فصل 7

7

Disconnecting the Panic Button

Mexico had been good for me, but it was now time to start my journey home. I headed back to the north and at day’s end found a small lake off a dirt road where I could spend the night. It was so peaceful that I stayed there after my morning practices enjoying the water. Time came for my afternoon meditation session, so I hiked up a hill and found a secluded spot to start my yoga postures.

About halfway through my routine, I began to hear some voices in the distance. I started to get uncomfortable, but I was not about to give in to that scared person inside. I just relaxed more deeply into my yoga posture, and the anxiety subsided.

The next sound that startled me was that of a snorting horse a lot closer than the voices had been. I was convinced that these were the banditos. I soon heard both the voices and the horses a stone’s throw from me. Relaxed was not exactly the word that came to mind. Scared, vulnerable, and terribly self-conscious was a much more accurate description of my state.

Everything in me wanted to end my yoga session immediately and open my eyes to see what danger I had gotten myself into. Well, everything except for the core of self-discipline I had developed for ridding myself of that scared person inside of me. The command of steel came from behind my fears: no way was I going to miss the opportunity to transcend all this inner commotion. I closed my eyes tighter as an act of defiance and took a deep breath. I demanded a state of relaxation in the midst of the drama.

When my usual set of yoga postures was complete, I normally sat for a half-hour meditation. I watched that voice pleading for permission to skip that step. After all, the horses had not gone anywhere. I could clearly hear their breathing right in front of me interspersed with the periodic whispering of their riders. There really was no decision to be made. I had clearly seen that it was this scared person inside of me who was holding me back from where I so desperately wanted to go. I needed to be free of him. So I took a deep breath and flowed into a full-lotus position. I began the Mu sound inside my belly in a vain attempt to drown out what the voice was trying to say. To me it was like an act of commitment: Which do you care about, outside or inside?

When I finally opened my eyes, I saw two horses right in front of me. They couldn’t have been more than ten feet away. On top of the horses were two riders who looked more like ranch hands than banditos. They were smoking cigarettes, and one of them was sitting sidesaddle facing the other rider. When they saw that I was back in their world, they began to talk to me in Spanish. I was somewhat surprised that I could understand most of what they were saying—and the very fact that they were talking to me was definitely a good thing. I began to feel relieved, and the series of events that transpired next left an indelible impression on my mind to stop letting that scared person run my life.

At some point in our interaction, the ranch hands asked if it was my van parked down by the lake. My mental voice immediately told me to be careful because they could rob me. I ignored that interlude and willingly reached my hand up when one of the riders offered to pull me onto his horse and ride me back to my van. I was a city boy; riding double on the back of a horse with a Mexican stranger while in my bathing suit was not an everyday occurrence for me. As I rode down the hill, a peace came over me from head to toe. This experience was so beautiful, and I would have missed it if I had listened to my scared self.

When we reached my van, the cowboy began telling me that he and others worked this land for a rich landowner. He said they were all very poor, and the landowner did not even allow them to fish in the lake. He pointed the way to where they lived and invited me to stop by before I left the next day. We said good-bye as though we had been friends for years, and they turned their horses and rode off.

I felt so open, so connected to the experience I was having. Though I was going through some very deep changes, I remember thanking life that night for such a special day. The pain and turmoil within me were beginning to subside, but the yearning for the absolute peace and silence continued to burn in my heart.

The next morning after my practices, I packed up to continue my journey northward. Before leaving, I decided to drive farther down the dirt road to see if I could find where the ranch hands lived. I came upon an area where there were fifteen to twenty adobe huts with thatched roofs. I had read about such things, but I had never actually seen a mud hut with a roof made of straw. Before I could decide if I wanted to go any farther, one of my new friends from the day before ran out to greet me.

I parked my van and followed the excited cowboy as he introduced his new American friend to the villagers. I was stunned by how primitive everything was. The huts were dirt floored and had nothing but square openings for windows. There were no doors in the door openings or windows in the window openings. Many of the people I met stared at me as though they had never seen an American before. I soon found out that many of them had not. I don’t think the pestering voice in my head said one word for the hours I was there. It was all so new to me. It was so natural, so down to earth. I sat in a hut with women breast-feeding their babies. I had never seen that before. I noticed I actually felt ashamed that my culture had so distorted nature that natural things were no longer natural.

Once we were back outside, we continued our tour of the small village. When we approached my friend’s hut, he asked me if I knew how to ride a horse. I told him it had been years, but that I had ridden before. What I didn’t tell him was that the last time I rode I was twelve, and it was at summer camp with an English saddle. He then did the most unexpected thing. He handed me the reins to his horse and pointed to an open field. This was no time or place to be timid. I stuck my sandal into the stirrup and swung myself into the saddle, just as though I knew what I was doing. I had always thought it would be wild to gallop a horse across an open field. Somehow that dream was about to be realized in the middle of Mexico where I knew absolutely nobody. I got used to the horse while some of the villagers gathered to watch, and then I rode like the wind across an expansive field. I was really flying high, very exhilarated compared to the strict Zen discipline to which I had been holding myself.

I spent a few more hours discussing American life with some very inquisitive villagers and then began to bid them farewell. I was invited to stay for dinner, but it was time for my evening practices. I remembered that my friend had told me that they were not allowed to fish even though they were struggling for food. I went to my van and pulled out the large supply of brown rice and dried beans I had stored under the backseat. I handed them all over to the women preparing the food. The women were so appreciative that it almost made me cry. This stuff meant nothing to me and so much to them. This was another one of life’s lessons I never forgot: the joy of helping people.

Before I drove off, they all surrounded my van to say good-bye. I had lived in silence and solitude with no human contact for almost a month—now I was a celebrity. How did this happen? To me there was no doubt about how it happened—I had let go of myself and something very special had followed. I was willing to face loneliness and fear and not grab for relief. Yet something happened on its own, without my doing it or even asking for it. The seeds of a great experiment were being planted. Was it possible that life had more to give us than we could ever take for ourselves?