As I’ve traveled across oceans and continents to find a new home here in Germany, I’ve found myself returning to my body quite often. As my Zen teacher used to tell me, this body is my home. She assured me that once I found a home within myself, that I would always be able to return to it, wherever I was. This has been a teaching that I have thought about a lot–both while I was still living at Zen Center and building (or perhaps, remodeling) my home within myself through hours of meditation–and while I’ve traveled from place to place trying to find my home out in the wide-world since.
There are many moments of great turbulence in my mind that make it hard for it to feel like home in here. As I’ve aged I’ve noticed my nigh lifelong companion anxiety has shifted forms throughout my life. She used to be disperse, nebulous, constricting. I wasn’t sure what was going on most of the time inside that made me so uncomfortable, all I knew was that I couldn’t breathe. I was nauseous. I was tired. As I became more and more self-aware through years of therapy and that one concentrated period of monastic living, the anxiety began to take a new form. She was no longer quite as much of an unknown, yet constant companion. She began to have names, and shapes.
I had a friend and dharma sibling at Zen Center who would talk about how they envisioned all of their demons as really just Bodhisattvas wearing demon masks. A part of their process of remodeling their inner home was to build a large conference table for all of their inner Bodhisattvas to sit, both disguised and plain. They wanted to give all parts of them a chance to be heard and understood. Why are you dressed like a demon? What are you trying to scare away? Is this to protect me? Do I need you to still protect me like this? Moderating over all of these discussions was my friend’s inner higher-self, helping to mediate, encourage, and placate all of the rowdy voices who demanded to be heard at that table. This was an idea I found inspirational at the time, and do still. I don’t know if my friend at the time was aware of the modern psychological model of Internal Family Systems or not. Regardless, when I came across this model later in life, I recognized it immediately.
Through learning about the Buddha’s radical teachings of compassion, I began to realize that my anxiety (and depression) were things that were calling out for love…but instead of heeding that call, I hated them. This makes sense. When I’m anxious, my mind is chaotic and loud. This chaos made it so that I had little filter between my unconscious thoughts and my conscious thoughts. I had (and have) a hard time mitigating emotions while anxious. Any maturity I had worked hard to gain often quickly went out of the window. I could only live in a reactive state. I did not like who I was when I was anxious–I was rude, condescending, snappish, petulant. It makes sense to not like that which made me not like myself.
In fact, not only were the anxiety and depression things that I hated about myself, they were born from parts of myself that I hated. Why did I become anxious? Why did that anxiety only bring out the demons? It was because the demons themselves were the source. It was a bit of a nasty negative feedback loop. I was afraid of being seen as incompetent and stupid, so I instead became rude and condescending. I was afraid of being undervalued and underestimated, and so I instead became sharp and petulant.
Through my friend’s insight of their inner table, I began to look at my own. Who were these demon-disguised Bodhisattvas sitting here, throwing trash around the room, demanding to be heard? Why were they acting out in such a manner? It became clear to me–they were there to protect me. They were there out of love. Just as my friend said–they were not actually demons–something born from a gross and terrible part of myself. They were instead Bodhisattvas, beings of ultimate compassion, wearing the costumes of demons. At some point in my life, I felt it was necessary to ask my inner Bodhisattvas to put on a demon mask to scare away the bad guys. The problem was, I never then asked them to stop.
So how do you ask your demons to stop? The most radical (and, in my experience, effective) way to do so, is to show them absolute compassion and empathy. This, of course, inherently means, showing yourself love. The more you tend to your wounds, and love them, the more they begin to heal. The more you speak to the demons and assure them that they are loved–that you are grateful for their help, but they are no longer needed–the more they begin to believe you and listen. They begin to let go of the costume they had to wear for so long, and can return to just being a Bodhisattva.
A difficulty in all of this is that while this practice of radical self-acceptance was a truly transformative and wondrous practice to undertake in the cloistered environment of a monastery, it is much more difficult to maintain while living in the “real world”. There is more to bump up against out here. There are more affronts to the ego, more complicated and heart-wrenching difficulties, more need to solve a problem now as opposed to later. There is more urgency, more conflict, and thus, less space. With the constriction of a busy mind comes more of a chance for the demon masks to return and for the habits to be reborn. Not only that, but there’s more of a chance for new demons to be conjured.
In all of the changes that happen with moving to a new country, on a new continent, with a different language and cultural norms, there comes a lot of stress and insecurity. I am continuously grateful that we immigrated to a country where we are wanted and treated with respect and patience. It is still difficult, but I can only imagine how different it would be immigrating to somewhere with overwhelming hatred thrown against you. There is already enough to deal with, such as a new phone number, bank account, ID/drivers license, new insurance, new doctors, new address, new customs, new timezone, new language, new town, new money. All of that with no friends, security net, or family (besides each other).
There is a lot that makes my body feel unsettled here. There is a lot that stresses out my mind. There have been new bouts of anxiety, appearing in its contemporary form. Instead of the anxiety manifesting as a constrictive body shroud as it had been in my younger years, it is now very highly concentrated in my mind. I am a rather visual person, and I experience it largely in a visual way. It’s as though my mind becomes a great tempest. I feel like the large, imposing, monstrous waves of thought are crashing against each other, with other thoughts adding to the noise as consistent crashes of lightning and booms of thunder.
Or, sometimes, I do envision it as a board meeting full of rancorous, temper-tantrum-wielding, disguised Bodhisattvas who are shouting at one another, throwing stuff at each other, leaping across the table at one another. It’s cacophonous and loud. There are so many voices demanding to be heard, and it’s overwhelming. In no small part, it’s not only the demons who are shouting and adding to the noise, it’s the unmasked Bodhisattvas too. For every diminutive or abrasive thought that comes crashing through, there’s another one that rises to meet it in love and understanding. Unfortunately, I’ve found that compassion just adds to the noise!
My poor, wonderfully mentally-stable husband is left with a catatonic wife who is at any moment’s notice about to break because of the overwhelm from the internal noise–and he is usually quite unsure of how to help me. His presence and love do comfort me, undeniably, but there is usually someone who helps more. She is the higher self, who exists outside of the noise. I in no small part identify her to be a deity. She is divine. She is a force that I encountered while living as a monk who is so complete in her unconditional love. She is in me and of me, and yet she is also in and of everything else. When I’m feeling helpless amidst the storming mind, she most often reminds me to return to my body in any way I can. I hear her voice as my own, as I often, out loud, need to say “I love you, I’ve got you. I love you, I’ve got you”. And, ultimately, I know and I trust that she does. That I do.
Eventually, I do return to my body. My lovely body, my complicated mind. As I’m getting older, more and more I’m realizing that my body is just as lovely as everybody else’s and my mind is just as complicated as everybody else’s (and vice versa). It just all exists in different shades, different hues. Everything exists on a spectrum. This body and mind are also singular. Just as with light, our selves are both a wave and a particle.
As my wonderful husband often affirms, I have a wonderful body and mind. His intense love of my body and mind have healed a lot in me. I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it–I ardently hope that everybody can have someone who loves them the way Michael does me. I often can’t believe how fortunate I am to have him–that he chose me, that we chose each other. It is healing just to have a partner who fully knew me before he chose to be my romantic partner. He had already lived with me and been my committed and loyal friend for years before our coupling; he had already seen a lot of me at my worst–and he chose me anyway. He knew about the anxiety, the depression, the snappish condescension, the overwhelm, the bossiness. He knew about it all and loved it, just as my Goddess does. He chose to not try to change me but to take upon himself a noble calling– the task of being a partner who could take care of me, support me, and encourage me in the ways I needed, without judgement and with truly divine patience. His gentleness, loyalty, and patience inspire me daily. He is a mirror of what I aim to be in my highest form (at least in most ways–I do want to keep my better sense of direction and attention to detail to our surroundings).
It is because I love his mind (and body) so much that I am now living in Germany. The offer for him (and thus us) to move to Germany had been proffered a few times during our relationship. For the first few times it was offered, I did not want to go, and he acquiesced. I was protective over my body and mind. I knew change was hard for me. I was afraid of leaving my purpose (working as a garden educator) that I had found in Madison. I was afraid to leave the city that I loved (I feel like I fell in love with Madison just as earnestly as I fell in love with Michael on that fateful trip in February of 2020). I was afraid to leave my friends (including the boy I had helped raise for the past 2.5 years), my cozy apartment, my happy life. I felt content and did not need disruption.
He felt incomplete. I felt afraid of being the reason he felt incomplete, and felt afraid that my happiness meant less than his, because he was the one with a career and I wasn’t.
Ultimately, a trip was offered for him and me to go and check out where we would live, if we were to move. This was a wonderful opportunity, because I was not sure I would be happy if we were to move. I could admit that a lot of my hesitation came from a fear of the unknown–could my body and mind be at home in a new place? Could I have a purpose there? A community? Could we eat vegetarian food and live with ease? Could we get my best friend, a 100 lb Newfoundland, over to Europe? Will I be able to take care of myself?
The trip ultimately helped assuage a lot of my fears. Germany does not feel so different from the United States. The language barrier is tough, but it is a hurdle that is clear how to overcome. I can learn a language. Navigating the new manner of apartment hunting, banking, credit, cell phone plans, markets, appliances, mail system–these were all stressful, but mostly because we had to do it all at once. At least we got to do it together, and these hurdles too, could be overcome.
At least Michael gets to pursue his dream, and is, so far, thriving doing so. At least the vegan scene here is legitimate and there’s always something for us to eat at restaurants, and the vegan meats and cheeses at the store are abundant–and of much better quality than those in the US. At least our dear gentle giant of a dog made it across the Atlantic relatively okay. At least the cost of living is cheap enough that I actually don’t have to work (which, as it turns out, was probably the biggest selling point for me to make the move). So now I spend my days making art, reading, and writing. It’s cozy and lovely.
I’ve always wanted to go back to graduate school, but felt unsettled as to why I would. I wanted to return because I love school. I love learning. I even loved taking tests and writing essays (I just didn’t love doing a lot of those things at once). But I don’t love the cost. I could never justify the cost of returning to graduate school to study what I wanted. I got to do that for my bachelors. I loved it, but there was and is a real world cost that I am still (barely) attending to.
However, in no small manner inspired by Good Will Hunting (you know, “You wasted $150,000 on an education you coulda got for $1.50 in late fees at the public library”), I am myself crafting my own graduate program, where I can learn and study and practice what I want to. I’ve been craving for a long time engaging my intellectual self again, and after only doing this a short while, I feel nourished by it. This blog is a part of my program–it’s an assignment I’m going to turn in every week. If no one reads it, that’s okay. I just need to know that I am practicing writing and organizing thoughts again. In the practice itself there is an engagement with my mind that is settling and uplifting all at once.
Now in Germany, I can engage in my own studies. I can read Between the World and Me and be inspired by Coates’ brilliant manner of exploring his black body and its place in his life and in this world. I can draw protest art, hoping in some small way to protect the bodies of those who are being slaughtered in genocide or carted away in unmarked vans. I can write about my own body, and in so doing once again help the mind understand itself.
One night in college I was walking back from the house of some dear friends that were living three doors down from me (one of those friends was, indeed, Michael). It was snowing softly and I was high. I usually don’t actually like being high on marijuana, which was something I had to finally admit when I was in my mid-twenties–but that night was a different night. I remember walking in the crisp air, and it being so quiet. The kind of quiet that has its own distinct flavor, that of a fresh snowfall early in the winter, when it’s still a magical thing. It was dark and no one was around. I was so cozy in my own body, happy after being with friends, glad to return to a home I cherished. I remember so clearly a thought arising from my deep unconscious, the marijuana helping lift the curtain so it could get through. As I watched my feet sink into the soft snow on the pavement, the thought floated into my whole body: I am so grateful to be spending this life with you.
To know that that love existed in me kept me going through so much pain. It helped buoy my hours of self exploration spent on the meditation cushion and in the therapist’s office. It helps my Goddess calm the storm and soothe the riled-up Bodhisattvas. It’s held and nurtured by my husband. It is a constant companion, this knowledge, that deep down I am so grateful to be spending this life with my own body and mind.
It is wonderful to know that it is all of this that I love: this body, with bones built by rocky mountains and fat built by Wisconsin cheese curds. This posture carefully constructed as a sanctuary under the instruction of my Zen teacher in California. These muscles built by a peppy YouTuber I’ve followed religiously since 2020. This curly hair from my mother, and these well-tapered fingers from my father and these same facial expressions as my brother. This mind with its myriad fears built from childhood, inflated during adolescence, and now being slowly released as an adult, one by one, into the unending blue. This mind full of flamboyant Bodhisattvas dressed in masks, and kind Bodhisattvas trying to tend to them, and, above it all, a Goddess who watches, knows, and deeply loves it all.
Reading now: The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander and Yumi and the Nightmare Painter by my boi Brandon Sanderson
Listening now: My Transitions Playlist on Spotify (I am a little bit crazy about making Spotify playlists)