Meds, Meditation and Me

Yes, this is exactly how it looks when I meditate. Minus the feminine shape.
Well, maybe that, too.

My wife and I poke gentle fun all the time at certain types of people. We shouldn't do it. We know we we shouldn't. But we do.

Sue us.

I think we're fairly open-minded, both of us. I'm more than willing to try things that people suggest, unless they sound downright unhealthy. I had a friend suggest blending up a lemon and lime in water and downing it first thing in the morning. I think, "Okay, fruit. Nothing bad here. Sure! I'll try it!"

Someone else recommends shoving frankincense up my butt. Hm. I think, "That sounds a bit nutso. Imma check that out with my doctor."

A lot of this stuff comes from fear. I know it. I'm afraid all the time. Fear can cause us to do some wackadoodle things.

Chemotherapy sucks. I may have mentioned this a few times before. I dunno. Probably not. I'm pretty stoic (cue hysterical laugh track).

It's pretty barbaric. I acknowledge that it's not ideal. Should there be a better way to treat cancer? Abso-*******-lutely. But when I'm looking down the barrel of an aggressive stage 4 cancer with another waiting impatiently in the wings? I'm going to look at that near 90% survival rate and say, "Yeah. I'll take it."

So, I take my medicine. And I supplement with other things. Stuff that seems to be cutting down on some of the nastiest parts of the side effects. Some are legal. Some are slightly sub-legal. Some are paralegal.

I may have gone off the rails there. Also, I've never seen a paralegal that happy.

Then, when presented with new options, I do what I can to take them. Like this last Sunday, for example. I was invited to attend a Buddhist meditation session.

Cool!

One, there's something very hip about doing meditation. It's in. It's now. It's happening. And I'm all about doing what's popular.

And B, meditation sounds like just the kind of thing that might help me deal with the fear that comes with cancer. Learning to stay in the present moment keeps me from thinking about the future, which is uncertain right now. Terrifying, really.

It also helps me from thinking about the past. Lots of land mines there. I can wallow with the best of 'em, and when I dig into my past for any reason other than to repair what damage I've caused, it rarely goes well.

So, off to meditation I sped. Quite literally. My friend has a Tesla. And wow, can that thing go zoom-zoom.

WANT.

The session was fascinating, enlightening, and--according to my friend--atypical. The meditation this last Sunday was on... a raisin.

Each of us were given a little container that held a raisin or two or three. Mine had like five, I think. #blessed

Here's the thing. I don't love raisins. I don't despise them like some, but I'm... ambivalent.

Plus, I'm still suffering from PTSD due to these guys.

But something about this experience did something to me.

We started by just holding the raisin, observing it. Introducing ourselves to our new friend. The woman leading the mediation talked of the wrinkles in the raisin, and how she didn't see it as ugly, therefore her wrinkles didn't make her ugly. I loved that.

As I held the raisin between my forefinger and thumb, I noticed that the grooves in the raisin matched the grooves in the joint of my thumb. Some smelled the raisin. I didn't. It seemed like it would be somehow disrespectful to my newfound buddy. Although what was about to occur was probably a lot worse.

We pressed the raisin to our lips, not yet taking it in our mouth. I felt it's skin, slightly pliable and cool. My raisin was plumb, not completely desiccated. The feeling was pleasant. Unexpected.

Next we popped it in, rolling it around our mouths, but not biting down. As I did this, the flavor of the raisin took me back to my childhood. Do you remember those red little boxes of SunMaid raisins?

This may be me exposing my old age here.

It was a sense memory like I've never experienced before. There's an acting exercise, developed by Constantine Stanislavski, introduced and institutionalized by Lee Strasberg, that deals with sense memory.

I hate it.

It's never really worked for me, and I don't think it lends itself to good acting, at least in my case. We can discuss this later, if you're really interested. When it comes to my discipline, I am quite opinionated. And at least somewhat educated.

Yep. Pretty much like that.

Anyhoo, this worked. I went right back to hot Texas summers, eating raisins out of that tiny red box. And it was lovely.

Not completely perfect, because no physical experience truly is. There's always some pain or discomfort or distraction that takes it just off square.

I think that's a good thing.

That brings it back around to me. Because, let's be honest, I can't go long without making it about myself.

My new norm is so far below the level of what it used to be. As I've said, ad nauseam, chemo sucks.

But I have moments. Beautiful, crystalline moments. Moments when I feel good or something tastes good or there's no pain or discomfort for a blissful second.

They're more beautiful because of their rareness and lack of perfection. Perfection's boring.

Normal light--let's say from a light bulb--isn't particularly beautiful. It allows us to see.

But take that same light and stream it through stained glass. Or broken, imperfect glass. What happens?

Gorgeous.

We're like that, I think. I used to think it was just you. Everyone but me, that is.

I've been asked, as an acting teacher, how I can see so much beauty in my students. The first time I was asked this, I was caught off guard and answered honestly. "When I see someone, I assume they're better than me. I look for that better, and I always find it."

Ouch.

It took me a long time (much longer than I'd like to admit) to figure this out. If I was consistently seeing beauty in every single student I worked with, without fail...

Maybe it was there inside of me too.

That started me down a rabbit hole that I haven't found the bottom of yet.

I kind of hope I never will.
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Coming up--we interpret the patterns left behind in the toilet, in order to peer into the future.


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