AHYMSIN NEWSLETTER, ISSUE - April 2014 | ||||||||
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Wildernessby Nic KleinI knew that I would never do it on my own. The only way into the wilderness was by attaching myself to something that was headed there with or without me. I had heard the voice of the wilderness calling for some time and so finally went in search of it. The chance came through a job doing wilderness therapy. The work included regularly spending long periods of time in the remote mountains of Northwest Montana, which is grizzly country. I was there to counsel drug addicted teens but also to discover what wilderness meant. The first thing to hit you is the physical. A 60 pound pack strapped to your back as you head over the first mountain pass is torture. The rule of the wilderness is to go until you can no longer, move your legs and hope you are not the first person to collapse. I cannot remember another time I was pushed so hard. On my own I would have quit; with others somehow I persevered. I quickly realized that I needed to make a decision on how I was going to deal with the pain, discomfort and exhaustion. Getting to the wilderness is not easy which is why most do not go. I remember bushwhacking through thick brush, fallen trees and mud, bugs biting, body aching and thirsty, and just saying to myself: you choose to be here so quit being a little pussy and embrace it. I pretended that I was holding a spear in my hands and hunting the wolf that haunted my dreams. Everything in that moment changed. Cross a river … great, thunder and lightening … amazing, violent rain storm … perfect. I am no longer at the mercy of the wild; now I am part of it. The wilderness at any moment reveals itself to you. One morning I walked to a mountain stream that was building into a creek and then a river. There is no better way to describe it than alive. The water was more like flowing spirits, singing ghosts. Its texture was cloud-like on the surface with the back of drop crystal clear, then mountain stone. Its invitation to me was overwhelming. Ice cold I plunged into her, sacrificing my good sense. She washed away my tiredness and depression and shot a current of electricity up my spine. The crown of my head began to ache from the cold. Three times I plunged myself into her. Three times I shouted at the top of my lungs. Every mountain lake and stream is a spiritual master waiting to baptize you. A thunderbolt waking you up to your true nature. After the initial shock the whole body tingles and a feeling of such re-freshness comes that any sorrow is instantly erased. This water in the wilderness can be drunk as it gushes from the mountain side. There seems nothing more sacred then kneeling on the banks of a diamond colored stream and drinking one’s fill. The secret of the wilderness is its simplicity. That is what you go to find. That you in essence are simple. The deeper into the mountains you go the more the superficial aspects of your life are wiped clean. A week into the trek things have never been so simple. Eat, hike, sleep, repeat. The thumping of your boots on the trail is like a sledge hammer to the rigidity of your mind. It goes something like this; you worry about the things you usually worry about until you realize that it gets you nowhere. You make plans, future plans for your life and then they change because a better idea has come into your head. That changes because you have just heard a wolf howl and you might not live through the night. You begin to question your thinking in general, begin to question, investigate all areas of thought and search for that one idea upon which you can govern your life. You find it and are relieved and hold on to it and repeat it over and over and then you go to sleep, wake up and realize that even that idea is just an idea that has no real essence. Perhaps you are just insane. Eat, hike, sleep, repeat. Time begins to be of little consequence, days come and go. When you forget about time everything happens at the right moment. When you forget about distance the path is so enjoyable. When the sun goes down there is nothing to do but crawl into your sleeping bag and watch the memories of your life visit you like the ghost of christmas past. Sun goes down at 7pm, up at 7am; we are far north. 12 hours in a sleeping bag. There is no comfort so there is no relaxing. You lay there for hours with yourself. Anger will get you nowhere, blaming will get you nowhere. Forcing will do nothing. Best not to think. Best to just be. There is a word in Sanskrit called Tapas which is similar to the word asceticism. It means to burn. Tapas is when you consciously direct your energy to eradicate delusion from your life. It is the clearing away of falsehood. This can take many forms, prayer, fasting, meditation, sleeping on the ground, hiking up mountains, lying awake all night in your sleeping bag. As you burn you get closer to the real you. Wilderness is tapas. About my 30th night in the wilderness I had a dream; in fact I had 10 dreams. I was myself in each one and yet in each one I was different. I woke and was struck at how closely my dreams resembled my thinking while on the trail. I knew that my dreams were not real as I had awoken from them. Their similarity to my mind forced me to question the possibility that my thinking was also not real, that thought was more like a dream than a reflection of reality. Is it possible that in the same way we awaken from a dream we awaken from the mind? I pointed my feet up the nearest mountain. With each step I did self inquiry. Every thought that entered my consciousness I investigated and found that it distorted or distracted me from myself. Thought was getting in the way of me or to put it another way mind was limiting being. Or to put it another way thinking was preventing me from the joy filled amazement of my existence. Kind of like looking at your smart phone instead of the grand canyon at dawn. Sitting on a rock I looked out to the most beautiful mountain vista I had ever seen. The late fall pines where a reddish yellow that made the entire forest look as if it was on fire. A cool breeze and a gulp from my water bottle complimented the ache of my legs and the sweat of my brow. Day 43 in the wilderness the snow was so deep that you needed skis to do anything. One morning I woke and my eye lashes were crystallized with frost. The temperature read 25 below zero [Fahrenheit. It would be -31.7 Celsius]. You could not stop moving or you would freeze. We dug snow caves to sleep in and to stay out of the wind. At night you would climb out of your sleeping bag and go outside for a piss. The stars would be so bright and the sky so dark that it boggled the mind. Mountains, snow, night, stars, giant pine trees, white blanketed earth, a split second of absolute stillness then back into the sleeping bag and 20 or 30 sit ups to create heat so you could go back to sleep. No matter what the conditions there is always a choice to be a victim of the wilderness or part of it. I did a total of 58 days in the wilderness. 21 in the summer, 21 in the fall and 16 in the winter. The meaning of wilderness, however, did not come to fruition until the beginning of Lent. While reading the Gospel of Matthew I was struck by the following passage “Then Jesus was led up by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted” Basically God calls us to the wilderness, He leads us there. Why would he do that? My answer is that it is the place of no distraction, the place of no escape and no excuses. In the wilderness everything we normally rely on is removed. By doing this we discover the true source of strength, the great I AM. Beyond who you think you are is the real you. Go to the wilderness; it’s crying out to you.
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