Do The Evolution

I’m not sleeping well lately. Ever since my final plans for Burning Man have started to come together it’s a struggle to get through the night. This has been over a year in the making, since I met my Burning Man friends a few weeks before the 2008 event was to take place. Looked at from another perspective, it’s five or more years in the making, from the time I first heard of it and knew, maybe not consciously, that I would end up going one day. Looked at from yet another perspective, it’s almost 30 years in the making. My life has been leading up to this in many different ways.

During Rubee’s pre-yoga discussion yesterday one of the other participants mentioned that he’ll be going to Burning Man. Afterwards I spoke with him and he talked about how he likes to pick a theme or intention for himself each year, something to align his experiences toward. I liked that idea a lot. Working with intention is something I’ve been thinking a lot about, and it’s certainly something that helps enhance a yoga practice. It didn’t take long for me to come up with my intention, because it happens to coincide with this year’s official theme: Evolution.

This ridiculous corporate song and dance cannot continue for much longer. I have to find another path, a way to serve. Someone mentioned something at Rubee’s class about being unhappily employed, and Rubee polled the class to find out who else is in that situation. I of course raised my hand along with a few others, and Rubee of course had to interject his beliefs about happiness being metaphysically negative, and so on (don’t get me wrong here, I love the guy, just poking fun). That got me thinking. It’s not that I want a job or career where I’m happy and fulfilled 100% of the time. I’m pretty sure that’s an impossible dream. What I really want is a job or career that I find to be relevant. My job right now holds no relevance toward the state of humanity. Not that another insurance job, which I have been seeking out, would, but at least I could be more challenged and excited during the day.

But what it feels like my life is opening up to is a way to serve humanity. I just checked out another fascinating book from the library, one that picks up logically where Anatomy of the Spirit ends. It’s called Your Hands Can Heal You, and one of its authors, Master Steven Co, will be in Chicago next month. I found out about him and the book from the most recent issue of The Monthly Aspectarian, a free local publication that I haven’t read in years. On a whim (or was it something more?) I picked up a copy from the yoga studio the other day.

There’s a life force inside of each and every one of us that is capable of astounding things. I don’t believe that I have it any more than anyone else has it, but what makes me different is that I believe in it and its powers. And I want to learn about how it works and what it can do. Yoga is a technology that uses it for personal development and growth toward enlightenment. But in that sense yoga is sort of limited. Being a yoga teacher and guiding people along this path is interesting and fulfilling to me but I want to explore other areas. Do I need to find a guru, or a master of some kind to study with? What is my life evolving toward? This is intention for my first Burning Man.