The World at Play
Saturday, June 30th, 2007Tomorrow, I leave for Portland. Friends have been asking: “Are you excited?” “Are you nervous?”
Well, I can tell you, I am tired after four days of packing and cleaning! This body has been less active during a couple of years of semi-retreat, and it is feeling some aches from the increased activity.
Mostly what I feel is wonder and gratitude. The move to Portland and the opening of Jaya Kula are not happening because “I” decided to do these things. This body is moving in response to . . . you could say “instructions,” but that would only be correct on one level.
When we are just starting out on the path of sadhana, “I” is still in charge. “I” suffers, asks for help, prays, and does mantra and other practices, often in a state of desperation.
Later, “I” relaxes a little bit. When we are very tense, we don’t communicate well. But when we are more relaxed, we hear more and can respond more appropriately. Just so, when we are not so busy defending “I,” we start to notice that the world is offering us guidance and assistance. We begin on the path of listening and following.
However, we are still quite anxious. Will I hear correctly? Do I understand what I am “supposed to do?” Will I be ok if I just follow along, not making decisions like I used to? “I” is afraid of living in presence and just listening and following. “I” still wants to be in charge, even though the process of letting go has begun.
At some point, the karmic pattern we call “making decisions” resolves, but there is still some sense of what listens and what follows, and of instructions.
A deeper relaxation brings more moments of simple responsiveness. We begin to consciously embody the understanding that the instruction, the giver of instruction, and the follower are one. There is just the constellation of the world in a state of total responsivity.
This is not some transcendental oneness. This world is Shiva. The state of the world, just as we discover it every day, is Shiva essence. As Anandamayi MA said: I am limited and I am without limits.
When our moment-to-moment embodied experience holds limitedness and limitlessness in equipoise, we finally begin to discover what is meant by lila, or the play of the world.
Play is easeful, immediate, effortless, and fluid. Our ordinary experience of emotions is generally more fixated and rigid. The best sort of play is wondrous. We play, and we feel wonder at our capacity for play and at the beauty of our creations. We feel wonder at whatever arises.
This is a long way of saying that excitement and nervousness are not “mine.” They arise and subside, when they do, in the great openness of the infinitely wise, compassionate, wondrous play of the world. And recognizing this brings gratitude and peace.
In Matriseva,
Shambhavi
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