![]() After fracturing my elbow on Thursday I had a huge bursting desire to paint. I had never painted and so was hesitating, thinking I needed to take lessons. A friend suggested skipping the lessons and just putting color on paper. Brian brought home an easel, brushes and acrylic paints and I was off. The energy waned with the need to rest my arm and sleep, but today I one handedly dragged out the easel, cardboard, paints and brushes. I just started painting the colors that were bursting to come out, and before long an inner knot started to unwind and emerge; This Kavi is Mine! In 2008 I was attending the three day Program by Swamiji called Vallam Valleram. It was being held in Thiruvannamalai, India and there were about 1000 participants. I was ecstatic to receive an orange colored cloth the color of Kavi, from Swamiji, to be worn throughout the three day program. It signified the cloth Swamiji received from Arunagiri Yogishwara. I felt as if this was the moment I had been waiting for for lifetimes, to receive the Kavi Cloth from Swamiji, to be His Sanyasi. I finally was wearing it again! I was finally his sanyasi again. I was where I was meant to be. The symbolism was so important! The moment so high! I went up and got the cloth and placed it on my neck. I wore it so joyfully for three days.
Swamiji had been very clear that we were to give the cloth back at the end of the three days, and we were not to be seen wearing it after the program ended. It was one of the most profound programs I had ever attended. In the program we had experienced the ecstasy and of Swamiji meeting Arunagiri Yogishwara, then one day, Arunagiri Yogishwara not being there, and Swamiji's grief and desolation. The program was over all too soon. Swamiji ended it gracefully and beautifully, and blessed us. Then we had to give the Kavi Cloth back. I don't know if I have ever experienced the kind of rage that burst up inside of me. I did not want to give the cloth back! I had to fight myself so hard! I was undone by the emotions of the experience Swamiji gave with Arunagiri Yogishwara, and the thing I thought I had wanted most, to be Swamiji's sanyasi, was tantalizingly close through that cloth. And now, I had to give it back. I felt the cloth was being taken away from me. I balled it up, wanting to hurl it, throw it with all my might. I seethed with rage. My outer self walked up and calmly put the cloth back in the box. My inner-self was a violent churning ocean. I felt a rage, lost and desolate. There was nowhere for that rage to go. There was no getting angry at Swamiji, there was no getting the Kavi back. My situation was stuck. I couldn't take Sanyasi in this form; being married with kids in the life I had chosen. But underneath everything, that Kavi was mine. The anger imploded. I went deep inside and a fever started that wouldn't abate. I got so sick. I wasn't aware of what was going around me. I missed my flight home. Manisha watched over me. She said that for three days I didn't move. I was as white as death with two pink spots on my cheeks from the anger that burned. Inside was a raging conflict. On the third day of the fever I had a dream. I was on a ship at sea with a snake that was crated up. I was guarding it. The snake started emerging and it was huge. It was unable to be contained. It was bigger than anyone. It was bigger than the ship. It was about to overwhelm us all. I kept trying to tell Ma Sivananda to watch out. I started yelling, trying to warn the crowd of people. The snake slowly uncoiled and moved toward the crowd. It was red with a yellow stripe and glowing eyes. Afraid of being swallowed, I swallowed my fear and went up to the snake and put my arms around its neck to guide it away from the crowd. I had the clear thought that the snake would kill me. However, there was no struggle. I gently led it away. The gentle snake was led. The snake vomited and something black came out. It was a fat round black bird that flew away. There were two Indian men dressed in white, sitting on meditation mats The snake turned to me and flicked its tongue on my forehead and the top of my head while I sat relaxed with eyes closed. It initiated me. Then the snake put its head down to go to sleep. One man covered the snake with my towel. The other man had soiled himself out of fear. After that dream the fever broke and I woke up. My daughter and I re-booked our tickets and flew home. The desire for sanyasi never subsided, it got worse. I started praying to have that desire to be taken away as it was causing so much conflict and suffering in me. Thirteen years later, this painting burst out of me. As I painted, a mantra started chanting inside, "This Kavi is mine!" "This Kavi is MINE!" It was always mine! It had been mine for ages and eons but I hadn't realized it. As I painted, an orange Shiva linga emerged with my eye at the center. Me at the center of the Linga. Me rising up out of the water. A huge wave of anger was generated in me when I had to give the Kavi back. That wave hit the Linga and Shiva destroyed it, changing the direction of the energy . The fractured elbow opened a crack that I walked through through to the other side. I am Kavi. I am Sanyasi. I have been wearing Kavi for lifetimes. Nothing on the outside will change that. The Kavi is very deep inside my soul. Deep inside my heart. I don't need to prove anything. Or show anything. Or win at anything. I've already been there. I am.
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