I suspect that all things work together. I've been navigating new relationships and methods for making my next album. It's been trickier than I imagined. There are lots of gaps in activity that perplex me, and when I'm in bad headspace/heartspace it frustrates me. Can't we get started already? Apparently not. So I have decided to just accept it all, or change it, but not fight it. What a revelation. And it's so simple.
In the gaps I've caught up on a bunch of TV shows, finally fixed up my backyard in a way that makes me happy to look out my windows, and I took a deep breath and signed up for 10 days of Panchakarma. I just felt like it's now or never. It was a total gut decision.
I'm on Day 3. The week of prep was such a challenge! I'm not one for eating the same thing every day for every meal (so boring!), but it's had quite a calming effect, just like they said it would. Go Kichari.
Disconnecting from distressing things is also a simple revelation. You just do it. I put up the meditation "hand" and very little has passed through. I watched a whole presidential debate and didn't get jacked up once. Incredible. I haven't felt the need to engage in controversial conversation with my boyfriend, so it's been less antagonistic. Again, incredible. We have all the power to choose our responses to anything.
Now I'm in the clinic for therapy 2 hours each day. I love these days so far. I love the ritual of it. They ring chimes over me and chant to open the session, and then the therapist punches and pushes and kneads my limbs in the same series of strokes over and over. My head and hair are bathed in warm oil. I have lavender scented things massaged into my forehead, and rose smelling oils dropped into my nostrils. The steam tent they put over me pushes my limits for heat tolerance so I'm building up time on that. It's only my digestion that needs a little help. Other than that the detox feelings have been nonexistant. I've just felt heavy like someone beat me up. They kind of have, so it's logical. At the end they feed me, you guessed it, kichari.
At the same time, I've started taking voice lessons. And this is where all things work together. The gap in album-making, I am realizing, is so I can learn how to breathe and sing, and re-connect to my songs. Yesterday I was in tears at my lesson, trying to get through a song that I suddenly felt deeply connected to. I am reminded that the things I write are meaningful for me -- there is an emotional origin -- but I distance myself from them for some reason. The opportunity, here, is to find a way to do both at the same time. How can I harness the emotion and use it to communicate the story in an authentic way, without falling apart? Aaaahhhhh, exactly.
Working to release my body of crap and my heart of locked away sorrow and heartache is so very synchronous. I'm turning myself inside out and letting sun shine in. I love how it all comes together. And I did and didn't plan this. Mostly I just said yes. It's the practice of my lifetime.
At my college graduation, the speech was all about Living in the Gap. I've thought about that recently. Living in the Gap is like watching the movie of your own life unfolding, only you get to be the actor, too. It's like watching the Divine Musician, and you are also the music. What will happen next? It depends what you say yes to today. How will the plot work its way together? Say yes, get really in, do the work, and find out.
