Why do I always get the feeling that if I rest I will never come back to practice.
I spent so much of my twenties resting, it was one of my most refined skills. Always “relaxing” taking it easy, chilling.
Why do I hate it so much now?
Even the thought of it brings up panic inside my chest.
“No, I cant rest. If I was really passionate about my practice I wouldn’t need to rest. I would find fuel inside the practice itself, you might as well just quit if you need to rest.”
At least that’s what keeps repeating inside my head.
Yet another form of negative self talk.
Here I was thinking I had found someway around it, silly fool.
Went to a friends wedding last weekend that set forth an unfortunate chain of events that is still emanating through my life as I write this.
As per expected, there was a great party. Filled with dancing, friends and of course, drinking. Lots of drinking.
Now it had been quite some time since I had gone to a party, so in the back of my mind I held caution. Just a little, left there to periodically sample my intoxication level and stand at the ready to raise the alarm.
Unfortunately, that caution is not well trained and while I was able to maintain my composer, I did not, however, limit my consumption of alcohol.
So, the day after drunk town….
It felt like any hangover day…Really shitty.
Did the normal things;
- Biscuits and gravy
- Drive Home
- Lay on couch and watch movies all day feeling generally sorry for myself
What I wasn’t expecting was the day after that.
See, there was something lurking in the shadows waiting to pounce on me the moment my immune system let down its guard, or in this case, was brutally assaulted by expensive bourbon.
That’s right, some sort of virus.
It crashed on me bright and early Monday morning in the form of a massive sore throat and the energy level of a tranquilized sloth.
So, I decided to “Rest”.
I stayed home from work and let the Tai Chi studio know I was taking some down time to recover.
Ha, down time.
So, instead of just sleeping, I pulled out my work laptop and logged in to the work network to get some work done as I laid there….
Sounds like the perfect relaxing way to recover from sickness right??
As you can imagine, right along side that work came ALL the stress.
All the work stress and NONE of the distractions. Just me, in my cave, sick and hyper focused on work.
I worked more hours that day than I would have if I had gone to work… and it was the same the NEXT TWO days!
That is how I “Recover”.
I drop all the self care and pull my work blankets up over my head.
Well.. at least that’s how I thought I needed to…
Now I find myself STILL sick, a week later.
Still feel like a sloth, but at least several hours after being tranquilized instead of freshly shot up.
I got fed up and did some tai chi this morning, the first all week, and it felt great.
My head is foggy, and I have this weird popping in my ears… but off I still go to work…
I think perhaps my priorities are backwards.
The Restless Raven 
Apr 15, 2016 @ 12:17:47
AYAZ AND THE KING’S PEARL
One day the king assembled his courtiers.
He handed the minister a glowing pearl.
“What would you say this is worth?”
“More gold than a hundred donkeys could carry.”
“Break it!”
“Sir, how could I waste your resources
like that?” The king presented him
with a robe of honor for his answer
and took back the pearl. He talked awhile
to the assembly on various topics.
Then he put the pearl
in the chamberlain’s hand. “What would it sell for?”
“Half a kingdom, God preserve it!”
“Break it!”
“My hand could not move to do such a thing!”
The king rewarded him with a robe of honor
and an increase in his salary, and so it went
with each of the fifty or sixty courtiers.
One by one, they imitated the minister
and the chamberlain and received new wealth.
Then the pearl was given to Ayaz.
“Can you say how splendid this is?”
“It’s more than I can say.”
“Then break it, this second, into tiny pieces.”
Ayaz had had a dream
about this, and he’d hidden two stones in his sleeve.
He crushed the pearl to powder between them.
As Joesph at the bottom of the well listened
to the end of his story, so such listeners
understand success and un-success as one thing.
Don’t worry about the forms.
If someone wants your horse,
let him have it. Horses are for
hurrying ahead of the others.
The court assembly screamed at the recklessness
of Ayaz, “How could you do that?”
“What the king says is worth more than any pearl.
I honor the king, not some colored stone.”
The princes immediately fell on their knees
and put their foreheads on the ground.
Their sighs went up like a smoke cloud
asking forgiveness. The king gestured
to his executioner as though to say,
“Take out this trash.”
Ayaz sprang forward.
“Your mercy makes them bow like this.
Give them their lives! Let them keep hoping
for union with you. They see their forgetfulness
now, as the drunken man did when he said,
‘I didn’t know what I was doing,’ and then
someone pointed out, ‘But you invited
that forgetfulness into you. You drank it.
There was a choice!’
They know deeply now how imitation
lulled them to sleep. Don’t separate yourself
from them. Look at all their heads against the floor.
Raise their faces into yours. Let them wash
in your cool washing place.”
Ayaz and his speech always get to this point
and then the pen breaks. How can a saucer
contain the ocean? The drunks break their cups,
but you poured that wine!
Ayaz said, “You picked me
to crush the pearl. Don’t punish the others
for my drunken obedience!
Punish them when I’m sober,
because I’ll never be sober again.
Whoever bows down like they are bowing down
will not rise up in his old self again.
Like a gnat in your buttermilk,
they’ve become your buttermilk.
The mountains are trembling. Their map and compass
are the lines in your palm.”
Husam,
I need a hundred mouths to say this,
but I only have this one!
A hundred thousand impressions from the spirit
are wanting to come through here.
I feel stunned
in this abundance, crushed and dead.
***
AYAZ AND THE KING’S PEARL (or, THE TWO WAYS OF BEING DRUNK)
— Rumi
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