Author: bondjanet

Posted on

The Foundation

“Everyone therefore who hears these words of mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man, who built his house on a rock. … Everyone who hears these words of mine, and doesn’t do them will be like a foolish man, who built his house on the sand.” (Matthew 7:24-27)

Admittedly, this biblical quote starts my second blog on, if not an ominous tone, then a more serious tone than I intended to set. But I go where the spirit moves me, and today’s spirits — tequila, Prosecco, rosé are leading me…No. Just kidding. Wishful thinking.

I was moved to pursue the theme of building a solid foundation when I realized, recently, that, like the foolish man, I too had built some part of my “house” on sand. I had illusions that didn’t withstand the wind, rain and waves to which Matthew alludes. I was not prepared for COVID and it’s attendant economic, social and political woes. I was not prepared for weeks of isolation from my friends and family. For plan after plan being canceled. But throughout the last ten months of shifting sands, my journal has provided some solid ground on which to stand.

Julia Cameron got me started on “morning pages” in the early ’80s and since then dozens, maybe hundreds of trees have given their best years to my journaling. (I switched to a computer a few years back so you don’t have to “cancel” me on Instagram or other enviro-friendly social media). Bottom line: keeping a journal is — for me — building block number one in the foundation of an examined life. Of a life built on a rock that has, and will continue to see me through life’s vicissitudes.

The journal is for my eyes only. In writing it I gain a degree of distance, of objectivity, from the “me” of the moment. A third-person-omniscient perspective on what is happening in and around me. Maya Angelou said: “you can’t really know where you are going until you know where you have been.” Keeping a journal is the best way I know to track my footprints. To observe how my choices have led me, for good or ill, to where I am today.

Only I can decide whether to change, amend, or abort mission on the course my life is taking. My journal stands as witness to my goals and objectives. It asks for accountability to myself, by myself, for myself. Did I keep those resolutions to lose weight, get in shape, make new friends, study French etc. etc? If not, why not? What obstacles blocked my way? Perhaps a realization dawned that those weren’t the goals I needed to pursue, anyway!

The key is that I’ve sustained a conversation between me, myself and I that’s bound to be enlightening, if only at some future time.

Care to give it a try?

Posted on

And so it begins…

“Am I willing to travel uncharted seas of the mind?”

With these words Swami Sivananda Radha closes the chapter on “Powers of the Cakras” in Kundalini Yoga for the West (Timeless Books 1978). Having reached somewhat of a turning point in my life, aka turning seventy, I found myself looking to Swami Radha (who initiated me into her lineage in 1995) for inspiration to carry me through however many years I have left on planet Earth. Not just carry me through the way drugs and alcohol might do. (Though with COVID it’s tempting to go that road.) Or more tame pursuits that are a repeat of where I’ve already been. Something of more substance and intrigue, as the study of Kundalini yoga has been for the past quarter century. In fact it’s no exaggeration to say that the Kundalini book, and the teachings I received at Yasodhara Yoga have got me where I am today. Along the way I have earned a Masters Degree in Transpersonal Studies (more on that later) from Sophia University in Palo Alto, California, which taught me, among many other things, that there are as many paths to fulfilling one’s human potential as there are people to tread them.

Walt Whitman wrote: “To know the universe as a road, as many roads, as roads for traveling souls…” so too I believe myself to be on a soul road or journey, and one that goes, by necessity, through the uncharted territory of my mind. Whitman’s poem closes with these lines: “But hail your fellow travelers from a distance. Don’t try to catch up and keep step. Yell ‘cheerio’ across the fields but stick to your own particular path. Be it paved, or grass, or just plain old dirt. It’s your path, and it suits your make of boot.” (End quote) So, for the past half dozen years I have been a yogini at large, one who has diverged from my “spiritual birthplace” in Yasodhara Yoga, and stuck to my own particular path of family life as a spiritual discipline and practice.

The pilgrim’s path, implied by Whitman, is seen as a solitary one, and indeed there’s nobody who can tread my path but me. That said, perhaps because I am a wife and mother whose role as matriarch (aka Air-Traffic-Controller) of a multi-generational family is fast becoming redundant, I am starting this blog in hopes of sharing my journey with other seekers of meaning and purpose. Thomas Merton wrote: “To live in communion, in genuine dialogue with others, is absolutely necessary if one is to remain human. But to live in the midst of others, sharing nothing with them but the constant noise and the general distraction, isolates a [person] in the worst way, separates [him or her] from reality in a way that is almost painless.”

Until it isn’t painless. Until it throbs like a primitive drum beat at the core of one’s being. Demanding more than a bridge or golf score, a high net worth statement, PhD or trip to Tahiti. Don’t get me wrong, I’m as materially-minded as the next guy. (Or gal, but “guy” rhymed with “minded”). It’s just that achieving some degree of the “success” that is vaunted in the west has not brought me the peace, harmony and ease of well-being that my inner drummer is seeking.

So, am I willing to travel uncharted seas of the mind, with humility and curiosity? Yes, yes, and yes again.

Are you?