From 2012 Writing From the Senses

ONE
I was 15 minutes late. They interviewed each other to introduce their partner to the group. Including a metaphor for their inner critic.

TWO
Then we did the eyes closed walk around and feel the stuff in the baskets.

I went to a basket filled mostly with percussion and flutes. I tried each of them out and felt a subtle but deeply poignant sense of LOSS. With the percussion- my condition has slightly loosened the coupling between the rhythm I feel and my hands’ ability to express it. This has always been an exquisitly tuned connection, so much so that even when I was not a professional drummer I always identified as a drummer. Now the sensory experience of not quite being able to play the rhythm gave me a powerful sense of the loss of that identity, and the primal boundless pleasure it had always brought me. 

Then I picked up the wind instruments and I couldn’t quite make the embouchure and my breath was not quite right. This is another sense of loss – I had been a shakuhachi player – the Japanese bamboo flute – and now that’s beyond my grasp. I went to walk around and felt the pain in both my hips (about to schedule hip replacement surgery) and felt the loss of my vigorous mobility.

This continued on. It looks like it’s time to really embrace and make friends with loss.

THREE
After a guided sitting meditation
Dialog with your inner critic, but allow your ally to observe

Ed-you don’t seem very well defined yet.

IC – No , you’re going to have to spend a little quality time teasing me out of the cloud.

Ed – I don’t have that time available right this moment, but I’m fascinated by the ally that appeared.

IC – tell me about that.

Ed – the first thing that came up was a vision of the winged heart used in some Sufi things I’ve seen. It was in my own chest. The words “sacred heart” came up and the visual shifted to the vivid red like the imagery in the Jesus prayer card Michael’s mother sent me. Is it Sufi or Christian? As soon as I asked that the Buddha appeared with the same heart , and then I realized it was going to cycle not only the major religious founders but also all the teachers I’ve ever had who inspired me and from whom I felt unconditional love, if even for a moment. That being is my ally.

IC – I’m speechless.

FOUR
People read aloud from what they wrote outside of class, with the prompt “My Strength”.

FIVE
What did you learn?

I loved the image of my ally that came up. With friends like that, loss is not a big deal.

SIX
Homework – write about a childhood smell

Also, try to spend some time exploring your ally. Maybe in meditation.