It has felt like a parallel process.
The course of treatment included 4 surgeries, 7 months of (more than one) chemotherapy infusions, 6 weeks of daily radiation treatment, and 8 months of physical therapy- the cancer treatment that is...
Two weeks ago, on the same day my husband was having surgery, my mother told me her doctors are recommending another surgery for her.
I was speechless.
Since that announcement, I've been thinking about the poem by 20th century Chilean poet and diplomat Pablo Neruda (1904-1973)
that is called "Keeping Quiet." It goes like this:
Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still.
For once on the face of the earth,
let’s not speak in any language;
let’s stop for one second,
and not move our arms so much.
It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines;
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.
Fisherman in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would look at his hurt hands.
Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victories with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.
What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about;
I want no truck with death.
If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.
Perhaps the earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead
and later proves to be alive.
Now I’ll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.
Exquisite, no?
It reminds me of the essence of author Pico Iyer's writings and essays about stillness and quiet-
which I seem to be needing lately because I've scoured the internet and his blog (http://picoiyerjourneys.com/) for articles and interviews on these very same topics.
But now, I feel like I need to put all of my reading (on the internet or otherwise) away.
I once heard an acoustic ecologist named Gordon Hempton, founder of an organization called The One Square Inch of Silence say:
Quiet can be quieting.
I couldn't agree more.
So this weekend, serendipitously, I am scheduled to attend an all-day mindfulness meditation retreat at The Center for Mindfulness, and the timing couldn't be more perfect.
If stillness and quiet are what I am craving, then eight silent hours turned inward--without electronics, CNN or even conversation--is exactly what the doctor ordered.
In an interview with Krista Tippett on NPR on the topic of his book The Art of Stillness, the also well-known travel writer Mr. Iyer had said,
I noticed when I began travelling a lot 30 years ago, I would talk about going to Cuba or going to Tibet, and people's eyes would light up with excitement. And nowadays, I notice that people's eyes light up most in excitement when I talk about going nowhere or going offline. And I think a lot of us have the sense that we're living at the speed of light, at a pace determined by machines [and politics]. And we've lost the ability to live at the speed of life.
I have found this to be true as well when I tell others I am going on retreat.
It's like people know that our current pace in the modern western world is not sustainable, yet up till now, we have not learned the necessary strategies and capabilities to set the appropriate limits in order to thrive in it.
Mr. Iyer offered up his own solution to this dilemma in a 2009 The New York Times article called "The Joy of Less" about his minimalist life outside of Kyoto, Japan.
I’m no Buddhist monk, and I can’t say I’m in love with renunciation in itself, or traveling an hour or more to print out an article I’ve written, or missing out on the N.B.A. Finals. But at some point, I decided that, for me at least, happiness arose out of all I didn’t want or need, not all I did. And it seemed quite useful to take a clear, hard look at what really led to peace of mind or absorption (the closest I’ve come to understanding happiness). Not having a car gives me volumes not to think or worry about, and makes walks around the neighborhood a daily adventure. Lacking a cell phone and high-speed Internet, I have time to play ping-pong every evening, to write long letters to old friends and to go shopping for my sweetheart (or to track down old baubles for two kids who are now out in the world).
When the phone does ring — once a week — I’m thrilled, as I never was when the phone rang in my overcrowded office in Rockefeller Center. And when I return to the United States every three months or so and pick up a newspaper, I find I haven’t missed much at all. While I’ve been rereading P.G. Wodehouse, or “Walden,” the crazily accelerating roller-coaster of the 24/7 news cycle has propelled people up and down and down and up and then left them pretty much where they started.
While I agree with Mr. Iyer himself who says: I certainly wouldn’t recommend my life to most people, I have found it deeply validating to read through his ideas and personal a-ha moments about material and spiritual stillness and quiet, in order to clarify my own need to follow Pablo Neruda's recommendation that we all take time to keep still while we count up to twelve.
May you find your own stillness and quiet in the coming days too.
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