My 27 days of transformative change are over
03/29/2010

My 27 days of transformative change (abbreviated CXC) are over and the consensus is that I regressed.  Although I honored the form of my commitments, I felt barred from the spiritual content.  I’d lost “beginner’s mind,” the ability to engage the practice period as an opportunity for profound spiritual practice.  Instead, the practice period became just another item on my To-Do list.  “Goals for the Week:  Honor CXC commitments.  Check.”  How disappointing.

Such is the way of the ego.  It takes the awe and wonder out of everything it gets its materialistic little hands on.  Although I am far from mastering the 27 days of practice, ego took the mere fact that I’d gone through them once before as grounds for adopting the attitude of “Been there, done that.”  As a result, I had to devote a good part of the practice period to wrestling with a layer of smugness that had been missing the first practice period, when it was all new.

Meditation periods, with a few exceptions, were far from peaceful.  My mind kept proposing new ideas of what to do after meditating.  Anticipating that I would refuse to follow any mundane offerings, some of these ideas were really quite good.  Too bad I can’t remember them now.  They seem to have been presented solely for the purpose of distracting me from “no thought.” 

Similarly, my commitment to refrain from alcohol consumption did not provide the clarity, or even the self-satisfaction, I’d hoped for.  I didn’t drink, but I never stopped *wanting* to drink.  My sister was helpful enough to suggest: “I think that’s what they call a ‘dry drunk.’”  Great.  At least we’ve arrived at a diagnosis.

Still, there are benefits to be derived from honoring even an empty form.  Surely my body received some benefit from 27 days without alcohol.  I also reduced my meat consumption to once a day or less, reducing my impact on the environment.  And I maintained my weekly peace vigils on Fridays at noon.  I changed the form of the vigils from silence to willingness to engage passers-by who had questions or comments about my presence.  I learned that having a conversation with most people—even those who disagree with me—is not scary.  I learned that I can keep my sense of calm—and can even appreciate most who stopped that they cared enough to have a conversation.  And something else.

The last Friday of the practice period I was alone on the street corner with my signs when a family of four approached—a married couple, a brother, and a 20-something son.  They’d gone online to find a peace vigil, mine was listed (who knew?), and they’d driven from Los Olivos—about 45 minutes north—to join me.  They were a smiling, handsome bunch, enjoying a beautiful spring day together.  I asked what had motivated them to look for a peace vigil.  The Scandinavian-looking woman, my age, got tears in her eyes and stammered out her reply:  I—I—I lost my son last year and—and—and—yesterday was his birthday.  We wanted to do this for him.

My eyes filled with tears too.  What if I hadn’t shown up?

We stood together for an hour, talking quietly among ourselves about why our country’s defense budget continues to grow without much debate or complaint.  When our hour was up, a beautiful yellow-breasted, red-crowned bird flew down to a branch just above our heads and sang to us quite animatedly.  Was it the spirit of their son? 

Before parting company, we hugged and I learned that they were off next to give blood.  What a wonderful way to honor the life of their precious child/brother/nephew.

When my 27 days were over last night, Micheal and I went out to dinner to celebrate.  I had a pre-dinner cocktail, a glass of pinot grigio with dinner, and an afogato with cognac for dessert.

Ahhh, life!

And so it is.