I’ve been on many meditation retreats in Massachusetts.  They’re mostly silent but every evening a teacher would give us a talk in the meditation hall, about such things as the mind, the qualities of spiritual life, and love.  I’ve seen so many teachers at the front of the room.  Almost all of them were “with” me and the other participants.  But there was one who stood taller.  Her name was Gina Sharpe.  As she unfolded her thoughts to us, something strange was happening to me.  I was being entered, graciously, from 100 feet away.  Gina was spreading through the hall.  Unlike every other person, she was filling the room.

It wasn’t Gina’s topic (which I forget).  It wasn’t her command of the English language.  It had nothing to do with people skills.  The mystery sat in front of me … and came inside.

I’m in the teacher training program for the Evolutionary Collective.  There’s a four-part course about connecting deeply with each other that I’m learning to facilitate.  Another mystery!  Patricia Albere, the founder of the EC, has been coaching me in the elusive teacher function.  Yesterday she told me to feel the fire of the work.  “Fill the room, Bruce.”

I realize that in my life so far I haven’t extended myself outwards enough.  Being careful doesn’t cut it.  I haven’t let the benign power in me explode into the world.  So today I decided to erupt.  I started yelling in the privacy of my home.  I knew that no one else could hear me, so I let ‘er rip!  “Fill the room!”  Over and over again.  Imagine two walls facing each other.  I created my arms and legs spreading in an X shape.  I saw my hands touch the joining of ceiling and wall at the midpoint, and my feet doing the same where the wall meets the floor.  And I yelled some more.

I’m not used to yelling.  I’m used to the sweetness of love.  But I kept breaking the decibel barrier.  There’d be a twinge here and there about how weird I am, but I shoved that aside.

Then it was time for groceries.  I drove to St. Thomas for the necessaries.  On the highway, I decided “Why not?”

“Fill the car!”

I mellowed myself once I was in town but there still was a silent fierceness that twisted my mouth.

I see that not having written in my blog for seventeen days is timid, a world away from fierce.  Time for a change.

How much of me am I willing to accept and allow to flourish?  Apparently lots.  I might even yell again tomorrow.