. Then I think there's some kind of mysterious something, you could call it our evolutionary impulse to grow toward our fullest potential, toward God, or whatever, but once you've cultivated awareness of the problem or defect or hangup, this mysterious something then seems able to keep us on course, to correct the defect. The change is not a question of will. Will is necessary to cultivate awareness, but it often gets in the way of that kind of subtle, profound inner change. That kind of change moves us in a direction of a way that's beyond our understanding and certainly beyond our capacity to consciously will. It's more of an allowing, an opening."

"A little like grace," she said. "I know exactly what you mean." "Yes, that's it. Like grace. I hadn't thought of it that way before."

And I thought of the Course in Miracles lesson that's been sitting on my counter the last few days. The last lines are:

By grace I live. By grace I am released.

By grace I give. By grace I will release.

These lines never got to me before. Too much echo of the benevolent grace of a paternalistic father-figure god, forgiving his erring, sinning children. But now they made more sense. I could see grace as one way of describing what I call that mysterious something that seems to heal, to keep us heading in the right direction, to repair faults.

Treya and I were trying to allow that mysterious something to repair the faults, to heal the wounds, that we had both suffered over the last two years. We were realizing that healing occurs – and must occur – on all levels of being: physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual. And we were just beginning to realize that physical healing, although desirous, is often the least important or least indicative of genuine health, which is the health of the soul, the recovery of the soul. Treya and I were blanketing the Great Chain in our quest for healing. And we were helped in this by so many people, starting with Frances and Roger.

And then Seymour, whom we took to calling See-more. Seymour is a trained psychoanalyst who early on realized both the extreme importance of the Freudian model and its extreme limitations. He thus began to supplement his own approach with contemplative endeavors, using primarily vipassana meditation and the Course in Miracles. Seymour and I had known each other for almost ten years, ever since he had phoned me in Lincoln, Nebraska, to talk about some of the theoretical issues involved in trying to synthesize Eastern and Western approaches to psychotherapy. Seymour had been attracted to my work, and to my overall model of consciousness, because where others were trying to use Carl Jung as a foundation for East/West unification, I had realized early on that, although Jung had made some very important contributions to this area, he had also made some profound and very misleading errors, and that a sturdier starting point (but not end point) was Freud. This meshed with Seymour's observations, and we had become good friends. As is so often the case in therapy – individual or couples – the really important breakthroughs are rather simple and obvious; the hard part is applying them in daily life, over and over and over again, until old habits are unlearned and gentler ones replace them. Seymour particularly helped us see that it wasn't so much what we said to each other, as how we said it.

Learning to focus more on how we say something, not just the content. Often each of us feels totally justified or right about the content, but we both say this "truth" in an unkind or angry or defensive or provocative way. And then we can't understand why the other reacts to the twist in the comment, not the content. The one biggest insight for me is understanding how our defensive styles interact with each other to set up a negative, downward spiral of reaction. Ken has been feeling anxiety lately, which surprises his friends (and me) because he never appears nervous. Instead, he gets angry and snide, his way of controlling anxiety. I couldn't see the anxiety, only the anger, which of course activated my fundamental fear, since childhood – that of being rejected and unloved. How do I react when I feel unloved? I withdraw, act cool, cover up, just like I used to retreat into my room to read as a little girl. My withdrawal makes Ken feel unloved, which makes him anxious, which makes him snide. I in turn become more withdrawn and rigid, and then my obsessive and controlling side takes over, I tend to issue orders, which makes Ken angry... and so on. I can see why at one point Ken refused to talk about any of our issues without, as he put it, someone to "referee." We could really batter each other. But when we start in this downward spiral in Seymour's office, the three of us can spot almost immediately the first step in this chain, and cut it off right there. The hard part, of course, is learning to do this outside of the office, but we're getting the hang of it.

After four or five months of this, Treya and I, with Seymour's ever-gentle help, had begun to turn the whole thing around. By the early summer of '86 we had reached a watershed.

It can't be June. I keep thinking it's May. It feels like it's been forever since I sat at this computer to write. I've been scribbling notes written with extra fine pens on tiny scraps of paper in ever tinier handwriting, how can I decipher these illegible signposts of moments of insight or fear or love or confusion?

But I know how I feel now. Better. Much better. Ken and I seem to have turned some kind of corner together. We don't fight now, at all, which is like it used to be, and we've learned to be more kind to each other. It takes awareness, some effort, to catch the reaction, the impulse to strike out, and learn to see underneath it the fear that fills the desire to hurt another. That's what we've been working on, what Seymour has been working with us on. And things are changing.

A good example. Taking a shower together, Ken asked me if I think we've made the right decision to move into this new house. I think so, I said, it will be good to have more room so you can get your books out, the other house was too small for Ken's library. His response was that he didn't care too much about the books now, all he was hoping was to get back into spiritual practice. I felt hurt by the whole topic, because he blamed me for not being able to write, and now he says that he doesn't care about the books. I was angry and hurt for most of the morning, but at least, thanks to Seymour, I didn't just dump this on Ken. I didn't say anything. But the first voice in my head was hurt and angry.

Then another voice within said things like wait a minute, how did this thing get started? You got defensive, didn't you? Why? Oh, you felt Ken was blaming you, you felt responsible for his not writing. You have a point, it does sound like he was blaming you. Why would he do that? Oh, he may not want to feel responsible himself, it might be easier for him to think it's your fault. What might be behind that? Maybe he's afraid it's his fault. Maybe he doesn't want to take responsibility for his not writing. Why would that come up just now? Ah, the new house with room for his books. Is he afraid that once in the house people might be expecting something from him (and they eagerly are), expecting him to write. Yes, I think that's it. He's afraid he won't live up to expectations and he defends himself against these expectations, against his fear of failure, by striking out at you.

As the second voice got closer to seeing fear at the root of our conflict, the first voice got less self-righteous. Once the fear lay exposed, I felt great compassion. Instead of a desire to defend myself in the face of Ken's "attack," I felt a desire to help him make this transition and to expect nothing from him. I could replay the scene and ask, how could I have handled this better? I could imagine myself no longer shrinking back in defeat, laying my head wearily against the shower wall, but saying – and meaning it – that would be great, honey, if you could get into meditating again in the new house. Whatever happens will be fine, and I think it's great that we're moving into a space that can help us heal.

Later that day I checked this scenario out with Ken, but very gently, no blame. He gave me a gold star, I hit it pretty close on the nose.

This feels like a real victory, and part of the other changes that are going on just now. There's some space now between my fear, the discomfort that results, and the defensive reaction. In that example I caught myself early enough in the reaction phase to back up and untangle what might have led to more conflict. I can feel more space too in my last individual session with Seymour. And more gentleness, more compassion, for others and for myself.

As important as these changes were in our relationship as a couple, the really crucial issues were being addressed on an individual level. Where I was getting a handle on my anxiety, Treya was confronting her archetypal issue: being versus doing, allowing versus controlling, trusting versus defending.

I feel more compassion for myself, more trusting. This is most noticeable in looking at my judgmentalness. In the last [individual] session with Seymour I noticed my discomfort at finally turning our attention to me, rather than to the relationship. I wanted to hide behind the relationship issues and not focus on me. So I talked about that, about my fear. It is now much easier for me to see and, especially, to acknowledge my fear. I'm less embarrassed by it. Somehow not wanting to talk about myself seemed related to something I noticed in myself years before, how difficult it is for me to acknowledge when someone says or does something that helps me understand myself. I tend to want to say something like "I already saw that" rather than, "Thanks, that helped." I think I find it hard to acknowledge help from someone because it makes me vulnerable, it puts me at their mercy in a way, that they could see me more clearly than I see myself. And even deeper than this, the important point, is the assumption that they would judge me for whatever they saw, they would have power over me, not that they would have compassion, for if I assumed that, then their insight into me could be the beginning of a deeper love connection. No, I assume that people will judge me, are judging me, always have judged me, will continue to judge me.

Because I judge myself. The old scorpion of self-criticism. And I am going to let that go. I am letting that go. Oh, I still have a way to go, but there has been a big shift within. I feel relieved. It seems it's been a long time since this process worked within me. Something has shifted, let go, opened up. I really feel I can start to trust, to allow, and not to force it, push it. And I can really let Ken's love in. It's funny, the first thing I wrote about him was "I trust him more than I trust the universe." It's true. It's been his love and trust just always being there, even in the worst times, that has helped me open up to this. Seymour says that before we can trust ourselves we have to trust somebody else.

Seymour also helped me understand my whole obsessional style better. He talked about my frittering my time away on all sorts of trivial details. That's largely at the root of my problem finding and doing what I want to do, I never seem to have the time. But the point is that that is classically the obsessive's way to keep things under control. In other words, obsessives do everything themselves. They don't trust others to do it – mistrust is at the root of the obsessional neurosis – so they try to control even the smallest details themselves. Again, trust. My big lesson.

As I said, Treya and I were covering, or at least trying to cover, all the bases – physical, emotional, mental, spiritual. On the physical level, I was learning to conserve energy and marshal my resources while the virus ran its course. Treya was exercising, jogging, going on long hikes. We both were continuing to refine our diet, based largely on general cancer-preventing measures (vegetarian, low fat, high fiber, high complex carbohydrates). I had long ago assumed the role of cook, at first out of necessity, then because I became rather good at it. At this point we were on a Pritikin-based diet, which I labored mightily to make palatable. And of course the megavitamins. On the emotional and mental levels, we were doing therapy, learning to digest and integrate various unresolved issues, and learning to rewrite our bruised scripts. And on the spiritual level, we were practicing acceptance and forgiveness, and attempting, in various ways, to reestablish the Witness, that calm center of equanimity in the midst of life's unending turmoils.

Although I had not yet started meditating again, both Treya and I had begun the search for a teacher we could both embrace. Treya's essential path was vipassana, the basic and core path of all forms of Buddhism, although she was also very fond of Christian mysticism and practiced the Course in Miracles daily for about two years. Although I was sympathetic to virtually any school of mysticism, East or West, I found the most powerful and profound form of mysticism to be Buddhist, and so my own practice had been, for fifteen years, Zen, the quintessential Buddhist path. But I was always attracted to Vajrayana Buddhism, the Tibetan form of tantric Buddhism, which is by far the most complete and well-rounded spiritual system to be found anywhere in the world. I was also drawn to several individual teachers who, although schooled in a particular tradition, transcended any categorization: Krishnamurti, Sri Ramana Maharshi, and Da Free John.

But Treya and I could never quite agree on a teacher, not one we could both follow wholeheartedly. I liked Goenka very much, but found vipassana to be much too narrow and limited for an overall approach. Treya liked Trungpa and Free John, but found their paths a bit too wild and crazy. We would finally find "our" teacher in Kalu Rinpoche, a Tibetan master of the highest accomplishment. In fact, it would be at an empowerment given by Kalu that Treya would have the stunning dream that made it clear to her that she had to change her name. In the meantime we continued the search, visiting, seeing, hanging out with, practicing with, the wildest assortment of teachers one could imagine: Father Bede Griffiths, Kobun Chino Roshi, Tai Situpa, Jamgon Kontrul, Trungpa Rinpoche, Da Free John, Katagiri Roshi, Pir Vilayat Khan, Father Thomas Keating....

On Sunday we go to Green Gulch [of the San Francisco Zen Center], the first time in a long time. When we arrive there are lots of cars, so we know someone important is speaking. Turns out it's Katagiri Roshi, one of Ken's old Zen masters. We stand near the entrance of the overflowing zendo. I like Katagiri, he seems very direct and somehow there. Even though I can't understand everything he says.

Even at that distance I can see how when he smiles his whole face smiles, every corner, every crevice, all of him. The Zen of smiling: when smiling, just smile! His head, of course, is shaved, an interesting, odd shape. I've never seen a head quite like this. Such a newfound interest in the shapes of peoples' heads underneath the hair.

Later, during the question and answer period after tea on the deck, someone asks him a question. I'm struck by his answer.

"If Buddha were to come to America today, which of his teachings do you think he would emphasize?"

"To be human, I think," Katagiri says. "Not to be an American, or Japanese, or whatever, but to be human. To be truly human. That is most important."

It strikes me at that point how appropriate it is for Americans to be so interested in spiritual teachers from other cultures. Certainly I've wondered about that, especially after having met so many from Tibet recently. I used to feel some sympathy with the criticism that we should look to our own culture, revive our own traditions, rather than naively and perhaps wrongly elevate exotic religions from elsewhere. But at this point I suddenly feel there's a certain Tightness in this trend, and it has to do with being truly human. Studying a spiritual discipline with a man who speaks halting English with a thick Japanese accent (or Indian, or Tibetan) can be an experience, not of cultural differences, but of how we are all working simply toward becoming more fully human. And thus also more divine, perhaps.

That evening Ken and I have dinner with Katagiri and David [Chadwick] in the Lindisfarne Center. Bill [William Irwin] Thompson, director of Lindisfarne and married to a friend of mine from Findhorn, took me on a tour of it a few years ago when it was almost finished. Small world it is. Ken and Katagiri reminisce about a sesshin [Zen intensive practice session] that Ken did with him in Lincoln, almost ten years ago, when Ken had a satori experience – "real little one," Ken added – which happened when Katagiri said, "The Witness is the last stand of the ego." They talked about this and laughed and laughed. Some sort of Zen joke, I thought. Seems there are a few pretty crazy spiritual seekers out there on the plains they both know.

Katagiri is very unassuming and somehow warms my heart. Some feel he's the true successor to Suzuki Roshi. I feel interested in studying with him and meditating at the Zen Center and seeing where that might lead. I'm no longer looking for perfection on the spiritual path either. It would be lovely to find a teacher I fall in love with, but that may take time and it makes no sense to wait for that. Perhaps, who knows, he's sitting in front of me at the moment only I just don't know it yet.

The next night we're having dinner with some friends who are members of the Johanine Daist Community and devotees of Da Free John. Ken had written an introduction to one of Free John's books and has just given a strong endorsement of his latest, The Dawn Horse Testament. Great people. I always look at a teacher's senior students to see what the teacher is really like, and these people are about as great as you get. We're watching a videotape of Free John, and I find I like him more than I expected. I think the path of the devotee, even the word devotee, has put me off. In the video he says the process first involves studying his written teachings (there's a lot of them!). Then, when that is understood, and if you feel the pull, one moves into closer relationship with him. It sounds like your life is totally controlled by him and his teachings once you are a devotee, and I have to admit I resist that. It's probably the very neurosis I most need to deal with, but only when I'm ready.

Later I find, reading The Dawn Horse Testament, that he outlines two clear paths. One is that of the devotee, the other is that of inquiry. This is exactly what Ken is talking about with other-power and self-power. I like what he says in this book, especially about relationship, about how the ego is nothing but the contraction or avoidance of relationship. I certainly recognize in myself when he describes the ego as reactive and contracting away from relationship. I recognize myself as often feeling rejected and then engaging in the "egoic ritual" of defending myself against what I see as insults or hurts. When I'm reacting in a hurt way – which means withdrawing, avoiding, usually through defending myself – to what I see as rejection, it helps to think of his teaching that I must stop dramatizing the situation as being betrayed, stop reacting, stop rejecting and punishing others when I feel rejected. I must not withhold love, dissociate myself, but instead be vulnerable and suffer myself to be wounded. "Practice the wound of love," he says, you can't help but be wounded, just notice it, don't contract, and continue to love. "If you are merely hurt, you will still know the need for love, and you will still know the need to love."

"Step this way please."

I can't make out the Figure next to me at all. Something is gently pulling at my elbow. I would strike out, or yank back, if I could even vaguely see what it is that I might react against. I slowly point the pen-light in the direction of the Figure, but the light just seems to disappear, to enter this thing and not come out. It has a definite shape, however, because it is much darker than the surroundings, which are already rather black. Then it dawns on me. This Figure isn't dark, it is the absence of either light or dark. It's there, but it is not.

"Look, I don't know who you are, but this is my house and I'll thank you to leave." I start laughing nervously. "Or I'll call the cops." I laugh because, the cops?

"Step this way please."

I decided to move off the porch and back into the house. Edith, I supposed, would be over in about an hour and I needed to get some lunch. The squirrels were gone for good, anyway. Treya was in Tahoe, finishing up some of her things in order to move more permanently to the new Mill Valley house.

All in all, things were going quite well; or at least, improving rapidly. As Treya told Seymour, she thought a corner had been turned; several corners, actually, and I agreed.

I got a sandwich and a Coke and sat back down on the porch. The sun was just starting to rise above the gigantic redwoods, so tall they hid the light every day until almost noon. I always looked forward to that, to the sun hitting me on the face and reminding me that there are always new beginnings.

I thought of Treya. Her beauty, her integrity, her honesty, her pure spirit, her enormous love of life, her astonishing strength. The Good, the True, and the Beautiful. God I love that woman! How could I have ever blamed her for my ordeals? Caused her such pain? The best thing that had ever happened to me! I knew from the moment I had met her that I would do anything, go anywhere, suffer any pain, to be with her, help her, hold her. That was a profound decision I had made, on the very deepest level of my being – and then to forget that decision, blame someone else! – no wonder I felt I had lost my soul. I had. By my own hand.

I had forgiven Treya. I was in the much slower process of forgiving myself.

I thought of Treya's courage. She simply refused, absolutely refused, to let this ordeal get her down. Life knocked her down, she got right back up. Life knocked her down, she got right back up. If anything the events of the last year had increased her enormous resiliency. I turned my face to warm the other side. It always felt like the sun was energizing my brain, pouring light into my brain. Probably, I thought, during the first part of Treya's life, her strength came from her being able to fight. Now, I thought, it started to come from her being able to surrender. Where before she would square off and take the world on, now she opened up and let it all come pouring through. But it was the same strength, backed by one overwhelming factor: an absolutely uncompromising honesty. Even in the worst of times, there is one thing I had never seen her do: I had never seen her lie.

The phone rang. I decided to let the answering machine record the message. "Hello, Terry, this is Dr. Belknap's office. Could you please come in and see the doctor?"

I raced to the phone and yanked it up. "Hello? This is Ken. What's up?"

"The doctor would like to discuss some test results with Terry."

"Nothing's wrong, is there?"

"The doctor will explain."

"Come on, ma'am."

"The doctor will explain."

Дата добавления: 2015-10-28