November 18, 2005

 Month by month and year by year I am amazed at how Spirit works inside and through our little drumming community. I have said many times, and I will say again: the experiences in those two and half hours are only part of the work. When you regularly make yourself vulnerable to Spirit, it continues to work on you in subtle ways. Well, I have found this to be true, and I hope you are finding it to be true as well.

 For three weeks now, a phrase has been circling in my head: I want to make myself vulnerable to Spirit.

 Becoming vulnerable is a difficult task, fraught with fears and resistance of all kinds. But all spiritual work is about allowing ourselves to become vulnerable to Spirit. As I have been letting that phrase (I want to make myself vulnerable to Spirit) circle around my head, and around my tongue, and though my body, two things have occurred to me.

 First, working through that collection of fears each month gives me joy. Yes, it is a weird joy. But there is simply no doubt that I get joy out of this difficult process of trying to make myself vulnerable to Spirit. This is a kind of joy that, I admit, not very many people really seek. But for some mysterious reason, I do. When I try to explain it, it stops giving me joy, so I have stopped trying to explain it.

 Second: you go through the same process, each time you arrive at a monthly drum.  You too must work through a variety of resistances in this world and the other world—I’m too busy, tired, distracted, sad, anxious, scared, doubting—on and on. But something in you works though all the reasons why you should not come this month, and you come. And then you work through your own voices that want to stop you from making yourself more vulnerable to Spirit.

The process of making yourself more vulnerable to Spirit is fraught with fire, and with beauty. And then again with fire, and then again with beauty…and on and on.

Why then do people do it? Because they yearn to come into the presence of what Christians would call “a love so Great” or what maybe some would be more comfortable calling “a mystery so expansive and beautiful” —that it makes the challenges worth it. Because the process of moving through resistance is a process of being dis-assembled. And when we get a glimpse of that  greater, expansive and beautiful  universe—that great love—we begin the process of being re-assembled into a new and more radiant being, a being that moves through the world in a different, easier way. 

Listen to Antonio Machado describe the process of becoming vulnerable to Spirit, and being reformed:

Last Night
by Antonio Machado

Last night, as I was sleeping,
I dreamt--marvelous error!--
that a spring was breaking
out in my heart.
I said: Along which secret aqueduct,
Oh water, are you coming to me,
water of a new life
that I have never drunk?

Last night, as I was sleeping,
I dreamt--marvelous error!--
that I had a beehive
here inside my heart.
And the golden bees
were making white combs
and sweet honey
from my old failures.

Last night, as I was sleeping,
I dreamt--marvelous error!--
that a fiery sun was giving
light inside my heart.
It was fiery because I felt
warmth as from a hearth
and sun because it gave light
and brought tears to my eyes.

Last night, as I was sleeping,
I dreamt--marvelous error!--
that it was God I had
here inside my heart.

So, this Friday, we will drum together, for an hour or more.  The drumming always begins the opening—the dis-assembling—process.  In the ceremonial, second half of the evening, I will offer you’re the opportunity to make yourself vulnerable to Spirit.

If you’d like to, feel free to bring a blanket or cloth to cover yourself with. Even a small cloth to merely cover your eyes can help. If you’d like to lie down, feel free to bring a pillow for your head, and a soft thing to lie on.

Also, I ask that you bring with you some kind of offering—something biodegradable—flowers, or a fist full of corn meal, or fruit, chocolate, whiskey, compost, herbs, tobacco. Whatever you want to offer to the Spirit. Don’t bring a huge load—just a little will do. And if you forget, don’t worry.

See you on Friday.

Jaime

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