Esalen (day five)

“There was a wicked messenger
From Eli he did come
With a mind that multiplied
The smallest matter.” Bob Dylan. 

Mary shows us how we live on a ‘spectrum of activation’ ..and that people spend most of their waking hours in the cautious zone (the yellow zone), which comes as a surprise to all of us. She refers to this as ‘being vigilant’, which she says is a good thing. It tells us when to stop (and enter the red zone) or when to go (and enter the green zone). Too much time in the red zone means being pre-disposed to doing nothing ..and too much time in the green zone means allowing events to zoom by without regard for where they’re heading. Sophia struggles with this, asking how ‘vigilance’ can be good thing “..isn’t there a fine line between vigilance and hyper-vigilance?” Feeling smart, because I think I finally caught-on to what Mary is saying, I jump in with something I think may be helpful. I suggest to Sophia that maybe it’s not a fine-line that separates vigilance from hyper-vigilance but a range or spectrum instead. Perhaps hyper-vigilance means living too much in the red zone where it suppresses needful activity. Now I hear my voice trailing-off into uncertainly .. hoping either Sophia or Mary will say something to help rehabilitate me ..and thinking ‘mindfulness’ may have been a better word, and so on. However, Sophia quickly nods her head in agreement, saying “..of course” and Mary lets it pass ..and I’m left here sitting, thinking “who do I think I am, chief semanticist ..splitting hairs over a choice of words” and feeling somewhat less than helpful. Even now, the fact that this is what I remember to write about tells me how cautious I can be even after the fact ..looking back and ruminating over an instance that went largely unnoticed and has been pretty much forgotten by everyone (including Sophia) ..seems pretty fucking useless. Oh well oh well.

That’s why I’m reminded of the lyric by Dylan quoted above. I interpret Eli to mean the high priest and judge that sits inside my head; and rumination to be the part of my mind that multiplies the smallest matter.