11: From Yangon International Airport
Dear friends,
It’s been a tough few days.
My last night on retreat, January 26th, was the first time there was no music during the night-time sitting meditation — the “club” (I think it was a pickup truck with speakers and some flashing lights) next door usually cranked up the volume right around 7PM, when we sat down to meditate, and the monastery on the other side usually began blaring chants around 4AM, when we sat down for the first session of the day. But, on my last night, it was quiet, and I was left to deal not with the noises of the external world, but the even louder noises in the internal one. I was questioning whether I’d gotten anything out of the retreat or whether the last 3 weeks had been a waste of time, and eventually the answer alighted on me and I remembered all I had learned.
In my last retreat, over Christmas in 2015, I realized there was a hard shell grown around my heart, and that inside that shell was a lot of hurt. I spent the last year and change softening the shell and getting in touch with the external facets of that hurt — the light, lower-case t trauma of not being able to pay rent during grad school, the fear of not knowing what to do with my life, the fear of losing myself in the world, the sadness of not knowing where home is, the loneliness amidst the bustle… At the beginning of this retreat, it felt like the last of the shell cracked. On day two, when I began to cry for my grandfather who died a few weeks after I arrived in NYC, I closed a circle. I felt at last what I had suppressed for so long. And then there was a whole lot more retreat, and in my last week, I went beyond the fear underneath the need to plan and found a soft, tender young Rafa who is afraid of dying and feels unworthy. It is this unworthiness, this fundamental lack of self-esteem that drives the need to do constantly. It feels like when I stand still I do not deserve to be loved.
Mind you, this is not a sad discovery. To be able to stand almost outside oneself and see where it hurts, and then to slowly recognize that the attempt to run away from the pain has only made it worse is an occasion for joy. To embrace this little tender heart, to quietly listen to its suffering and offer it unconditional love and support feels like the beginnings of freedom. I have a whole lot more listening to do to heal this wound, but as I left Shwe Oo Min, I felt I knew what my next personal development project was, and I was thrilled to have a more tender heart.
And then I came back to the “real” world. My first dinner in three weeks gave me food poisoning. I went from sitting meditation to shitting meditation, just like that, and I began to feel weak. Then I got caught up on the news, and I couldn’t quite distinguish the psychological from the physiological in the weakness and the nausea and the tight blue heart and the bright flames of anger. The next day, the sounds and sights and smells of Yangon felt like too much, even on a short excursion to the convenience store. And the hostel was booked that night so I couldn’t stay longer (I’d planned to take a night bus north that night, but that felt unwise), and when I checked out they charged me for an extra bed (booked for my friend Ash, who’d unwittingly booked one herself) and I got red-hot angry like I haven’t been in a long time and it wasn’t about the money but about feeling so tender, so vulnerable and unsafe. I sat down and watched my feelings and the sorrow bubbled up like a freshly dug well and I cried silent tears until Ash gave me a hug. And then the tears were no longer silent and I wanted to go home and I didn’t know where that was and I was afraid because my last home not with my parents might not welcome me anymore.
Today, after a night spent at a much nicer hotel (courtesy of Ash, who’s been an incredible caretaker and friend), I came to the airport to take a plane to the beach. (Fuck adventures — I want sea and sunshine). And I left my phone in the taxi.
When it rains, it pours.
So I was meditating (what else am I going to do at a time like this?) waiting for my check-in to open and I watched the feelings and I felt my feet on the ground and my butt on the chair and I breathed and slowly I came to rest. I’m here. That’s a good start. I know how to handle this. And I have friends. When I can’t handle it, I can ask for help, and I will receive it, and that is the biggest of all blessings.
Thank you, friends. I am tearing up with gratitude and love, and with saudades, that elusive Portuguese word that refers to the presence of an absence. Thich Nhat Hahn points out in “no death, no fear,” that we think of our lives lived in a horizontal dimension of time that runs from our birth to our death, but our lives are lived also in the horizontal dimension of space. The thoughts, the words, the actions we have exchanged make indelible expressions on each other. I am made up of my parents and grandparents and their ancestors and of my brothers and teachers and of each one of you, and of all the many other small interactions that I have ever had. Even if I am sitting alone on the plane, I am carrying you with me, within me. Ubuntu, as they say: I am through your being.
We exist interdependently, even as leaders in the world push us to believe (and act as if) the only way to survive was through asserting our radical independence. To stand alone in postured strength is cowardly — it is the rebellious child who wishes to be free of mom and dad and sweeps weakness and hurt under the rug, where it piles and piles until it festers. In vulnerability, on the other hand, there is great courage. It is brave to witness the world and surrender to love, even when the sights and sounds and smells feel like too much. Individually and collectively, we will not always be brave. But I for one intend to keep on trying, to keep on fighting, with love, and with as much levity and laughter as I can muster.
Through you I am.
Yours,
Rafa
