Carmelina hopes that Geronimo doesn’t speak and ruin the moment. His fabrications, which he’s worn tight against his body to maintain control of his and others’ realities, have finally unwoven.

She can’t yet tell whether they’ve given way to a new panties-clad fabrication or whether she’s peering through to skin. But she doesn’t care. She likes it! “There’s something sexy about a man who believes that he’s making the world better by posing like a stork!” she thought, a few chapters ago, when watching another man practice yoga.

Now she notices that posing like a stork is just a gateway. “Men become gods the moment they discover that they are storks rather than gods,” she says, as she takes off her shoes. And tosses them next to the size 32 panties laying next to the coffee table. And smiles. And tells him that men are like… sandstone.

“Oftentimes beautiful on the surface. But so much more interesting when they crack into two or a handful of pieces. And sediment layers become visible. Exposed to the elements. To decay. And reformation. Still one man. But not one. And no longer just facade.”

*****

He wishes for her to leave. Wishes that he could order her to leave. With strength and foreboding in his voice. So that he can continue to interweave his fabrications. Alone and devastated. But without the threat of fissure. Each layer separate from the others. The darkest layers still hidden.

“This is the worst kind of torture,” he tells her, as she touches her lips to his neck. “You want me broken. And you’re breaking me. Rendering me powerless. Forcing me to face the worst in me… in you. In your desire. My fatal character flaw turns you on! What the fuck? It turns you on!”

She grinds her hips against him. And he is repulsed. Even though her skin feels like velvet. Even though her curves are in the right places. Even though her body moves in the right ways. Because her fabrications now dominate. And all he wants is to retreat. Into his own fabric. Into his size-32 panties.

*****

“Gods are emotional, wrathful, and possess earth-altering character flaws,” she tells him. “Which is why you are a god. Because you dominate. Yet you still feel compelled to steal panties.”

She undresses him. Touches his long muscles and ashen skin. And shudders. And presses. And notices that something is different. Wrong even. Confused, she touches more. And presses harder. Until she is too exhausted to continue. And says, “I don’t get it. It’s still so…little!“

“I think you should go,” he says. “Right now. Please go!” She stares.

He lifts her. Carries her to the front door. Naked. Opens the door. Puts her outside. Shuts the door. And slumps against it. Free. From the bondage of truth. Of undesirable fabric.

Benny studied politics and war in Europe for three years. While studying, he developed a strong conviction that freedom cannot exist without freedom (yes, that’s right), and that we must push ourselves past our own perceived limitations to achieve it.

Freedom, for Benny, happens when we perceive that oppression no longer exists. Thus, since returning to his home continent – South America – a few weeks ago, he’s decided to obliterate the perception that vicious tigers, school bullies, and the long arm of the Spanish Empire exist.

He’s been speaking in town squares, taverns, churches, and wherever else people have been willing to listen. Today, he’s speaking in front of his largest crowd yet – fifty thousand blood-thirsty fans packed into the Lima Coliseum. The fans aren’t interested in freedom, though. They want to see Benny die!

*****

He stands in the center of the Coliseum, and watches the fans watching him. His face is hollow, as usual. His frame is diminutive, as usual. And he appears unable to fight a squirrel, let alone a tiger. Yet he sought out a battle with Vicious Tiger – without armor, weaponry, or any other protection.

VT, as he’s known by adoring fans, is legendary in Peru at this time (early 19th century). He’s torn apart hundreds of fully armored men in front of similarly blood-thirsty crowds. But they were prisoners sentenced to die. Benny is the first person to ever voluntarily fight VT.

He motions for the crowd to quiet so that he can explain. “Freedom is the most natural state of humanity. Yet because of a flaw in our thinking, we’ve been unable to achieve it. Until now! Today, I will reveal…”

“Release VT!” a blood-thirsty fan shouts. The crowd cheers, drowning out whatever Benny is saying. It’s not that the fans are unconcerned with freedom – their women have been raped, their villages pillaged, and their lands unfairly taxed by the Spanish Empire. It’s that they’ve worked hard all week, and now they just want to relax and enjoy Benny’s death.

“Vi-cious Ti-ger. Vi-cious Ti-ger,” they chant.

*****

Benny took a class called “Psychology of the Masses” while studying in Europe. He understands that to earn his fans’ trust, he must first give them what they think they want. Once he has their trust, he remembers from the text, he can teach them to want something better. So he decides that a speech can wait until later. And signals for the cage to be opened.

VT struts onto the Coliseum field. And stares at Benny. And growls. As he walks circles around him. The crowd roars as it cheers on Benny’s inevitable and painful conclusion. Benny seems to be on a different wavelength, though. He stands on one foot, like a stork. And flails his arms, like a bird. And begins to speak:

“Freedom doesn’t happen by praying or fighting,” he says. “When you pray or fight, you acknowledge that a tiger looms. And you spend your life praying for the tiger to disappear, or fighting to kill the tiger before it kills you. But tigers don’t disappear or die. They just grow larger. Meaner. More insistent. Until you die!”

*****

The fans are uneasy. This isn’t a time for speeches. Vicious Tiger is looming. Ready to pounce. To rip Benny’s head off. Any sane person would run. Or pray. Or play dead. Or fight! But Benny is standing on one leg. And flapping his arms. And not yet done with his crazy-talk:

“If you want freedom, you must recognize that you already have it. That you have always had it. And that you will forever have it. Especially when you stare into the eyes of the tiger who wants to take it from you.” Vicious Tiger is crouched and ready to pounce. Yet Benny still seems not to notice.

“When you notice that freedom already exists, your tiger will cease to exist. Because you’ll have changed the flaw in your thinking – the flaw that has kept humans from freedom all of these years – which is the belief that tigers do the killing.”

The crowd is silent. Benny stands on one leg and flaps his arms. And the wild animal attacks!

Carmelina is our storyteller. Without her, the rest of us don’t exist. Because we are her stories. Which means that to keep us alive, we must keep her alive. And inspired. And to do that, Benny and his Algerian co-conspirators – coincidentally named Juan and Geronimo – must torture her.

Only during their torture can she create. Pain motivates her to transcend. It forces her to make space between her physical reality and the one that she must conjure to move beyond it. The more intense the physical pain, the easier it is to make that space.

Carmelina isn’t the only one. All great artists need torture. Creation happens during the journey from darkness to lightness – from identification to transcendence. Great art is, after all, the observation that happens when we cease to identify and start to understand.

*****

Carmelina’s torturers left her hours ago. Yet she’s been deeply enmeshed in her writing at a desk in a library with an open window that exposes her to an ocean breeze. So she hasn’t noticed that the pain is gone. Abruptly she notices. And abruptly she returns.

Her eyelids are no longer stapled open. Water is no longer dripping on her forehead. Torturers are no longer shouting. And the stories have paused. She is unable to find that well of creativity from which to draw. Which is a pity. Because she is again alone with her own sagging shadow. And her own stale stench. And her own sullen story.

She screams for the torturers to return. Not because she finds torture pleasurable. But because it is painful. A pain that can make one story cease to exist while others take on lives of their own. Lives that don’t include prison walls. Or counted seconds. That pass. One. By one. By one.

*****

She can’t wait any longer. So she does the only thing that she can think to do: She digs her disfigured, dirtied fingernails into her arm. Deep. Deeper. Until blood begins to run. And she winces in pain. As she digs even deeper. And finally feels relief. From purgatory.

From the worst kind of torture – the torture of facing herself rather than her torturers. The inability to transcend. Or create. Or be. “Oh,” she shrieks, as she digs deeper still. Ripping apart her arm. And finally returning to the desk in the library overlooking the sea. And feeling the ocean breeze against her face as she presses quill to paper.

“Carmelina is our storyteller,” she writes. “Without her, the rest of us don’t exist. Because we are her stories. Which means that to keep us alive, we must keep her alive. And inspired.”

*****

As she writes, Benny, the torturer, returns to her cell. He doesn’t know what brought him back. He knows only that he had to return. When he sees Carmelina sprawled unconscious in a pool of blood, he removes his shirt and presses it to her damaged arm. “You can’t die!” he cries.

A tear drips onto Carmelina’s forehead, cascades through the crevices of her face, and reaches her lips. She tastes it. And opens her eyes. And Benny decides that there is no difference between her story and his own. And if he can stop the bleeding, he will plan her escape. To save her. And himself.

Carmelina notices pink lacy material between the couch cushions. Curiosity gets the best of her, and she breaks her embrace with Geronimo. And grabs. Pulls. Pulls again. Until she holds a lacy size 32 panties. And laughs. Because as far as she’s known, he’s always preferred skinny women.

He loves to tell her about the cardboard cutout of a tiny female silhouette that his college roommate created for him. If women could pass through the cutout silhouette, his roommate joked, he’d probably date or sleep with them. If not, they didn’t have a chance.

He didn’t save the cardboard, but he remembers the shape and size of the silhouette. And he professes to Carmelina to have never dated or slept with a woman who couldn’t fit through it. “There’s no need to worry,” he’s told her. “You’d fit just fine.”

*****

Geronimo’s heart sinks. He’s been stealing panties for twelve years, and has often disputed with women or security guards the clear evidence of his addiction. And he’s done so with dexterity, flare, and success every time. But tonight he’s tired. Sick of the lies and misdirection.

“It’s not what you think,” he mumbles. Carmelina laughs because she hasn’t rushed to any judgment. She’s surprised by the sheer size of his mistress, but she expects his infidelity. As he should expect hers.

She’s more interested in his explanation than in any sort of truth. So she rolls her eyes, stands, and crosses her arms. Watches him watching her. Wondering what she’s thinking. And she waits.

What fantasies might he contrive to explain away his extra-large indiscretion? How passionately would he believe his own story? And more importantly, how would she pretend to react? Her response, she knows, will surely depend on his performance. She lets a slight smile slip. Oh, what fun!

*****

Carmelina knows that Geronimo dominates people by creating realities that are more persuasive than the ones they can create for themselves. Whereas most of us live in worlds that we can see, smell, hear, and touch, Geronimo occupies the world that he fabricates. Then he makes sure that the rest of us live in that world too!

It’s a good gig. He’s built his business on fabrications. He’s built his sex life on fabrications. And so on. The more elaborate the fabrication, the better. Because the world is elaborate too. And people want their worlds to be elaborate. And his imagination is compelling.

Yet lately it’s been too much for Geronimo. He’s feeling crushed by the weight of thousands of panties that must continue to accumulate for him to survive. What a depraved story! And he can’t take it any longer…

*****

“I steal women’s panties, Carmelina. I’ve been doing it for a dozen years, and I don’t see an end. This is my water. My cocaine. I need it to live. But it’s killing me!”

Carmelina doesn’t respond. Geronimo continues: “If you want to go, I understand. But don’t go because I slept with a size 32. I didn’t. Go because I’m not the man you think I am. Not as strong. Not as rich. Not as smart. And not as good in bed.”

Carmelina climbs atop Geronimo, kisses his neck, and unbuttons his shirt. “Don’t speak,” she instructs. “I want you to stay like this. Exactly how you are right now!”

You might not steal panties. Or endure torture at the hands of medieval Algerians. Or want to defeat the long arm of the Spanish Empire. But if you’re like me, you’ve noticed that there’s something vaguely familiar about Geronimo, Carmelina, and Benny.

It’s not their lives or experiences. It’s their desire to transcend those lives and experiences and create a better world. A world without panties, without medieval Algerian torturers, and without Spanish Empires.

It’s nice to imagine a better world. We reside in our own worlds – mixed with daily revelation and catastrophe – and wonder how we can keep the revelation while ridding ourselves of the catastrophe. Perhaps Geronimo, Carmelina, and Benny are showing us the way.

*****

If Geronimo can stop stealing panties, then we can overcome our less silky addictions. If Carmelina can thrust herself into stories that she prefers, then we can transcend our less torturous monotonies. And if Benny can defeat the Spanish Empire, then we can pin our less vicious tigers. But what can we learn from Juan not Don?

A friend of this author thinks that he offers us more hope than Geronimo, Carmelina, or Benny. Because he exists in a world that the rest of us want to return to. A world of innocence. A world in which addictions, extended metaphors, and empires cannot exist. Simply because he’s in love. And for lovers, nothing exists but love!

When we left Juan, he’d shared a first kiss with Carmelina before returning to tend to his sheep in the pastures, and carving into stone these words: “Love is a kick in the balls. But it’s still better than the alternative!”

*****

It’s the morning after his first kiss, and he notices a discolored black and blue area on his balls. And smiles. After thirteen long years, the stars are finally aligned. And slight testicular discoloration is a small price to pay for heavenly support!

He looks at his favorite sheep, massages his achy balls, and says, “God, they hurt so badly. Ugh. But… I kind of like it. The pain reminds me of her. And anything that reminds me of her must be perfect. Because she’s perfect!”

He’s so inspired by thoughts of perfect love that he runs with his sheep through the pastures like a stoned idiot. Until he stumbles upon a plot of marijuana plants. And breaks the biggest leaves off the sturdiest branches. And uses the material to braid a ceremonial hemp engagement anklet.

After decorating the anklet with precious granite and quartz, which he found on the ground somewhere, he goes to the marketplace to tell his father that he wants to ask for Carmelina’s hand in marriage.

*****

His father approves. And pays for him to take a ceremonial hot bath. And buys him a ceremonial translucent white toga. Which he dons. Before walking, with a brisk confidence, toward the colorful “Make Love Not War” booth at the other end of the marketplace.

What synchronicity! Carmelina is already walking toward him. Long, beautiful strides. Radiant as ever. Glowing, even. A woman who knows what she wants. He takes a deep breath. And smiles.

*****

And notices a boy beside her. Holding her hand. Looking at her… like that. What the f*#k! He dives into a nearby pig pen. And sloshes in a muddy trough as he watches her walk past him and toward the statue of David. With Benny!

His heart sinks. He knows that he must make the most important decision of his life: Does he pretend that nothing happened? Not the kiss, the blue balls, the perfect love, the sullied ceremonial garb, or the engagement bracelet. Or does he can follow Carmelina and Benny and confirm the end? Of innocence. Of perfection. Of the world as he knows it.

He decides to follow.

It’s four in the morning and Benny’s council is awake and discussing the day’s strategy while watching him engage in a series of elaborate “warrior poses” that, he claims, help him to maintain a flexible body, mind, and spirit.

When he stands on one foot and points his left index finger toward the sky, his mistress Carmelina says to the rest of the council, “There’s something sexy about a man who believes that he’s making the world better by posing like a stork!”

“I don’t know about sexy,” says Geronimo, his chief adviser. “But it’s rare that someone who looks more like an uncoordinated baboon than a warrior can still inspire us to believe that, together, we can defeat the long arm of the Spanish Empire and create a unified South America.”

*****

After finishing his poses, Benny sits with his council members and discusses the address that he’ll make today to a crowd of fifty-thousand at the Coliseum in Lima. “Is it really necessary to wrestle a tiger with no armor and your bare hands?” asks Carmelina.

Benny laughs. “Freedom is won on the battlefield of ideas. Our words have captured people’s imaginations. Now the slaying of a tiger will capture their hearts!”

Benny stands and begins to wrestle an imaginary tiger. His arms flail, his teeth grind, his eyes focus on an invisible enemy, and he tosses himself through the air. His council members watch his elaborate dance, with jaws agape, and remember why they’re here.

“He believes,” Carmelina will write, later that day. “And despite his ugly facial features, diminutive frame, eccentric behaviors, and youthful idealism, he inspires others to believe. This inspiration, for me, makes life again worth living!”

*****

When Benny finishes wrestling his imaginary tiger, he sips a banana, lemon, and rotten squirrel meat tea. The tea smells so bad that he holds his nose as he pours it down his throat. But he doesn’t mind holding his nose. Because he read somewhere that matter is no match for the mind!

Rotten squirrel meat, he tells his council, will make him strong because he thinks it will! Which is a nice thought… but not a nice smell. “It’s not the tea that we oppose,” a council-member wrote in an anonymous note left on his hammock this morning. “It’s your farts. They’re… distracting!”

Benny was too inspired when he awoke this morning to notice the note. Which is unfortunate for his council members because he just farted again. Silent, but not unnoticed. “Benny!” they scream, in unison, as they pull shirts over their faces and run for cover.

“It wasn’t me… I swear!”

Carmelina is both. She’s the ancient Greek slut who made out with Juan underneath David’s slingshot. And she’s the Manhattan debutante who walked into Geronimo’s penthouse with instructions not to wear any panties.

But she’s also neither. Because in another story – hers – Carmelina is a middle-aged Spaniard locked in an Algerian prison awaiting execution, or a ransom payment. She fled Toledo years ago, upon being accused of prostituting herself by an Inquisition task force.

Yes, it’s the fifteenth century. And Carmelina’s captors would prefer to receive ransom money. Yet they kidnapped her in a forest, where she wore a pretty red dress with no pockets to hide her true identity. Which has remained a secret. Despite years of torture.

So she sits strapped to a chair. Eyelids stapled open. Captors screaming in her ears. Water dripping on her forehead. Yet she doesn’t see faces, hear screams, or feel water. She instead watches the rise and fall of an ocean tide through a window atop a terrace.

While listening to a Beethoven symphony. And feeling a slight ocean breeze. And noticing that her once rotten teeth are again white pearls. Her once sagging breasts are again full. Her once weak breath is again strong. And she’s almost ready… Now!

She dips a feather into ink, touches it to a piece of parchment, and writes:

*****

Longing eyes. Desperate. To engage, to penetrate, to possess. Because he believes, as men so often believe, that engagement, penetration, and possession will give him whatever he’s looking for. Which isn’t whatever. It’s a soul.

Grabbing for my breasts. Desperation. Pulling at my hips. Engagement. Prying open my lips. Penetration. But not possession. Which doesn’t exist when all things must end. As tonight must. With a punch! Or with the discovery of several other women’s undergarments.

*****

Her captors are done torturing. For the night. So they sit in a secret room and share a few pints of beer. And laugh. And talk about their captive. Who passes horrific and unending torture sessions telling stories. Unless they staple her mouth shut. Which stops the stories!

Although Benny isn’t so sure. “What if the stories still continue… in her mind?” he asks. Geronimo and Juan not Don laugh. But Benny chugs the rest of his beer. Because he realizes that by torturing a storyteller, he’s already become part of her story…

As Geronimo walks out of the strip mall and toward his Fifth Avenue Manhattan penthouse, he laughs. Not because he’s happy. But because he’s relieved to hit rock bottom. It means that he can gather the remnants of whatever is left, and begin the process of getting better again.

As he laughs, he looks at the veins in his arms. No puncture wounds! He looks at the Park Avenue sign a block away. Perfect vision! And he shakes his head. Because his compulsion to steal panties doesn’t appear to affect his brain chemistry the way addictions to drugs or alcohol might do.

Yet he would argue, if he wasn’t ashamed of himself, that there’s no difference between his panties-stealing and a cocaine addict’s compulsion to shoot up. It’s that salient. He needs it that badly. Or it tears him up inside.

*****

Geronimo is a successful investment banker. He earned more than two million dollars last year. He has no reason to steal panties. He could buy many of the stores from which he steals panties. Or, if he were embarrassed to make such a purchase, he could ask his maid to order boxes full of panties.

If he didn’t want his maid in on the gig, he could ask one of the many women who frequent his flat to leave her panties with him. Which would be much less stressful than concocting elaborate schemes to avoid security guards, and going to great lengths to hide his panties-stealing self from the world.

If he knew that I’m now writing about him, he would first tell me to change his name, profession, and compulsion – which I’ve done. Then he’d tell me to choose my words carefully. Because whereas I can choose words and fake compulsions, he can’t choose to stop stealing panties.

He steals because, according to a note that he wrote on a napkin years ago, “I’ve descended into a hell that won’t offer me respite until I concede and offer my soul once again.”

*****

He’s in his Fifth Avenue penthouse now, and sitting on a black leather couch. Panties of different colors, shapes, and sizes are strewn around him… on the couch, on the floor, and on the coffee table. He looks at the panties. And cries. And thinks that he hates panties more than anything in the world.

He hates the way they look, feel, and smell. He hates that he must steal them anyway. He hates stealing them. He hates the relief after stealing them. And he hates hiding it all from the women or businessmen who think that they know him so well.

Yet he thinks, as the doorbell rings, that such loathing doesn’t deter him. Instead, it motivates him. Because if he loved (rather than loathed) anything about panties, or about himself, he would respect rather than steal them.

But he can’t think about any of this right now. Because he’s grabbing panties by the handful and shoving them under couch cushions.

*****

“One minute,” he says, as he notices that a couch cushion appear suspiciously lumpy. He removes a few panties from under the cushion and hides them in a nearby drawer. Then he walks to the door and invites a woman into his home. “Hello Carmelina,” he says.

(This post is prologue for the Share Your World Journey, which you can follow here on Avanoo)

A young man sits at a café in Venice, California. He is poised to write an epic story that, he thinks, will inspire millions of people to make a better world! Notes are stacked high next to him, and his pencil is raised… ready to capture a moment, a beginning.

But he can’t put the pencil against the paper. Can’t even make a smudge. Let alone write a word. Because he just had another idea: “What if a talking giraffe rode into the second chapter on a rocket ship while juggling the sun and the moon?”

That’d be crazy! And it’d change everything. It’d create so many possibilities. And those possibilities must be thought through. Now. Before beginning the story. And maybe ruining it because every possibility hadn’t been considered.

He puts the pencil down. And tells himself that he’ll begin the story in a few weeks at the most. Which will give him enough time to understand exactly how the talking giraffe – who, he’s decided, is also an expert ballroom dancer – can help the story develop.

*****

The young man spends a week exploring Billy (he’s now given the giraffe a name). And though he now loves Billy, and all the energy that he might bring to the story, he can’t help but notice that Billy has created more questions than answers.

For instance, what does his protagonist – a young man like himself whom he calls Dan – feed Billy in New York City, where there are no high trees. And how can Dan protect Billy from poachers in Zimbabwe, where some people like spotted blankets? And where will Dan store Billy’s rocket ship in Japan, where rocket ships are in high demand?

The young man begins to believe that his story will never get written. So he goes to an ice skating rink and slides around the ice in his shoes. As he slides, an errant beach ball hits him in the head. And he falls to the ice, unconscious.

*****

When he wakes up, he’s sitting at a café in Venice, California. His notes are stacked high next to him, and his pencil is raised… ready to capture a moment, a beginning.

He doesn’t know how he got back to the café, which he hasn’t returned to since postponing the beginning of his epic story that, he thinks, will inspire millions of people to make a better world.

But he doesn’t think too much, because he has the desire to write… to begin the story that he’s spent so many years thinking about… but has had so much trouble beginning. He puts the pencil to the paper and writes:

“Clarity comes when consciousness is regained.”

*****

He keeps the point of his pencil on the paper. And thinks about Dan, his protagonist. Dan’s mission in the story is to travel around the world listening to people’s stories. And to ask those people to share their stories with a growing global community of friends who, together, are making a better, more meaningful, more fun, and more tolerant world.

The young man knows that to make Dan’s journey as authentic and real as possible, he must do something drastic….

He looks at the pile of notes next to him. Hundreds and hundreds of pages. He smiles, drops his pencil, grabs the notes – which he’s spent months creating and organizing, and dumps them into a nearby recycling bin. Then he returns to the table, picks up his pencil, and writes:

“Moments are realized when we stop imagining how they will be… and realize that they already are.”

*****

The young man continues to write paragraphs that are, he realizes, forming a prologue of sorts for his epic story that, he thinks, will inspire millions of people to make the world better!

At the end of the prologue, he gives Dan a duffel bag full of clothes, keys to a hybrid car, a connection to the Internet, and seven peanut butter sandwiches. And he writes that Dan will begin traveling tonight… without any of the extra provisions or zoo animals that he’d once imagined would help Dan along.

“In each moment,” he quotes Dan as saying at the end of the prologue, “life gives us exactly what we need to do that thing that we were meant to do. Our only obligation to ourselves and to others is to recognize that thing, and to do it!”

(This post is part of the Share Your World Journey, which you can follow here on Avanoo)  

She has dark brown hair, a demure smile, and engaging eyes. The kind of engaging that makes me want to engage too. Even more than usual. So that I can explore and know and understand.

But I avert her gaze. And talk to the wall. And the ceiling. And the wall again. Not because I feel exposed or even afraid. But because I feel tempted. And I suspect that she is the girl G.Q. met last night – a crazy night that, he said, included “pistachio nuts, a cappuccino rap, and really foggy car windows”.

When someone else at the party asks me how Avanoo is different from MySpace, she deftly slips away. And I wonder if she’s the pistachio nut girl. But I don’t wonder for too long, because G.Q. enters the room.

And introduces me to Drue. Who he connected with last night. And I laugh. Because she’s not the same girl. And because I know all about the pistachio nuts. And the cappuccino rap. And the foggy windows!

*****

Hours later, I finish talking with people about Avanoo. And I walk onto our makeshift dance floor that is also a makeshift paint studio. The painter is still painting, the band is still playing, and she is still dancing. Oh… how she dances! “Where’d you learn to dance like that?” I ask.

“I’m a professional dancer,” she says. And I smile. Because my mother, many of my friends who are girls, and most of my girlfriends have all danced professionally.

I touch her hand. And we dance. Which is easy. Because dancing is being aware of energy that slips between bodies. Energy that creates movement. That flows with movement. That submits to movement.

*****

The drummer keeps drumming. The guitarist keeps strumming. The painter keeps painting. And we keep dancing. Now the only ones dancing.

As we dance, she tells me that she feels as if we’re naked. Not just her and me. But everyone who is left – the painter, the guitarist, the drummer, and the two of us. And I tell her that we don’t need to remove our clothes to be naked.

Because moments flow into each other like pistachio nuts flow into cappuccino raps. And if we let them, they can expose us totally. And continuously. And create climaxes that don’t require climax. Because, really, climax has little to do with crescendo or orgasm. Instead, it is simple flow and rhythm.

*****

She asks if I want to go somewhere quieter. Perhaps into another room. Even the back room. And I say yes. But only to talk about how crazy this world is.

A world in which nakedness isn’t required for nakedness. And climax isn’t required for climax. Instead, we can do it with paint and music and dance. Or, as we soon find out, with stale potato chips, a rusty harmonica, and sweet, seductive laughter.

(this is part five of a ten-part story about a recent meditation retreat. You can connect to the project on Avanoo here.)

The woman with the cute British accent tells me that when she returned from the meditation retreat, her family and friends liked her better, but feared for her more. “My parents actually had an intervention with me because they thought I’d joined a cult.”

I thought about my family and friends. Mostly doctors, lawyers, scientists, investment bankers, consultants. Always amused and interested by my pursuits… but rarely approving. Which is why I didn’t tell any of them about the meditation retreat…

Except Wilford and my parents (and our Avanoo community… ten minutes before I left). Wilford was supportive. “It’s wonderful,” he said. My father was suspicious. “You’re not going off the deep end?” he asked. My mother went off the deep end. “I’m just worried that you’ll get into some weird sexual shit,” she said.

How could she say something like that?

“I don’t want you to come back thinking pain and pleasure are the same thing,” she said. I didn’t know how to respond. So I told her that the weather outside looked nice.

*****

It’s my second day at the meditation retreat, and I’m trying to integrate the instructor’s lessons into my practice. I’m focusing on my breath. In and out. For hours at a time. Accepting that my mind cannot stay aware of my breath for longer than a few seconds.

It drifts to my hunger… to the cute Indian girl eight rows across and two heads down… and to imaginary conversations with imaginary people. Which is all fine. Because right now I have a fickle mind. This is the reality of the moment. And it’s my job to be observe my mind, and to pull it back to my breath whenever it moves away from my breath.

I notice, as the hours pass, that it’s impossible to control what thoughts or emotions enter my mind. If I tell it not to think about hunger, for instance, it starts obsessing over hunger. So instead of practicing control, I’m practicing giving up control… observing rather than participating in my mind’s craziness.

As I watch, I’m learning about the mind’s obsessions… its attachments to ego… its identifications with moments past and future expectations… and its inability to focus on breath… or to enjoy even the most enjoyable moments.

*****

It’s the afternoon of the fifth day, and I’m eating a banana… slowly. This is a minor miracle. When I’ve eaten in the past, I’ve been starving – or perceived myself as starving – and wanted to get as much food in my stomach as quickly as possible.

Today I’ve slowed down considerably. My meditations are influencing my eating habits. Probably because I recognize, now, that hunger is one of many sensations in my body. My face and neck feel cold air (because I’m outside). My feet are tingling from the constriction of my shoes. My nose itches. And so on.

These sensations all have different textures… but they’re similar because they’re just sensations… and because they’re changing all the time. And by observing them and not getting involved, it doesn’t even bother me to watch hunger. Because I know that eventually, it’ll be gone.

This is, for me, a totally new way to experience life. Until now I’ve exerted lots of physical and mental energy to be a champion wrestler… to not give in to hunger… to run a start up company… to be a good boyfriend… and so on. Which is a strategy that has worked… but at the price of happiness and, sometimes, sanity.

Now I’m learning that I can achieve ever better results – while staying happy and sane – by not exerting any effort at all. Instead, I can just acknowledge that change and progress are natural. That the universe has been changing and progressing (evolving) for billions of years. And that I can do the same.

Without any sweat! The universe evolves by moving from moment to moment. By occupying each moment fully. And I can do the same. I can exist fully in each moment. I can be joyful in my work and life and relationships… right now! And it takes no effort at all. Because I’m already here… now.

*****

It’s the last day of meditation and I’m packing my clothes… almost ready to drive home. I know, for the first time in my life, who I am and what my job is:

I am the observer of the thoughts, emotions, and sensations in my mind and body, and my job is to choose what to observe in this moment.

The thoughts, emotions, and sensations in my mind and body are how I experience the world. I can’t control them… but I can watch them. And by watching – by giving up control over my sensations – I have more control over myself – my real self – than ever before.

Because I don’t need anything. I am whole and complete as is. Even with hunger. Even without the hot Indian girl. And now, every time I breathe, it’s the most liberating breath I’ve ever taken. Because it’s the first and only breath I’ll ever take in this moment.

****

As I carry my bags to the car, I realize that my mother’s deepest fears have materialized. I’ve come to the conclusion that pain and pleasure are the same. But this doesn’t mean that I’ve developed any weird sexual fetishes.

It just means that I’ve experienced pleasure and pain. And that I’ve noticed that pleasure and pain are sensations that come and go… and will continue to come and go. And neither is worth chasing after or running away from.

Because neither sensation affects the inner joy that I experience when I observe each moment as it changes… changes… changes. Which is the reality of my world, now. Changing sensations. Which is also the reality of things.

(this is part four of a ten-part story about a recent meditation retreat. You can connect to the project on Avanoo here.)

The woman with the cute British accent warns me that I’ll be thinking about sex for at least the first four days of the meditation retreat. “Because you’ll find that your mind wanders a lot… and sex is just a natural place for it to wander to.”

I remember being thirteen and in algebra class, and thinking the same thing. And I remember, even a few months ago, looking forward to the weekend with my girlfriend (because we lived in different parts of the city). But I’m not attending a ten-day silent meditation retreat to fantasize about sex.

Not when there’s so much else to figure out. Like how to enjoy moments when the weight of the past and the future are on my shoulders. And how to think about concepts like meaning and existence without stumbling into a black hole of meaninglessness.

“You can only contemplate meaning and existence for so long before you just… you know… want someone to fuck your brains out,” she says. “You know what I mean?”

I don’t know what she means. But I nod because I’d prefer that she doesn’t elaborate.

*****

It’s the morning of the first day of meditation. And my mind is wandering. So I open my eyes and look around the ashram. And scan the rows of women who are so close… but seem so far away. Because I’m not permitted to talk to them… or even look at them.

I know I should close my eyes and focus on my breath. But I don’t want to close them. Because I’ve noticed a beautiful Indian woman sitting eight rows across and two heads down from me.

Her face is coffee and milk. Her features are delicate and smooth. And her posture is perfect. “I could fall in love with a woman like her,” I think. “I wonder if she could fall in love with me?”

But I won’t find out. Because she can’t look at me. And I can’t approach her and say something like, “Hello, I’m Dan… you probably hear this all the time… but I think you’re beautiful. And I know there’s so much more to you than just being beautiful. So I wanted to say hello… because I figured you’d say hello back, and that’d be a beginning, and then we can start to be friends.”

My intention, of course, wouldn’t just be friendship. It’d also be to find out if I could love this woman. And if she could love me. And if so… bring on the courtship rituals. If not, well, I have a wonderful friend… or in a worse case, nothing less than what I have now.

I smile. Because my mind has drifted completely away from my breath. Which is fine because before her, I was only thinking about my hunger pangs. Which are so strong right now. I wish they’d go away. Anything is better than these hunger pangs.

I close my eyes and try again to focus on my breath. But my mind returns to my stomach. Which roars loudly enough to keep the focus on my stomach for the rest of this first meditation session.

*****

It’s the third day of the retreat, and I’ve learned that I don’t have to be so attached to my hunger. I can just observe it. And when I do, I notice that it’s just a sensation… one of many sensations occurring simultaneously all over my body. And I don’t have to run from it, or even want it to be over. Because it’s simply not a big deal.

Which means that my mind can focus on other things. During formal meditation hours, I’m mostly aware of my breath and the sensations on my body. But when formal meditation hours are over… sometimes I let my mind wander a little bit.

Like right now. I’m walking around the circular walking path and thinking about her. The cute Indian woman. And wondering whether I’ll be thinking about her more… now that I’m not thinking about my hunger.

*****

It’s the sixth day, and I haven’t stopped noticing her. I can tell you, for instance, that she changes her clothes midday… when she probably showers. That she likes to tie her hair in a pony tail for the last meditation session. And that she closes her eyes and begins her meditations before her neighbors do… and well before I do.

But that’s as far as it goes. I observe her… and then I observe my breath. No wild sex fantasies. No kissing fantasies. Not even any hello fantasies. Just observations. And moments, like now, when I think about my life and notice patterns…

Like that I’ve fallen in love many times. And always, she’s the most beautiful woman in the world. And the smartest. And the most loving. And the person I knew I was going to marry since I was, like, five.

These loves have been nice for a time… but never worked out. Either because she turned out to be a lesbian. Or I decided wrestling championships were more important than her. Or she cared more about her eating disorder than me. Or I cared more about my business than her. Or she didn’t believe in monogamy. Or I fell in love with her best friend…

I’m just observing my mind’s reflections. It notices this pattern, but that’s as far as it wants to go. Before returning to my breath. And to sky… which is becoming dimmer and dimmer as the sun starts to set.

*****

It’s now the eighth day, and I still haven’t fantasized about her. It would be so easy… especially when she pulls a blanket over her body. Oh! So… damn… sexy!

But instead of fantasizing, I return to my breath and the sensations on my body. Until formal meditations end, and I decide to walk for a while. And as I walk, I make two new observations about my relationship history:

The first is that I’ve bounced back from every woman that I thought was the only woman in the world for me… the moment that I found a new woman that was the only woman in the world for me. The second is that I’ve looked for the wrong things in every relationship that I’ve ever had.

I’ve wanted either to fill holes from the past or cater to fantasies about the future. But I’ve never wanted to just exist in moments. Never!

And I know that things have changed. Because for days I’ve been walking in circles and existing in moments completely; meditating in an ashram and existing in moments completely; observing a cute Indian woman and existing in moments completely.

*****

It’s my final day at the meditation center, and participants will be permitted to speak with each other in less than two hours. But I know that I won’t speak to anyone… especially not to her.

Not as an act of defiance or deprivation. But rather because it’s the thing that I most want to do. Because for the first time in my life, I feel complete. And I don’t need to meet her or think that she’s the one… to feel happy… because I imagine that one day, with her, I might feel complete.

Because I feel happy now. And I feel that feeling of completeness. Of having everything that I could possibly want. In this moment. And this one. And again… in this one!

(this is part three of a ten-part story about a recent meditation retreat. You can connect to the project on Avanoo here.)

The girl with the cute British accent tells me, as we drive to the meditation center, that exercise won’t be permitted. “Not even yoga?” I ask.

“Not even yoga,” she says. “Because we’re living and meditating in close quarters. And exercise disturbs other people’s meditations. But trust me, it’s really not that bad. Between meditation sessions you can stretch for a few minutes.”

This isn’t as frightening for me as, say, being eaten alive by a pink troll who hops out of a cereal box. But it’s nonetheless frightening. Because, as you now know, it’s hard for me to sit still. Which is why I spend at least an hour each day running… or wrestling… or weight training… or dancing… or doing downward-facing dogs.

To think that I won’t do even one downward facing dog for ten days…

“It’s not a big deal,” she promises. “If you need to move… there’s a walking path that you can walk on during informal meditation hours.”

*****

I soon learn that the circular dirt “walking path” can be circumnavigated in four minutes… at geriatric speed. If I pretend that I’m a sloth, or if I don’t cut in front of the ants, a lap lasts as long as eight minutes.

The path is cut around pine trees. And at two points I can see Yosemite’s majestic mountainous landscape. But the view is a tease… and I don’t want to see it. Because I can’t climb those mountains. Instead, I’m here. Meditating… and walking in circles.

It’s the first day, and I’ve just eaten lunch. Usually, I’d be active after lunch, knowing that I’ll eat again in three hours. But right now, my stomach is packed with three plates of salad and three bowls of soup… because I won’t be permitted to eat another meal for nineteen hours.

So it’s hard to walk. And I’d prefer to sleep. But I don’t want to go back to my sleeping quarters. Where there are snoring men and a faulty toilet with a sign over the lid that reads: “Plumbing is delicate. All but the most soiled paper should go in the trash can.”

The smell of dirty toilet paper is so pungent in the cabin that I dreamed I was suffocating next to a pile of feces. Only to wake up to and notice that I was indeed suffocating next to a pile of feces.

So I’m out here in the open air and walking. Thinking about the food in my belly… the hunger to come… the hot Indian woman in the ashram… and anything else that’ll take my mind off of the wafting, pungent vinegary smell of drying turd.

*****

It’s now just before breakfast on the fourth day of meditation and I’m smiling… as I walk in circles. Partly because I’ve been watching the sun rise… and it’s beautiful. And partly because the wind is touching my face gently… in a way that I don’t remember being touched. But mostly because I’m living… and enjoying this moment.

And this one. And this one. Oh my gosh. This one too. How lovely. How fucking lovely! Now I’m laughing at myself. As I’ve been doing a lot lately. I’m laughing because I’ve never considered anything lovely. Cool…. sure. Sweet… okay. Beautiful… sometimes. But lovely?

Heck… why not. I’m just an observer now. Observing hunger pangs, sexual fantasies, redundant walks, the smell of excrement, and… surprisingly… loveliness.

And I’m noticing, for the first time, that life has a rhythm. Sensations and experiences come… and then they go. In fact, everything comes and goes. And if I just observe… and don’t get involved… I can watch it all… and appreciate it all.

An instructor bangs a gong. Which means that the next meditation session will begin in ten minutes. And five days ago, that would’ve signaled my mind to start thinking about meditating. Because I couldn’t be in one moment while anticipating a future one.

But it’s not five days ago. It’s right now. I know this because I’m still walking around this path. Putting one foot in front of the other. And feeling the breeze. And the crunch of the leaves under my feet. And my breath. Right now.

*****

It’s the sixth day and I’m again walking on this circular path. But I don’t want to be. I don’t fucking want to be! Because this is jail. I’m pent up in a fucking jail. And for what?

To endure snoring and stench that make sleeping impossible? To engage in never-ending redundant meditation sessions? To eat fruits and vegetables and try to pretend, somehow, that they’re cow? To fantasize about an Indian girl eight rows across and two down who isn’t permitted to make eye contact with me?

It’s a waste of time. Oh my god. It’s a fucking waste of time! And I’m dizzy. Vertigo. Holy shit, I want to fall down. It’s because of the circles. I’ve been walking in circles all of my life. And it’s killing me. It’s fucking killing me!

I sit down. And breathe heavily. Until I notice that I am breathing heavily. And a searing heat is pulsing through my body. Starting in my throat… roaring through my heart… revving up my stomach… and infecting my limbs. It’s a sensation that, I’ve learned, develops whenever my mind tells me to run.

Which has happened here at least once a day. And sometimes twice. Because my mind is waffling. Sometimes it supports this meditation thing because it thinks I’ll be able to produce more thanks to whatever liberation I get out of it. And sometimes it thinks I should run away because I’m getting nothing done right now.

When it feels that I’m wasting time… it tells me so over and over again. Until I believe it. And then I start to feel crushed by the weight of a universe that notices that I haven’t been producing as much as I should.

Now, though, I’m learning about my mind’s tricks and the entrenched patterns that it plays out. I’m learning, for instance, that it’s not the meditation retreat that my mind wants me to run from. It can’t be. Because I’ve had this feeling almost everyday since I was a child.

Because as far as my mind is concerned, nothing is ever good enough. No accomplishment and no moment. Accomplishments and moments only serve it one purpose: to get to a future accomplishment or moment.

Knowing this, I remind myself that I’m here to stop this craziness. Because my mind is wrong. My job in this moment isn’t to get to a future moment. Because this moment is already here. And future moments don’t exist. They can’t. Because I can only be in this one.

This voice is new. It just started speaking a few days ago. And it’s been speaking more and more ever since. Telling me to breathe. To listen to my breath. To observe moments and not participate in them. To be. Just be!

I no longer want to run away. And I’m breathing normally again. And my body feels free… awake… and alive. And I’m again walking on this path. In circles. And reminding myself that every moment is new. That my only responsibility is to experience this moment. As it is right now.

*****

It’s the last hour of the last day here. And I’m walking around this path one last time. And smiling. And thinking about the hundreds of laps that I’ve walked over the past ten days. About the sunrises and sunsets I’ve watched. About the laughter. And tears. And hunger pangs. And feelings of satiation. And feelings of confinement. And of freedom. All here. On this path.

As I walk, I am convinced that these few hundred laps have me understanding life more fully than ever before. Life not a diploma. Or a paycheck. Or a winning argument. Or a good-looking girlfriend. Life just as a range of sensations that I can feel. Even here, while walking in circles.

Which is beautiful because it means that I don’t have to be anyone but myself or be anywhere but here to live fully. And I can keep living fully, no matter where I am, as long as I remember one thing: to be here. Now. In this moment. Not that one or that one. This one. Yes… this one!

(this is part two of a ten-part story about a recent meditation retreat. You can connect to the project on Avanoo here.)

The girl with the cute British accent drank every night for a week before attending the meditation retreat two years ago. And she did the same before this one too. Which is why she’s tired. And why she thinks it’s “so cute” that I didn’t drink and actually practiced meditating these past two weeks.

I don’t think it’s cute. I think it’s essential. I’m so awful at sitting in one place that my first grade teacher thought I had diabetes… because I’d ask to leave the classroom every ten or fifteen minutes to pee.

I didn’t have to pee. I just had to wiggle my arms and legs. And I didn’t think she’d let me go if I asked to be excused just to wiggle. And I was right. Because after the tests concluded that I didn’t have diabetes, she stopped letting me leave the classroom. “Just pee in your pants,” she said.

But my incessant wiggling became such a distraction for her and the rest of the class, that she soon started writing “wiggle notes”, which permitted me to stand outside the classroom and wiggle until I felt like I could sit down again.

Almost two decades later, not much has changed. Even during stationary activities, like writing, there’s a good chance that I’m also pacing… or doing push ups… or standing on my head… or walking to the bathroom to pee (even when I don’t need to).

*****

Two weeks ago, I set a timer for thirty minutes. Then I closed my eyes for a first practice meditation session. And adjusted my posture. And adjusted again. And again… every few seconds for the next four and a half minutes. Until I opened my eyes and decided that this was a good first try.

This morning, before driving to the meditation center, I meditated for twenty-three minutes and only wiggled twenty or thirty times. Which I thought was impressive. Until this moment, when I learn about about “Sittings Of Strong Determination” from the woman with the cute British accent.

“For three hours each day, you can’t move. Not even to crack your neck or adjust your posture. You look frightened, Dan. Don’t worry… it’s easier than you think!”

*****

For the first two days of the retreat, I am instructed to spend my fourteen formal hours of meditatio