Broken <> Chains<> of<> Connection (+ Jampa 🌕 Check-in)
What to trust and what to not when auspicious arisings sing in the desert.
Sometimes it's hard to know what to trust.
What to not.
When are things falling apart — or when are they coming together?
And part of this dilemma is this thing we often half hazardly label "intuition".
Is this "intuitive feeling" a deluded self-centered ephemeral body sensation based on conditioning that just wants me to be comfortable and safe and trapped in an endless cycle of craving & rebirths? (bummer alert)
OR
is this a grace of my inner wisdom guiding me?
In this deluded fool's experience — who warning, had to create a phenological bingo chart to even learn embodied emotions like joy and grief1— both are often true.
Some of us are simply numb to it all.
While some may suppress away "empty feelings" and gas light others.
And some may reify and glorify every little phantom and trauma.
Yet I taste, that like most paradoxical things — there is a middle way. A refining and sharpening of this attunement is an art of a lifetime — something the feminine is often so good at.
As I navigate this retreat — or as I have been relating to it as a pilgrimage of the non-dual heart and an offering of what’s true and good moment to moment — I find myself running into this knife's edge of intuition A LOT. Especially since I don't have an (in person) teacher to ask for help every couple of days. It's just Jampa's mind (and I guess this sketch book).
And although my inner wisdom is mostly veiled and clouded, I am relishing in trusting my ultimate guru — this primordial inner wisdom mind. Who often sings in whispers. Impulses. Who we often label — somewhat lazily — "intuition".
Yet this intuition seems to not be isolated on a remote island with a wiji board.
Just as when it rains — it feeds the streams and ponds, the trees and birds and eventually feeding the oceans — like all interdependent phenomenon — I intuit something, someone is feeding my inner guru. Synchronicities — or as Carl Jung coined it 'meaningful coincidences' — don't touch this grace I taste.
A greater play is at play. In a sea of cause and effect — Auspicious arisings swim everywhere. So even when one things goes "wrong" — it’ often hard to know where it truly goes. And when things are going "right" — maybe they are really trapping us.
Just as there is a danger to reify the fabricated— there is the other guard rail of nullifying cause and effect as simply random "coincidence". But I notice my mind wanting to go down a Karma rabbit hole, which has been one of my homework assignments. But I will spare us both that.
This poem and simple story is one such auspicious arising. I am still not sure who she is — but I am listening.
I pray it instills more beauty, faith and mystery in this divine communion of being. I pray we all gain more clarity that every little thing matters — whether we realize it or not.
Disclaimer: this poem was incepted on January 12, 2024 in the mountain desert of Crestone, Colorado and later auto scheduled with the start of the next phase of my retreat. For context for my benefactors, I will be ending my "Level 1" retreat (~50% shamatha meditation, 50% contemplative practices) and transitioning to what CCR calls Level 2 (mostly shamatha, 10-20% supportive practices). Into 2nd and 3rd gear basically. Thus this mind is some moons old and will be on hiatus. And weirdly, this poetic heart is channeling the vibe of a grandma in a rocking chair drinking sweet tea. But that seems to be how this land whispers.
Enjoy, the poem.
Broken <> Chains<> of<> Connection
I am not sure I should tell you, you may just think I'm weirder than I am already am. But sometimes clearly, yet strangely, I think she talks to me. Like that one time, Frigid with a refreshingly warm sun, An average rocky mountain sublime day, The frosted elders overhead, were starting to melt into Gold. Soon it will actually be cold. As I stood there stupefied in simplicity, Wham! It came blasting into mind, An image slapped me, stripped for me and seduced me. Vivid. Crisp. And weirdly novel. What did it show? How it was such a nice twilight to walk this bike home, with me slowly doing so, But other parts of mind made up their own mind. AND so with our schedule, and pride of walking a bike, we started to ride home. Wouldn't you know it, In not even one breath, Maybe two pedals if you're generous, That chain snapped with attitude! Just like my plans. Seems like the universe will have her way today. We will humbly walk this bike home, soaking in this golden valley of kings. Usually suspiciously silent, this bellowing laugh is music to the birds ears, (or so I like to think), Walking right through the image I previously saw, And then ditching the bike in the garage, We also ditch the path, Not really much of a shortcut, and it would be so cliche, if it were not so damn true, some souls just have to find their own path home, Bobbing and Weaving, the snaking ground cacti jump at us, and never mind those fierce green porcupine always ready to spear you. The laughing still keeps coming, a chuckle now, and that image keeps arising, that was all too damn weird, Maybe she was warning me of a crash down the hill? or maybe just telling me to slooooooooow down, synchronicities of the hippie. and the attunement of the sage, are in a clash, And then she slaps me again. We both stop in our tracks, eye to eye, breath to breath, still. Five paces, yet nothing is separating us. Fear melts to now. the stillness is crushing, and if I must admit arousing. We are sharing something, and this verse, is afraid to murder it. One minute, then two, not one, not two, Then finally a frozen pond of stillness cracks. This majestic mama, makes her move. she didn't prance nor gallop away, But I shit you not, With a Zen Roshi's grace, eye to eye, she fully bows her head to me, and then looks up and stares right through me. Dumbfounded, yet awed, I prostrate too, Exchanging a few more breaths with no hello and no goodbye Some unions are free of meeting and parting, We each slowly go our own way. Some may say I am projecting, the same ones who are often blind, to how we are all - always projecting. And so I don't really know, What she was telling me, And neither do you, But I sure do like the taste, of karma and grace at twilight.
Dedication Prayer
May all beings
open to the grace,
the horror,
and the potent possibility,
of cause and effect in every moment,
May all our wishes,
inspired by truth, goodness and beauty,
auspiciously arise!
🌕 Howls of Crestone 🌕
An unofficial collection of monthly Poems and reflections while on solitary retreat:
Sacred Songs of a Fool (audio)
Exploring sound, prayer and the sacred in a cynical world.
How Views create our worlds, Rebirth & Intuitive Wisdom.
A spicy poem & exposition Where we tackle a phoenix rising from debauchery, Boundless Impartiality, Radical Love, & Woke Culture's anti-love.
A true story of Karma and Grace shining in the desert.
Eating Potatoes to D.I.E. for we go down the potato hole of impermanence + Emptiness via Jampa's killer potatoes.
Yes this is true. "How emotions are Made" fascinating. And yes from my anthropological emotions interviews (yes i did them) each person has unique ways of experiences emotions. They are subjective. AND there are correlations and patterns, e.g. Joy in the throat area.