CAN I BE HERE NOW?

XINILANI MEXICO

THE SECRET OF HEALTH FOR BOTH MIND AND BODY IS

TO NOT MOURN FOR THE PAST

NOR TO WORRY ABOUT THE FUTURE

BUT TO LIVE THE PRESENT MOMENT WISELY AND EARNESTLY.

Gautama Buddha



31 January - 9:20am
I am on a plane. I am settled in. I am realizing a dream to move further into the Dharma and the Yoga that I love. I am telling myself the story of how it will be; what it will look like; how it will smell and feel and taste.  I am writing a beautiful story that takes place in the mountains on the west coast of Mexico at the mouth of the Bay of Banderas looking out onto the Pacific. I am writing the whole thing in my head, and the cabin doors of the plane are still open, wheels firmly on the tarmac.

Turns out, I'm a sorry conjurer of what the future looks like. Hard as I try, I cannot perform the magic hat trick of shaping whatever comes to look like my desire.  I never will.

The seat next to me is empty...the doors are about to close. I am thinking "Isn't this nice....six quiet hours alone to keep dreaming up how perfect this will be".  Then it happens...a bit of a commotion and, just like in a movie, enter Maura Tierney, the fantastically talented, beautiful and today, very frazzled actress. She tells me her saga of trying to get to Mexico for the last two days for a friend's 50th birthday party.  She had arrived at JFK airport yesterday only to be told that her passport had expired. She had to return to the city to have a new one expedited. She headed back to JFK to catch her flight on this morning only to be told that her new flight was, in fact, leaving from Newark Liberty. Miraculously she made it from JFK to Newark and plopped down next to me seconds before the cabin was sealed.  She was delightful and it turns out we have something in common.  Her tv show "The Affair" takes place in Montauk, NY and filmed during this past summer in the Hamptons.  She loves it there. I love it there. We love it there! It was a fun and unexpected meet-cute that hadn't been a part of my overall story....time for the first rewrite.

Maura Tierney

Still 31 January - Six Hours Later
Goodbye Maura...be well. Through customs and into a taxi that takes me to a Marina in Puerto Vallarta. There, I get on a very small boat with a few of my new retreat companions.  This little vessel will take us across the Bahia Del Banderas to Xinilani.  The only way in or out of our retreat site is by boat.  No cars. No roads.  Just a mountain forest rising from the sea.  The captain is lovely and his first and only mate is his 10-year-old son. Forty minutes later we pull up to the beach at Xinilani...no dock.  Some of the staff wade through the surf to grab the boat and hold it as steady as possible while waves come and go.  They grab our bags, then they grab each one of us and help us down and into the water where we wade onto the beach.  When I turn back towards the water, our launch is already headed back out to sea. Here we go...the story is now falling in line with the way I have already written it.

1 February

Last night's evening yoga practice was beautiful.  Up the steep path to one of  three practice spaces on the property.  We moved on our mats quietly, led by our teachers Eric and Jacoby.  We moved together separately.  It was peaceful and it was perfect.  After yoga we settled in to meditate.  A guided meditation that was so powerful I actually had tears running down my cheeks.  No sound, just streams of tears which indicated a kind of happiness I rarely feel but am wildly interested in revisiting as often as is possible.  I enjoy this practice, especially in a group of like minded people who are also interested in finding the kind of personal peace that can transform everything.

After meditation we are told that we will all be engaging in "silence" each and everyday of the retreat from the moment we wake up until our Dharma talks begin at 11:45am. No speaking and, if possible, no eye contact (OK - that was unexpected. Another little rewrite. ) We will eat together, practice together, meditate together and we will be silent - together.  Discipline...practice. 

2 February

Up before dawn...6:30am.  Down the path to get a tea or coffee before meandering all the way up for our 7:30am yoga practice.  I feel my fellows rather than see them.  We are focused, we are quiet, we practice and we meditate.  Then down the path once again to eat breakfast and then go off on our own to read or swim or hike until our gathering talk at 11:45am.

The Dharma is fascinating....not really a formal religion.  I see it as a map and as a survival guide for the human traveler. I like this road and it's varied pathways.  I can follow these directions, I understand them.

We are all getting to know one another now.  Me and my fellow Spirit Junkies are together, learning to let go in the tiniest of increments.  When you move into a deeper practice of anything, you want to be focused.  Musicians know this....if you want to make fine music, you have to play all of the time.  Not every minute of every day, but all of the time.

Discipline...practice and being at ease is the recipe and the way.

So...the story I had already written in my head is now certainly falling into line with the reality of this journey.  How wonderful!  Until...

3 Febraury - 7:30am Morning Practice. 
Fifteen minutes in....moving into a modified pigeon pose I hear it. The familiar sound of my back giving way and then going completely out of alignment.  I have been here before.  I quietly lower myself to my mat and curl up into a fetal position.  Class goes on all around me as it should.  Daybreak is coming. My teacher Jacoby comes and sits at my head.  Without a word, he knows and asks what he can do.  I tell him there is nothing to be done at that moment.  Mexican blankets are placed over and around me to keep me warm while class continues.  After yoga practice everyone settles in to meditate.  I meditate as well - still lying on my side.  I meditate trying to medicate the pain.

When morning meditation concludes everyone puts away mats and props and then head down the path to breakfast.  My other teacher, Eric, whom I consider "my yoga teacher" and have known for two years now, comes to me and together we figure out how to get me off the floor and down the path.  No more silence for me today....we have to work this out with words and gentle maneuvers.  Very slowly, we do.  We are solving - resolving the situation such as it is.  We have nothing but each other and an umbrella which is serving me well as a walking stick.

And so, another, more serious, rewrite is in order. The question is: "Can I Be Here Now?".  In this forest, isolated and in pain. Or....do we call a medical boat and get me back to Puerto Vallarta and into some kind of hospital. No. I want to be exactly where I am....in or out of pain.  I am here to learn something and I want to finish it, for better or for worse, exactly-where-I-am.

By 4pm Dr. Luis is sitting next to me on my bed.  The lovely people at Xinilani have called him...explained my situation...sent a boat and he is here. All 70 plus years of him are here. Huffing and puffing because the path is steep and the walk from the sea not so easy for a man of his age.  Still...he is here and he has a huge syringe of strong nsaids.  He gives me a poke in the butt and I suppose it helps a little. But there is really nothing for it.  Once your back gives way it's a waiting game, no matter who you are, no matter where you are.

Down  - Not Out

4 February
This is not going well and now I have another choice to make.  I can hold onto MY story (which includes pain & suffering), OR...I can give in to this NEW story.  So I choose. I give in and simply let it all go.  The story is in charge now...and IT is writing ME.

My teachers visit me in the morning.  My Spirit Junkies file in and out in the afternoon.  Food is prepared by our Chef Mario and brought up the path to my beautiful little tree house in the sky. I rest,  I wait. I meditate. There is a plaque outside of my door...I am reconciled with my present state...I am reconciled with myself.

I read Noah Levine's beautiful book The Heart of the Revolution - an interpretation of the radical teachings of Gautama Buddha on Forgiveness, Compassion and Kindness.  I am strangely at ease with the situation just as it is.  I understand that this is the story now and I decide to like it.  Then, I decide to love it. All of these teachings begin with the practice of self love, self compassion, self kindness.  How can we give what we do not have.

7 February

I have been well enough to slowly walk the path to morning practice both yesterday and today.  I was able to move a little on my mat and to sit in easy pose and meditate - to mediate. I have had a transformative time here and cannot stop thinking about something I either heard or read once:  that we can find a portal to the divine in anything. Which means that we can find a portal to the divine in everything...including our pain.

The practices of Compassion and Kindness that were laser focused in my direction by my fellows and teachers, by Dr. Luis and the staff at Xinilani were overwhelming in their sheer simplicity and ease. I felt loved and loving...

I learned what I came here to learn...that sometimes getting the story right means letting go of the story completely.

Caro

©️ Caro Kalb-Marr