Misha Vanya

A short bus ride or three later and I was in India. And India is a spectacular land which demands, and has inspired, books and books of its own to attempt to describe the colors, the sights, the smells and the sounds of this place, and this is not that type of blog. Sure I was in India, but at this time I wasn’t in India because I wanted to be in India, I was in India because I was meeting Michelle. For those who don’t understand what im talking about here is a -

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While I was teaching English in Costa Rica, ’07, I met an amazing woman named Michelle. We recognized in each other a distinct way of seeing the world – a desire to live, truly. To embrace the world in all its’ splendor – both positive and negative. To look past the surface and to find the depths within, to bring those out and to create the type of world we wanted to live in, not to settle for the suffering that is so common. We loved each other nearly immediately. She came to live with me in Sandalo for 4 months, and then went back to Canada for 2 months to make some money, and then we met again in Venezuela. We traveled together in South America for 6 months. Our love was passionate, true and powerful. But something went wrong. From the time that we were in Peru onwards things didn’t feel the same, and 2 weeks before our trip was to end she broke up with

me. I have thought about my part in that drama probably (I know Jalice would say, “definitely”) too much, and I think what happened was that I began to take her for granted. I think that this habit is one of the worst afflictions that plagues humanity – I was told by a friend that, in general, the ninth time we experience something it looses its original power. How sad is that? Remember, if you will, the first time you experienced the ocean, or climbed a mountain, or your first kiss… remember the intensity of the awe, the wonder, the joy that filled your being? Zen Buddhists call that feeling ‘satori’ and it’s a glimpse of enlightenment. And now, how many of us take for granted kissing, mountains or the ocean? True, to operate normally in the world we need to be able to desensitize ourselves – if every sensation was as powerful as the first time we experienced it we would often be unable to do anything, merely standing in the middle of the street gawking. A

nd yet, how sad is it that we desensitize ourselves so much that we forget how to allow that understanding back into our beings? And that is what happened, from my side at least, with my Misha. Months passed and eventually we began to email each other, to talk on the phone occasionally, to recreate our friendship. But always lingering in my mind was that other affliction of mankind, “what if…..?”

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I was about to find out “what if”. It would be nearly two years since we had seen each other, we had both dated other people, we were good friends, but what if? I didn’t even know what I wanted – did I want to be together again? Did I want to just be friends? And what did she want? I knew that, no matter what, I didn’t want to jeopardize our friendship, but I knew that seeing each other would settle a lot of these uncertaincies. And even more confusing, she invited me to join her in a course on Tantra Yoga – sexual yoga. Now my mind was projecting all sorts of things…

So what happened? I arrived in Rishikesh and we when we hugged everything felt right. We were together for just over a week, and in that time we were sexually intimate, but not in the beginning, and not at the end. The tantra class was cancelled, so we spent our time doing yoga, going to meditation, searching through the market for various gifts and eating the wonderful food that can be found in Ram Jula.

More than anything I was impressed and inspired by her – how much she had grown in the time since we had seen each other last. She had dedicated herself to a spiritual life as an Osho Sannyasin and chosen a new name, in

this recreation or rededication of herself. She had grown so much in her understanding of herself and her feminity – she learned that she loved to dance and wasn’t afraid to do so anymore, embraced being a woman and explored what that meant within herself and to others. So much more confident, creative and radiant. And she began confronting her demons with meditation, yoga and primal deconditioning. She learned more about who she is, what she wants, where she came from and where she is going. I don’t mean these as blithe comments – truly. She used all her courage to ask herself the really scary questions and has come out stronger and more beautiful. She’s an inspiration. And I hope to follow in her footsteps. Really look at myself and where im going. Why do I travel? Do I really want to reach a spritiual understanding in my life? Will I ever deal with and heal the issues of my fa

ther and sister? Why do I regress in a relationship? These questions prompted me to set and intention into the cosmos –

With my strengthened determination and willpower, I will immerse myself in this pilgrimage. I am open and receptive to new ideas and energies. I have the courage to proceed in the face of my fears and am alive in love.

The day that she left Rishekesh I did a two card tarot reading for myself and what I pulled was the 2 of Cups (Love) and the 3 of Swords (Mourning). There are many ways to interpret this reading, but what felt intuitively right was that I was mourning the loss of our romantic love, that I knew that we were friends and friends only, for ever more, and I was a bit saddened by that – not that we were only to be friends, I was ecstatic about our strengthened friendship, but a bit saddened that I no longer yearned for a romantic relationship between us. So much of my identity over the last few years had been built around her and our relationship and I was letting that go. B

ut letting go I was, and our time together was exactly as it needed to be. We expressed our love for each other, and we made love. And both of those acts were true and honest. But we were not in love with each other anymore, and we both knew it. We parted as friends, not lovers, and I have no regrets about that.

While obvsiously important to my life, why did I include this in my spiritual blog? For a few reasons. Firstly I believe that love and spirituality are intricately tied together if not the same thing. "Love isn't a portal (to enlightenment); its what comes through the portal into this world." Understanding one helps one to understand the other. Achieving one helps one to achieve the other. Accepting one helps one to accept the other. Being open to one helps one to be open to the other. And secondly because it was affirming and inspiring to me to discover another, so close to myself, on the same path as I was. It is a wonderful feeling to know that I can call her up with any spiritual trouble I have and she will understand, she will know what I mean and perhaps have a suggestion from her own life or from the writings of a guru to point me towards. It is wonderful to know that I am creating my own sangha, my own spiritual community.

Thank you Misha Vanya, for everything.