Posted on April 17th, 2011
Tonight, a group of friends and I attended a workshop with one of my favorite teachers, Adyashanti. A rare visit to NYC. Since 2007, I have had the good fortune to have participated in many of his silent retreats, which aided my personal process of “letting go” of “me” immeasurably.
He encourages those in his presence to call him “Adya”, remarking that he, too, feels that the grandeur of the name Adyashanti is a “bit much”. He tells us that his nieces and nephews call him “Uncle Ad” and I cannot help reflecting on how much that sounds like “Uncle Odd”. And, to the average person, he is “odd”, pausing often, “waiting” for his responses to arise and bridging us into the calm center of Now.
I wonder how often most of us just ramble on without so much as a breath between words, let alone sentences or paragraphs. We always seem to be going somewhere, forgetting that we have already arrived.
So….
“Me” pauses.
And….
A flurry of thoughts at first.
(My mind is doing its job beautifully.)
I wait for the inner traffic to slow down.
And…
I am waiting. Joyfully, curiously waiting.