Savasana in the Himalayas…

So it’s Thursday, September 8th, 2011. Bhaktifest officially begins. I’ve already been on an adventure and a half, and technically the festival had not yet even begun. I woke up, rather spontaneously, right as T and Jen were unzipping their tent across from me. We had discussed getting up early together so that we could go sign up for yoga class last night. Being that I was a first timer, they pick out a class for us to sign up for together – a Vinyasa flow class with Scott Blossom. We wait in line for about an hour and sign up. It’s only about an hour and a half before the class, so we wander around the venue. The vendors we saw last night are mostly set up, others are just rolling in and starting to set up. There is an energy that already has an edge on yesterday.  It’s hard to pin down; last night, we anticipated the festival. This morning, we could see it, but maybe not yet touch it, just know that we were taking steps towards the precipice.

I really don’t know what to expect – in yoga class or at this festival overall. One expectation I came with was lots of bear hugs with new friends, and I am most certainly not let down on that expectation. I’ve done a few yoga poses before on Wii, which evidently does not count as having “done”  yoga. We line up our mats in the left front corner, all four of us close to each  other. T is just to my left and has already let me know he’ll give me tips as we go along. Scott talks to us in a calming and soothing way about preparing mentally for our practice, for Bhaktifest, and about the yoga we will be doing. As I’ve come to learn often accompanies yoga classes, a philosophy is taught in short lessons and stories both before and during the instructors direction for the practice. I listen with an open mind, a slightly open heart and just try to visualize and internalize the lesson.

I can’t remember the particular deity, story or lesson that Scott delivered – I ‘ve had so many lessons since that they start to melt together a bit – but I do remember the way his voice grabbed my focus, and held it, for most of the class.

The kirtan music starts up. A harmonium thrums out a soft, reverent melody laced with longing. A set of tabla drums join in and give this longing and seeking a pace. We hear the ancient Sanskrit names of God in beautiful yearning euphony, and we repeat them back with as loving an attempt at pronunciation and tonality we can muster. Scott invites us into each pose, explaining what we are stretching, opening, or strengthening – physically, mentally, and spiritually – with each position. We begin going through our flow. Each pose, I just start a second or so after everyone else and imitate their movements and positions. On several occasions, T whispers a correction to me and I promptly attempt to do what he suggests.

I’m feeling some intense stretches, some serious muscle work, and one other thing; an unbearable sensation of heat. It’s unseasonably hot right now – I think the high for the day was around 115 Fahrenheit. Class started at 11 a.m. just as the heat of the day gained its footing, so I’m estimating the current temperature at precisely one-hundred and hotter-than-you-know-what degrees. I live in Arizona, so I’m no stranger to these kinds of temperatures – just not used to doing hour and a half yoga classes in them. Several times, I feel the heat and exertion pushing me to the edge and suspect I shall soon swoon. I take short breaks in child pose (Scott said I could if I needed to!) and walk back to my backpack once to get a sip of water. Then, I go right back into the flow. My mind is grappling with this heat, as if thinking about it instead of focusing on my poses and intentions will somehow help. Bikram yoga, or hot yoga, is practiced by the legally insane, yogicly gifted, and constitutionally cold blooded in the safety of climate controlled studios set to 95-105 degrees; not on 115 degree days, outside, by yoga virgins.

For the third time in less than 24 hours, I’m rather sure that I’m going to die. After a class lasting long enough to read Dante’s Inferno aloud twice, we are nearing the end of our practice. I can barely hear Scott’s instructions to lay down on our backs in Sivasana position over the moaning of my body telling me to please go find a pile of ice to climb into. I learn that Savasana translates to “corpse pose” which is awesome, because I’ll already be in position when I croak in 2 minutes. He tells us to still the mind – no small challenge since mine is running around like a horse on fire. I am laying there ignoring his request and just feeling hot, being hot, thinking hot when it occurs to me that I need to knock it off and just try to do this thing.

“Chill out self. The body isn’t going to kick the bucket over this. You’ve been hotter before and lived, and you are already cooling down – you’re just laying here for crying out loud. Now shut up and focus.”

“Focus on what dummy? YOU were just freaking out over the heat yourself and you ignored his instructions.”

“Well, then, just focus on breathing in and out. I think that’s supposed to work.”

“But it’s SOOO freaking hot!”

“Shut up and breathe.”

So I did. I decided that I would try and still the mind. I’m sure I wandered off of just focusing on my breathe a few times and let those thoughts just flitter away, possibly broke into a mantra in my head; would have either been the Mahamantra, or, possibly, Our Father. Either way, all I know is that I left that really hot place – my body – for the next 10 or 15 minutes. I’m not asleep; falling into slumber always brings on dreams right up front – I often start a dream 3 or 4 times before I actually fall asleep, and I can usually remember the parts of the dream where I’m bordering on conscious, but that transition didn’t happen. I just left my mind and body altogether, but was still conscious.

The only things I can say about that time is that it was timeless – both an instant and an eternity at once, it was calm like I’ve never even considered before, and it was cool. I did not visualize corresponding scenery, but I felt that I was somewhere cool like the Himalayas, and it was light – pure light, brighter than white light. No sense of movement, no “tunnel” of light like people report in near-death experiences, no sense of vision, smell, or hearing – just light, and cool, and calm.

Photoshop on yoga

Scott asks us to wiggle our fingers, and wiggle our toes, and I immediately begin to do so. The brightness starts dimming slowly, and degree by degree the sense of heat comes back. I cannot believe how many degrees come back, because when it’s completed I feel like I’m in an oven. I can’t believe the contrast between how cool I just felt and how hot I feel now – it’s drastic. The coolness leaves me, the light leaves me – but the calm stays, and it feels wonderful.

After class, I’m explaining this sensation to someone I just met, and he asks how long I’ve been practicing.

“Um, this was my first class.”

“Ever?”

“Yeah, Ever.” At least in this life. “Is that normal?”

NO, that is not normal, evidently. Some people work for years to achieve that kind of stillness of mind. Some never feel it. Well, I know what I felt and it was incredible.

I’m thinking, “Ok. This yoga stuff is pretty cool. “

Yoga Virgin!

While setting up camp, T mentioned that they might be going
into town later in the evening to stop by a drug store for a few things and
asked if I needed anything. I asked if I could tag along, and he agreed. I set
off to wander the grounds a bit as vendors and staff finished setting up for the
festival’s beginning the next morning. People were trickling in the whole time
and setting up camp. People seemed to all have things they were busy doing, but
none were too busy to stop and say hello or introduce themselves.

My heart was already cracked open a sliver by the day’s events, the friends I had just met, and the overall vibe that embraced the grounds of the Center for Spiritual Studies –  http://www.jtrcc.org/ –  where the festival was being held. I was excited; I already felt as though in a hieghtened state of awareness, and the festival had not yet even begun. After touring the grounds and meeting several people, I made my way back to camp. By this time, Jen and T’s friend Bearnedette had arrived and we were introduced. Immediately, I felt connected with this soul. I knew she was a kindred spirit, yet I was timid about how to engage her in conversation. Good old ego worried about how someone would receive me with acceptance or rejection. We all got to know each other a little bit with conversation and had a few laughs that just can’t be conveyed well – you had to be there. To give this inside joke some credence, even though those not present may ever understand:

“No, I said I brought swimming trunks.  What in the hell are swimming drugs?”

“My tent flaps just won’t stay put. They keep flapping around in the breeze.”

Yeah you really just had to be there. For the record, no drugs, swimming or other, were involved in the creation of this inside joke, just a very very funny lesson in communication perceptions.

I think that we all got to know each other quite a bit better once we landed at our destination – the local CVS drugstore. Well, there were drugs at the store and I did purchase some Benadryl – due to discovering that Bearnadette, like me, had some serious allergies to ant venom, and the correlating discovery of the fist sized ants that occupied our camping area, but none of this Benadryl needed to be or was consumed during the festival. These three souls invited me in, gently, to child-like play in the store. We must have toured every isle, some twice, finding items of use or amusement and sharing humour and innocence with eachother. This was to set a precedence that shopping can be a profoundly playful event that we could continue on a few occasions over the weekend.

At some point shortly before, during, or after this excursion, a discussion of signing up for the following day’s Yoga classes commenced. I felt like a freshmen as this deliberation of classes to take took place. At some point I had to confess, amidst a yoga instructor and two seasoned practitioners, that I had never taken a yoga class before. Well, unless doing yoga on Nintendo Wii counted – and it didn’t.

I was a yoga virgin.

My new friends were both surprised and intrigued by this notion. Why in the world did I pay for and come to a 4 day yoga retreat if I wasn’t into yoga? The truth is that it was the kirtan, the worship music, that led me to this destination. Most folks get into yoga for the physical aspects and are then exposed to the philosophy and music. I, however, do everything in life backwards. I was first interested in the philosophy, which then led to the kirtan music, which finally landed me at a yoga retreat.

My yoga mentors decided on a class that would be good for me to take, and we all retired to our tents agreeing to get up early enough to get in line and sign up.

Musings of a Modern Seeker

I spent months buying gear, planning, and preparing for my trip to Bhaktifest. I began packing a week beforehand, not wanting to forget anything important. I was going to be camping – something I had not done since I was a kid – and doing so for 5 days in the harsh desert environment of Joshua Tree, California. Sure, I wasn’t exactly going to be backpacking, and I’d have access to water, food, and modern amenities within a few miles of suburban comforts like convenience stores and Starbucks, but I really wanted to be as self-sufficient and self-contained as possible. I had everything in order when I left on Wednesday morning to begin the journey.

I had reservations about driving alone; I’ve dealt with anxiety and panic attacks for years. The anxiety seems to hit when I’m far from help, on my own, and especially if I feel I’m not in complete control. Driving alone on an unfamiliar path to a new destination is about the epitome of those elements that have brought on my anxiety in the past. The majority of the drive was uneventful, even pleasant compared to my fears of how this would go.

As I came up Highway 62 from Palm Springs to head into Joshua Tree, the road became windy, steep, and unnerving. I’ve certainly driven on worse roads in more foreboding conditions, but as the canyon walls steepened I felt my nerves becoming unsettled.

About three or four miles (I was later to learn this distance) from the road’s emergence from the canyon, my anxiety peaked as I rounded a corner and the power from the car’s engine suddenly wavered. I was rounding a turn when this happened and just barely completed the turn when the guardrail ended and I was able to pull off onto the shoulder – more appropriately described as a narrow ledge before the edge of a cliff – just as the car stopped moving.

Panic set in. Cars and trucks were flying by at 55 miles an hour with perhaps a foot, maybe two, between my door and their passenger side doors. I hopped out reluctantly in between cars passing and instinctively reached for the modern version of a pocket savior – our indispensable smart phones. This was nothing AAA couldn’t handle, right? Surely, if and only if – I had any kind of tower signal. The canyon walls rose sharply perhaps 500 or 600 feet on all sides. There was nowhere to go to gain signal if I wasn’t going to get it here.

Well, no worries. I had packed for nearly all possible emergencies and certainly had some tools in my gear that would save me. I tried a family radio I had brought, but with line of sight a necessity, I tried in vain to toggle between channels calling out a mayday; someone would have to be ON that channel in the precise 30-45 seconds they were driving within line of sight, so none of this technology was going to help me.

It was 115 degrees outside. Thankfully, some things I brought actually would help me – the water, ice, and hat I had brought were quickly put to use as I decided what to do next. Of course I could try and walk out, but all of my gear was in the car – which itself was in a precarious positi0n – and I couldn’t see far enough ahead to know how much shoulder I would have to walk on or how far I might have to walk. I elected to just let go and let God. I would be here until He sent an angel, or at least a tow truck, to rescue me.

After about 20 minutes a passerby risked stopping to offer help. I was positive that the breakdown was more than could be fixed with some hand tools on the side of the road. What I needed was a tow. He offered to stop at a service station up the hill to have them send a wrecker to come get me. He departed, and I waited. And waited.

About an hour into the ordeal, I saw a wrecker with no tow on board pass in the opposite directly. I waved furiously and exuberantly, thinking this was my rescue, just needing to go past me to a turnaround and I’d be in business. I waited, but the wrecker never came back. A different wrecker, also with no tow on board, did eventually round the corner on approach to me – and blew by at 55 without the slightest hesitation. I waved (I found out later that California law prevents a tow truck driver from stopping unless you wave them down – however, waving them down does not necessitate that they stop) but he didn’t even bat an eye.

Another good Samaritan stopped at this point – he offered water, which I didn’t need as I had 5 gallons with me, and I told him someone already called me a tow truck. He left, and I waited. I waited, feeling utterly helpless, completely exposed, and in danger I had no power to remove myself from. I desperately required the assistance of someone’s sense of goodwill or duty to get me out of this predicament. Nearly two hours after breaking down, I still waited, sweating in the sweltering canyon.

One last passerby stopped. I let him know how long I’d been waiting, wilting, and wondering if anyone was coming to help. I asked him to call 911 for me when he got back into cell phone service and he promised he would do so. Perhaps another 20 minutes or so later my tow truck finally arrived. After the car was loaded, he apologized that the rig had no air conditioning – at that point I wouldn’t have cared if the cab of the truck was filled with alligators so long as I was getting out of that death trap canyon.

The wrecker was from a service station in 29 Palms. The driver said he could drop me off at the festival, take my car to his shop and call me with the estimate. I was impossibly close to my destination when my car broke down, just a fifteen-minute drive. By foot, however, it would have taken a few hours, not to mention the impossibly heavy load of gear I had with me. The driver dropped me off at the main entrance. I climbed onto the back of the wrecker and unloaded my nearly 200 pounds of gear.

I expected to be able to back my car in, pull out my tent and set up camp, but given the circumstances I was glad enough to be out of that canyon and to have made it to the festival. I was greeted at the check-in tent with warm smiles and cold water.

Finally my spiritual adventure could begin! After getting all signed in, I asked for directions to the campgrounds and was given a general heading. I loaded up about 120 pounds of my gear on my back and arms and set out in that general direction.

A quarter mile later, I was pretty sure I was going to die. I had made it to the main stage which was still under construction as the festival didn’t officially start until Thursday. I set down my gear to rest for a moment and was about to have another go when I was confronted with the sweet, smiling face of an angel wearing a volunteer badge.

“Can I help you carry some of that?”

My brain said, “No, I’m a man. I’m self-sufficient. I can haul all of this by myself.”

My body, which at the moment was thankfully controlling my mouth and vocal chords, said, “Oh dear God please and thank you.”

“Where are you headed? Are you a vendor?”

“Looking for the campgrounds – I’m just an attendee. How far is it?”

“Um, dude, you’re not going to make it there like this. You need a ride! What’s your name?”

“I’m John.”

“I’m Jen. Hang on a second.”

A wave of relief, gratitude, and openness washed over me.

Jen pulled out her phone and called her friend “T-Rex” to see if he could give me a lift. A few minutes later, T-Rex arrived in a pickup, loaded my gear, went back to the entrance to grab the rest of my gear, and then drove Jen and me to the campgrounds… about another half a mile away. I now knew that I absolutely was going to die – or at least pass out- if Jen and T-Rex had not rescued me. T pulled up the truck to where their tents were and asked where I wanted to set up….

“EXACTLY here looks just fine. Thank you SO much for helping me.” I was holding back tears as I set up my tent. After the ordeal of the canyon, the heat, the hike, and the heavy, I don’t think I’ve ever felt so in need of others’ help; here these folks were rescuing me like there was no other possible response. I wanted to stay as close to these nice people as I could, hoping to find some way to repay them for the help when all I really had to offer was my friendship and excessively too much camping gear. Little did I know that they had only begun to help me in ways I may never be able to repay.