From the Musings of a Cave-dweller:
On my bliss walks, I go to my cave to meditate. I realize that I am just a walking-talking-yogi-stereotype, but I simply can’t help it. The cave is small and perfect for me. It is one of four that are nestled into the side of a (relatively) small canyon carved out by Mill Creek. It’s my glorious backyard, and seldom visited by anyone but locals. I have been marking the entry of my cave with pigment marks, and developing increasingly complex rituals in there. The cave transforms all sounds- frequencies and vibrations are palpable forces. My body and particularly my head seem as hollow as a cave: echoes and resonance. I feel my slender husk of self quivering like a hollow reed in response to the slapping flow of the creek, to the whisper of air folding as birds sweep across, flirting with the contours of the sandstone cliffs. I slow down so that I may dissolve, and open up to hum and buzz with awareness.
I sat and arrived, and deepened my breath- and had just settled into my meditative seat, when a beetle dropped down from above and landed on its back on the sand at my feet. Flailing legs, it seemed so poorly designed to not be able to right itself. I assisted it, only to see him tumble over again, struggling frantically, but this time able to right himself, and then scurry under my legs. A few minutes later, I observed this “poorly designed” beetle march straight up the side of the cave, confidently walking up this wall, confident clearly because it just walked away unperturbed by a drop of thousands of it’s own body length, and was now racing up what would be (for people) immense overhangs and slabs with nothing to hold on to. Six delicate legs, balancing this improbable bulbous form, propelling him ever upwards. I thought about how being able to walk up walls would add a whole vertical dimension to my life, allowing for me to break away from merely walking across the flat 2D plane of the earth.
Later, I went to the backbend chasm, a place of mystery and magic. A place that for the entire winter, my footprints were the only evidence of human presence. A place that has defied any and all documentation. Backbends performed here make me feel like my life will never be the same again. I wedge myself into the chasm, which supports me as I relax my way back and hold the posture as deep and as long as I can, while energy bursts out of my heart and travels in red tingle heat waves out of my heart and up my arms and is released into the cool womb depths. An enchanted place, so intensely sacred and intimate. A stone is lodged between the two walls on either side of the chasm, trapped, hovering a few feet above the ground. I allowed myself to become fixated with a single point, a tiny impression in the stone, everything else tunneling deep around it, and I rose, fresh and dizzy-elated! and dropped my head to the ground, only to discover another insect there, (this one dead- but still!) and was reminded of the beetle earlier, transcending the plane across the earth and onto the plane directed towards the sky. I have always been so fixated on the lodged stone, and the backbends, that I failed to wonder if I might be able to climb up and over it, even though my desire has always been to get as far in and up as possible. She just always felt impenetrable, off-limits.
It turned out to be a much easier climb than I thought that it might be, and following the little exposed scramble, I chimneyed my way up and in, to the discreet and sacred space deep within the mother womb. And, there, tucked in high and out of sight, a new cave!!! Three OMs in its’ depths rattled my very bowels and soul, and tickled the sandstone monument, womb cathedral. I realize that I am learning how to explore and expand both my knowledge of this small section of canyon as well as my consciousness. Each visitation offers new insight, healing, delight. The best discoveries happen when I overcome a certain limitation: limitations of time, fear, or just not seeing what is present and possible. The rewards are infinite; I cannot believe how much I have seen, learned, and experienced in such a seemingly small area. Fortune certainly favors the bold, the brave, and those willing to just get out there.
On my bliss walks, I go to my cave to meditate. I realize that I am just a walking-talking-yogi-stereotype, but I simply can’t help it. The cave is small and perfect for me. It is one of four that are nestled into the side of a (relatively) small canyon carved out by Mill Creek. It’s my glorious backyard, and seldom visited by anyone but locals. I have been marking the entry of my cave with pigment marks, and developing increasingly complex rituals in there. The cave transforms all sounds- frequencies and vibrations are palpable forces. My body and particularly my head seem as hollow as a cave: echoes and resonance. I feel my slender husk of self quivering like a hollow reed in response to the slapping flow of the creek, to the whisper of air folding as birds sweep across, flirting with the contours of the sandstone cliffs. I slow down so that I may dissolve, and open up to hum and buzz with awareness.
I sat and arrived, and deepened my breath- and had just settled into my meditative seat, when a beetle dropped down from above and landed on its back on the sand at my feet. Flailing legs, it seemed so poorly designed to not be able to right itself. I assisted it, only to see him tumble over again, struggling frantically, but this time able to right himself, and then scurry under my legs. A few minutes later, I observed this “poorly designed” beetle march straight up the side of the cave, confidently walking up this wall, confident clearly because it just walked away unperturbed by a drop of thousands of it’s own body length, and was now racing up what would be (for people) immense overhangs and slabs with nothing to hold on to. Six delicate legs, balancing this improbable bulbous form, propelling him ever upwards. I thought about how being able to walk up walls would add a whole vertical dimension to my life, allowing for me to break away from merely walking across the flat 2D plane of the earth.
Later, I went to the backbend chasm, a place of mystery and magic. A place that for the entire winter, my footprints were the only evidence of human presence. A place that has defied any and all documentation. Backbends performed here make me feel like my life will never be the same again. I wedge myself into the chasm, which supports me as I relax my way back and hold the posture as deep and as long as I can, while energy bursts out of my heart and travels in red tingle heat waves out of my heart and up my arms and is released into the cool womb depths. An enchanted place, so intensely sacred and intimate. A stone is lodged between the two walls on either side of the chasm, trapped, hovering a few feet above the ground. I allowed myself to become fixated with a single point, a tiny impression in the stone, everything else tunneling deep around it, and I rose, fresh and dizzy-elated! and dropped my head to the ground, only to discover another insect there, (this one dead- but still!) and was reminded of the beetle earlier, transcending the plane across the earth and onto the plane directed towards the sky. I have always been so fixated on the lodged stone, and the backbends, that I failed to wonder if I might be able to climb up and over it, even though my desire has always been to get as far in and up as possible. She just always felt impenetrable, off-limits.
It turned out to be a much easier climb than I thought that it might be, and following the little exposed scramble, I chimneyed my way up and in, to the discreet and sacred space deep within the mother womb. And, there, tucked in high and out of sight, a new cave!!! Three OMs in its’ depths rattled my very bowels and soul, and tickled the sandstone monument, womb cathedral. I realize that I am learning how to explore and expand both my knowledge of this small section of canyon as well as my consciousness. Each visitation offers new insight, healing, delight. The best discoveries happen when I overcome a certain limitation: limitations of time, fear, or just not seeing what is present and possible. The rewards are infinite; I cannot believe how much I have seen, learned, and experienced in such a seemingly small area. Fortune certainly favors the bold, the brave, and those willing to just get out there.