Letting Go of Resistance

The last two weeks on the Mystical Yoga Farm have opened my heart and ears to the sounds and beauty in nature.  But sometimes the beauty was hidden under a less than appealing exterior, filled with challenges and inner chaos. 

I tend to jump into things, not worry about the challenges I might have to face, and then wonder what the heck I was thinking when I finally face the challenges.  This experience started the very same way they always do, with a good dose of "what have you gotten yourself into now, Korken!"

For whatever reason, I thought the transition from city life to farm life would be smooth.  Piece of cake, really.  I mean, I've always loved the idea of living 'off the grid' and on a farm!  Boy, did I underestimate how different it would be.  The first three days I was taken way outside of my comfort zone.  Let me paint the picture for you. 

There's only one place where you can get electricity and if there are clouds in the sky, you can forget having any connection to the outside world, as the internet is less than reliable.  There are three, yes THREE, mirrors on the entire farm, and none of them are larger than my hand.  Laundry is done by hand here unless you want to spend 3-4 hours taking it to town, which involves calling a small boat to come get you off the secluded farm and take you into the closest city, Santiago.  There you have to hope the lady who runs the one laundromat will actually remember to put your clothes in the washer.  She tells you come back in two hours and when you come back, the place is closed and you will have to come back tomorrow. 

 So, I guess I chose the lesser of the two evils and decided to wash my clothes by hand.  You fill up a large bucket with water and throw in some detergent.  Then your hands become the washer.  Swirling, pounding, and turning the clothes around over and over again to get the dirt off of them.  But the best part (sarcasm intended) is having to rinse them.  After about three cycles of rinsing and STILL seeing soap suds come out of your clothes, you eventually accept that it won't be perfect and wring the water out, so you can dry them.  And here's the funny thing, it takes some of your clothes an entire day to dry on the clothes line AND it rains almost every day here.  Sometimes the winds are so strong that it doesn't matter if your clothes line is sheltered under a roof, because your clothes will get wet again.  If this happens more than once, you basically have to wash them again because they stink!  

Speaking of stinking...I haven't flushed a toilet in two weeks!  That's because we use a fancy, shmancy compost toilet on the farm.  Basically you lift the wooden cover off a hole in a piece of wood, you bring down the toilet seat and next thing you know you are dropping the Cosby kids off at the local pool.  But wait, this isn't a pool, it's just a really muddy playground.  Mistake number 1, pointing my head light into the hole.  I highly advise you NOT to do this.  You will never get the picture out of your mind.  To top it all off, you get to use biodegradable toilet paper to finish the job!  For those of you who've never used it, it's not exactly the strongest, most durable toilet paper.  And I'll spare you all the details of my bowel movements, but let's just say constipation has not been an issue whatsoever.  :-)

Is the picture getting clearer yet?  For those of you who have been out in nature for most of your life and done lots of camping, I'm sure you're like, what's the big deal?  But for a city boy who has lived in Philadelphia, Miami, and LA all his life, it is quite a shock to the system.  

A few more challenges:  we don't have a refrigerator so our leftovers are left in a tupperware container on the counter over night.  Who knew half the things we keep cold in the US, don't actually need to be kept cold!  Most everyone here walks around barefoot in most parts of the farm.  Going to bed with dirty feet or socks is also common.  Dirt under your fingernails?  So common!  Especially if you do things like digging holes, building a chicken coup, planting seeds, clearing wet, muddy pieces of wood that have all kinds of insects over it.  Yeah... no gloves people, unless you want to look like a prissy boy from LA, which I'm sure people labeled me as for the first week I was here.  

But eventually you give in to it all.  You have to, especially  if you're staying here for months like I am.  You watch how other people around you are coping and not making a big deal out of things and you wonder why it is so difficult and appalling to you to do the same.  It's all about upbringing and what you're used to.  So, I had to look past all the dirt, showers every other day, the lack of amenities, and the fact that I would have to live with a constant barrage of mosquito bites everyday (they are merciless and everywhere!).  Nothing like being awakened in the middle of the night by a startling scream from a jungle animal and then being greeted by bed bugs and the buzzing of mosquitos in your ears.  Where will they land, what will they bite?  You can't even see them because it's pitch dark!  But eventually you just accept it and find yourself smiling and being grateful for all that you DO have, and realizing that at the end of the day "It's just dirt." (thank you Nick for that amazing revelation).  

I wake up every morning at 6 am, we meditate on the dock from 6:30-7.  Then yoga for two hours followed by breakfast.  Then it's 4-5 hours of working on the farm, doing various things, which often include food trips to Santiago, which is a story I must tell you in a future blog.  Then dinner around 5:30, Satsung/Kirtan at 7 and in bed around 9.  Yeah, this is how we used to do it before electricity and TV and other distractions kept us up well into the night.  It's kind of nice to have nature be your alarm clock in the morning.  I rise with the rising sun.  And get to bed when it's dark, mainly because there's really nothing else to do and your dead tired.  

I'm living on a self-sustained, beautiful farm, where we use solar energy for electricity, rainwater for drinking and showering, and use our waste to fertilize the land.  I'm stepping outside of myself and being of service to the earth.  I'm learning about permaculture and farming.  I'm learning about my connection to nature and how profound a spiritual practice can be and how it can totally change how you see yourself and the world.  I'm healing myself so I can be ready to help heal others later in my journey.  

It's been rough, I won't lie.  But the good has more than covered the challenges.  I kept asking myself the first few days, "Why did I come here?  Was my intuition totally off? Why am I putting myself through this?"  But as I let go and accepted my environment and adapted to it, I began to experience things that I never knew possible.  I began to really see the world and listen to the sounds and intimate messages from nature (I talk to the plants and crops, it helps them feel appreciated and loved and they grow bigger and healthier).  And I began to strip away my layers.  Take it one day at a time, I told myself.  One moment at a time.  Don't look too far ahead.  Forget the answers, just trust that you are in good hands and allow life to flow through you.  So I've thrown down my walls and resistance to the flow of life, knowing that it would take a serious illness to get me off this farm.

Bring it mosquitos!  Bring it diarrhea!  Bring it Guatemala!  Because you damn well know that I'm gonna bring it!

PS:  For more pics, visit my facebook page.

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