Mike,
I say Edgar is right, though, that coming back is a hard part.
Especially coming back from a long practice somewhere, and making your own
(interruptable) schedule, again. It takes balance (retaining it, and, yes,
reGaining it), and grace. Grace toward others and toward oneself.
And/but, one must keep up practice, too, else what has become clear, and what
is light and healthy in you, becomes dull, and heavy and perturbed.
One need not even have awakened on the long practice for you to nonetheless
"have to" take these few precautions, and protect and nurture what you have
clarified to some extent.
Another approach is to practice not at all, and watch, day by day, the
centeredness and poise erode and disappear entirely. This is educational,
i.e., pretty painful. Yet I think it is of value to any practitioner, and
maybe more to anyone who feels they may some day teach other practitioners, and
practice with them: It will help all your "students" for you to know exactly
how it feels to be a beginner again, and see, for yourself, several or many
times, just how one does and *can* make some progress toward cleaning up the
mess, and be patient about it. One makes mental notes as one does this, and
can speak in clear terms with students about how they can do it. In other
words, you're not making up the advice by the seat-of-your-pants each time a
question is asked, or a demonstration must be made, or a suggestion offered,
but you have a rich store of experience of desperately painful times and
weightlessly glowing clear times behind you, not just once, but I won't say how
many.
Needless to say -- and I don't mind admitting -- I've taken both approaches
many times. At this point in time, I'm in a building-up phase again. Early
days of slim progress. A difficult Yoga! But the field is familiar, and I've
pitched no-hitters and hit home runs here before.
Spring training in Arizona,
--Joe
> uerusuboyo@... wrote:
>
> Edgar,
< Lose your head and gain the universe.
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