Gut and Heart Talking

One of the strange slow moments of the drive east was having the entirety of The Well Tuned Piano by La Monte Young on the car stereo from Van Horn TX, for the five hours it takes, driving nearly 400 miles, up through Pecos, Odessa, Midland, Colorado City, to just east of Abilene. One thing about so much solitude since my life collapsed in 2017 has been situations where long, slow experiences have plenty of room to unfold. If you have the luxury of loss or making space and time in your life, and pass through the inevitable panic and restlessness of nothing to do, and then the inevitable grief of the self-encounter, you begin to have a very different experience. 




There's a lot of new things to listen to, to pay attention to, and to actually heed, rather than ignore. 

I had a fierce intuition after the PhD defense to head east, for example, and heeded it, and it turns out there was good reason. I have realized over the past year, especially, that in the past I often have not known what my gut was telling me, and even when I did, I have often ignored it, minimized the message. sought to rationalize or push aside the message, or delay acting on it. The problem with deeper listening for me has been that one starts to hear things one would rather not hear at all, let alone heed. It's highly inconvenient. It means letting go of control and being open, but being on guard against one's own bullshit. It means encountering what Pema calls "groundlessness." 

Sometimes it means losing and letting go of the one thing I've wanted more than anything in the world. Ignoring the message leads to chasing, pursuing, trying to hold it. In all of that experience, one already feels the searing loss. The loss is contained in all of that effort, just waiting to be honored. Of course there's relief when one finally lets go, but what I wouldn't give for even five more minutes with a certain person, for example. One more kiss. One more breath. And yet we know, these "agains" sometimes, or often, cannot, will not happen. That dark grey word we try with all our might to stave off floods the field: Never. 

Living a heart and gut attentive life often means not having any good explanation at all for why one is doing something. It can mean being fiercely rejected and judged by others, since choices and decisions seem irrational, inexplicable, definitely outside of the safe narratives of others or the role one plays in those narratives. It makes one somewhat dangerous to others, since balancing the commitment to one's intuition with compassionate action in the world is tricky. It replaces a whole universe of "can't" with a weird urgency of "musts." But it also replaces a whole universe of "why not?" with "must not." Of course, when I am not listening to my gut and behaving in ways to try to stave off realization or message, I am just as dangerous if not more so. It's a lot more likely for me to use people as a distraction, for example. When I'm more firmly ensconced in the intuitive space, there's a whole different ethics. There's even a feeling of being repulsed by the idea of using people. My "need" shifts much more to either want or don't want. The worst thing that can happen from not getting the company of a person then is simply what I already have: solitude.  

One of the bigger realizations arising from solitude is that love is a lot more than what we conceptualize in the mind. When I'm safe in solitude, I am able to love a lot better, and realize that I want the level best, the highest purpose and possibility of happiness, for those I love, whether or not any of that "includes" me, and, especially, without regard to what I think those people should do or how I think they should do it. I guess there is a more unconditional experience of being alive, on the safe side of solitude. The terror of letting go subsides somewhat and is replaced by a larger, more wide open acceptance. 

I had a vision of someone I love dearly, growing old. This was inspired by observing my own 88 and 87 year old parents. I thought of this person I love, and now know to be vital, fierce, physically radiant, embodying a real life force, and imagined this person, say, 50 years from now. The tenderness that came up for me was tidal and complete. The wish for a good old age, happiness, wellness, the ability to look back on a good life, with people loved and loving, constant and present in the surroundings. This feels like a good way to connect with reality, sometimes. I need to recall that true love is wanting the best for someone else, even when it doesn't include me, even when they find their best in a way I don't support or agree with. In all ways, letting go of the need to be a part of someone's life but still honestly wishing them well, is maybe as close to unconditional love as we can get on this Earth. 

Much of this moves only in the silence of the mind.