Archive for January, 2009

“The road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom; for we never know what is enough until we know what is more than enough.”  –William Blake

After having been flown to NYC to teach Yoga + Chocolate at an international PR event, I attended the ensuing party on the top floor of a skyscraper. It was ultra-glam and I was feeling pretty darned good about myself. Grabbing another fancy hors d’oueve that slid gallantly across my palette, and sipping on a fine cocktail, I found myself surrounded by very “fabulous” types.  I ended up spending the better part of the evening hob-nobbing with the following:

Rita, an architect from Spain who was quite conservative in her button down. Already a bit tipsy, Rita told me in broken English, “I had sex with my yoga teacher once. He has a grande dong so you tell me that you es professor de yoga and I see you with grande dong. No?”

“Oh how wonderful,” I replied. What else was I supposed to say to her.

Then there was Johan, a marketing director from Norway in a navy blue sweater and white cackis.  He said to me in broken English, “Yes yoga, I try and I hate it. I don’t understand. Everyone say yoga this, yoga that. I say f-ck yoga,” and he proceeded to laugh tapping me affectionately on the shoulder to laugh along with him.

“Ha, ha, ha,” I sarcastically said under my breath.

And lastly, there was Martin, a big-time art dealer from Berlin who also spoke in broken English.

“So what kind of yoga you teach?” Martin inquired seeming to be genuinely interested.

“Well I pair yoga with everyday passions. To make the practice more accessible: yoga and chocolate. Yoga and Wine,”

Silence.

“You should try yoga and cocaine,” Martin said straight-faced.

I feigned laughter.

But Martin wasn’t laughing.

“Cocaine, everyone say it’s bad, but I love it. Cocaine! Here’s to cocaine!” Martin screamed raising his champagne glass in the air.

And Martin clinked his champagne glass with Marta, Johan, and Rita as they all screamed in unison, “Cocaine!”

“Cocaine!” another person screamed from the far corner of the room.

I was very naïve and did not realize until that moment that I was right in the heart of huge international coke party.  Being that I’m a relatively healthy yoga teacher, I wanted to get the heck out of there but my host insisted that I stay.

So I sipped on my martini and watched the slow disintegration of Johan, Rita, and Martin along with the other hundred or so folks at the party.

At 11pm, two hours after the party began, Johan’s nose was bleeding and his shirt was unbuttoned halfway, but he still insisted on speaking with me about yoga.  “Why everyone like so much? So boring yoga!”

Johan shoved his bag of coke in my hand saying, “Yoga this!”

I threw the bag of coke to the ground and headed toward the exit when Rita grabbed my hand and dragged me to the corner. She whispered in my ear, “You do me down dog dong baby; muy grande mi professor de yoga!”

Rita wreaked of garlic and cigarettes and I slithered out of her grip and toward the exit.

I went to collect my things only to stumble upon Martin who had unrolled my yoga mat in the room where four hours earlier I’d taught a yoga class. Martin had invited people to snort lines of cocaine off of my yoga mat.

“Yoga and cocaine!” martin screamed. “This how you do it!”

“Cocaine!” everyone screamed. “Cocaine!”

*****

Riding the elevator down the 50 floors, I felt horribly depressed. I felt depressed because it’s a lonely action to break away.  I felt depressed because it seems harder and harder to fit in. I felt depressed because that was my favorite yoga mat I’d left behind.

This isn’t a judgement about what those people were doing. God knows I like to party!  Maybe not cocaine but I like to have a good time. And I’ll spare you the “drugs are bad” message. This is more about decisions.

Most of us stumble upon everyday situations where we’re faced with a decision: to live it up and do something that’s less than healthy. Or to sacrifice certain pleasures for a smaller belly and a stronger heart.

More often than not these days, I’m living it up. I opt for the In n’ Out double double instead of the salad bar from Whole Foods. I opt for beers with my friends at Father’s Office instead of an evening jog. A few days ago when I realized I weighed as much as an NFL linebacker, I saw the scales tipping in more than ways than one.

To live a life of purpose and to attain any sense of direction, health, and well-being,  sometimes (just sometimes) we have to say NO.  No to the international coke party. No to the pair of shoes that will put you deeper in debt. No to the double-double with cheese.  Because YES will grip, tug, and bite demanding your attention. But to shake it loose yields something much greater than pleasure.

Freedom.

–DhammapadaWhen I found out one of my favorite yoga teachers goes to a shrink, I figured it must be one helluva shrink. After all, I find great clarity in this yoga teacher’s class. So I got the name and number of this Dr. Schein and showed up for a session.

“So David, what brings you here today?” he asked.

“Well I feel so nervous about the impact of the economy on my financial well-being. That and I have a strange fetish with gerbils,” I quietly answered

“Who doesn’t!” he shot back.

“Oh good, so I’m not alone. It’s just that I find them so cute and squiggly,” I added

“Oh I was referring to the economy, not the gerbils. And let me tell you, I’ve gotten some great advice from my shrink about this subject,” Dr Schein continued.

“Wait a second, you have a shrink?”

And a few weeks later I booked an appointment with the shrink to the shrink. And after 6 months, I discovered the shrink to the shrink to the shrink to the shrink to the shrink to the shrink. All rivers seem to lead to one ocean, one guy who seems to be at the top of the chain of shrinks, a Dr. Abramowitz-Weinstein.

It took me 2 months but I finally got an appointment feeling absolutely confident that Dr. A&W, as they call him, would be nothing short of a friggin guru.

A measly man, 5 foot 2 with bifocals and a toupee, Dr. A&W greeted me.

“Velcome,” he said in a German accent.

It didn’t take long before he led me outside, down a path, through the forest, around a pond, under a tunnel, over a mountain, across a graveyard, and through a labyrinth. And there in the middle of the labyrinth on a golden table was a big chocolate truffle.

“Zis is the answer,” he said.

I hesitated but ate the special chocolate and felt amazing. I wandered through the woods and returned to Dr. A&W week after week. Each time I would eat another special chocolate and feel more ecstatic joy frolicking amongst the trees.

Finally, after thousands of dollars of doctor’s bills and a strange problem with itching, I had the special chocolates investigated and realized they were coated in oxycontin. I turned Dr. A&W into the police who also discovered he ran a huge pot farm, yoga studio operated by midget hookers, and counterfeit Christian Louboutin shoe factory.

I was devastated. Horrified. Flabbergasted. Oh my God. To think all those shoes I’d bought from him were fake?!

*****

At that moment I realized the Source does not exist in the form of a human being. Yes there are gurus who are close to pure channels of the Source energy. Wayne Dyer calls them “Sorcerers.” But for most of us, it’s not likely we will come in contact with these gurus unless we’re able to journey to India.  So the most realistic and financially healthy option is to chart your own path to the Source energy.

Source energy is rich with wisdom and revitilizing power that is yet to be filtered by the mental kaleidoscope. Think natural spring water. Think organic food. Think pure healing energy.  Without a daily moment of mental freedom, we essentially spend the day wallowing in the pollution of old habits and smoggy consciousness. Think Tijuana tap water. Think McDonald’s filet o’ fish. Think the nastiness in the crevice of an American Airlines seat.

Carlos Castaneda said, “The task of sorcerers was to face infinity and they plunged into it daily as a fisherman plunges into the sea.” Each and every day, we must find the place from which to take the plunge. The plunge need not be from the ridge of the Himalayas. It can be from the ridge of a fine glass of Cabernet or (if you don’t drink), from the miniature craters of chocolate coating a Vosges red-fire tortilla chip (see below).   Who doesn’t feel like jumping from all that binds her to the world!

There’s nothing wrong with a trip to a Shrink many of whom are brilliant. But there should be a balance. By taking too much of a another’s advice whether it’s your crazy red-headed yoga teacher or Dr. Abramowitz-Weinstein, you risk ingesting the runoff of their influences, flaws, and fears.  But worse, you risk drowning out one of the most untapped human resources: intuiton. As Herman Hesse said, “All I ever wanted was to live from the promptings of my true self, why was that so difficult?”