Esalan Institute is a community in Big Sur nestled in between the Pacific Ocean and Highway 1. It's natural beauty is astounding and truly needs to be experienced firsthand. I first heard of Esalen when I went to massage school and they showed us a video of Esalen massage, done outside, with the waves crashing in the back, it was a far cry from practicing massage in a Baltimore classroom. Life continued to happen and I had heard people mention Esalen here and there and was interested in going but not in any rush.
Last year I was living in Austin and getting involved in 12 step programs and was reading a lot about, addiction, recovery and co-dependence. I was at the book store and I had a feeling of being fed up, I didn't want to read anymore about addiction, and that's when I found a book on the history of Esalen, with the subtitle, the religion of no religion.
Within the first 2 chapters I knew that I needed to go to this place as soon as possible. It just so happened that I was planning a road trip out west, so I went on-line and signed up for a 5 day massage workshop at Esalen. The main thing that struck me about the book was that many people that had founded it had experiences of psychoses and were looking for understanding and alternative ways of healing from it. That is actually what led me to massage school, having psychotic meltdowns and breaks from reality. It was also a place where many well known writers and philosphers had passed through. Aldous Huxley, Alan Watts, and Henry Miller. Needless to say, I was extremely excited to go and experience it firsthand.
Route 1 is the most beautiful drive in the country I have experienced.
It had been awhile since I have been in a spiritual community and it felt good, theres something very earthy, natural and rugged about the spiritual centers I have visited. Between learning massage, the people, the food, the baths and the environment. I had fallen in love. There are many things that I could go into or mention, like the naked Didgereedoo meditation, but the main thing I want to convey is that someone planted a seed while I was in the baths. I struck up a conversation with a young lady that was in the middle of a work scholar month. She told me how intense it was and that it felt like her heart and mind were gonna explode regularly. She said something that really resonated, saying that she always dealt with her emotions and stuff on her own and at Esalen she was learning to do it with others and realizing maybe there was a better way. I was the same way, always dealing with my emotions on my own and never really allowing others in on my inner process. Maybe I was making it harder for myself this way.
Maybe I could change.
I had done a meditation retreat a few years prior in Colorado at Shambhala mountain center with Pema Chodron and it was great, but a lot more severe than Esalen. I just want to take a moment to say that I love Buddhist teachers. They really resonate the most for me. For me meeting Pema should be a blog entry in itself.
It was rough leaving Esalen. I spent a few days heartsick in San Francisco-my heart really opened at Esalen. It slowly wore off as I got back to normal and drove through Salt Lake City on my way back to Texas. When I got back to Texas the first thing I did was get online and figure out how I could get back to Esalen as soon as possible. Amazingly, there was a Buddhist teacher Noah Levine, who was leading a month long work study program on Buddhism, recovery from addiction and awakening the heart. It seemed like the perfect combination for everything I was doing.
My lease in Austin was ending in July, the Esalen program didn't begin until the end of October. So I had 3 months and I didn't know for sure that I would get in. So I decided to roam around. For August I went to Denver, Colorado. While in Denver I got the call that I had gotten in for Noah's month.
I was going back to Esalen!
I went back to Austin for September and spent some time in Chicago before dropping my stuff off at my parents and flying back to Big Sur. I narrowly missed hurricane Sandy and navigated safely to Monterey airport.
When I got back to Big Sur, I was actually really tired, I had done alot of traveling and moving things around to get back and now that I was, I just wanted to rest. Little did I know I was entering one of the most intense, environments I would ever experience.
Sunset after meditation intensive.
I think there were about 20 other work scholars. Work scholars are volunteers for the month, each assigned to one of the 4 department. Kitchen, farm and garden, grounds, and cabins. You work 35 hours a week, in addition to having class with the work scholar teacher that month. I was sleeping in a small room with 3 other grown men and I got put in the grounds department. I love grounds! I feel I really lucked out with this group. We got to work outside almost daily(I did get poison oak a few times-small price to pay). Grounds was such a loving, supportive group to be a part of. I looked forward to waking up and meditating with them and checking in. I hadn't had colleagues in awhile and it was really refreshing.
I suppose all the work scholars were all feeling it out and getting to know each other. It was sink or swim. There were so many interesting people, not just in the work study program or the teachers, also in our work environments, people in the community and of course the people doing the workshops. Esalen for whatever reason is designed to trigger your stuff so that you can work on it. The first week with the teachers was so intense, I couldn't wait to see how things were going to unfold. I remember mentioning that it seemed to be full of emotion, I just couldn't wait for people to start breaking down.
This was going to be fun.
It was Halloween our first weekend. The Esalen community loves to dress up. It was a blast, we danced all night in our costumes-I dressed up as Vera de Milo, Jim Carreys In Living Color character and no one knew who I was(these people don't watch much TV). I think this is one of the best things about Esalen. You can do really intense, emotional work during the day and then theres happy dance music, theres never too much time to dwell on anything.
The next week, I had a big breakthrough for me. We had all been meditating daily, and I had been seeing things I was doing that weren't very easy to see. One morning, it all culminated. Someone who had gotten on my nerves was sitting at breakfast with us. I was friendly and open to everyone at the table, except him. I completely had the ability to block him out of my existence. After breakfast, I was on my way to meditation and I realized what I had done at breakfast and how I had perfected that ability to block people out and then the story came about what an asshole I was and then the corresponding emotions. It was a small group, maybe 8 of us. Most notably, the young lady who had planted the seed in my head about doing the work study was there. Vinny, Noah's sidekick was leading the meditation and Enrique, Noah and Vinny's meditation helper was also there. Those people that I couldn't wait until they were going to break down, those people turned out to be me. For the first time in my life, I didn't just cry in front of a group, I bawled like a baby.
Did it feel good?
Yes and no, it was embarressing and I think I even started to disassociate. However Vinny was very skillful and had me open my eyes and look at the people in the group who were all present for me and not judging me. Vinny loved to say, cannonball right into this shit. He thanked me for dropping us off at the deep end. He also said, which really struck me that he had never seen a spiritual emergency, that couldn't be dealt with. Vinny was full of great one liners that stuck with me, such as "I have never seen anyone hate themself into being a better person." and " You can be happy right fucking now" and "I'm glad my happiness isn't dependent on conditions".
My emotional boom, started me to spin out and I spent the rest of the month pretty unstable and just holding on for dear life. I got to see all my issues, all my insanity and it was painful, grueling and humbling. I also experienced a tremendous amount of joy. It was both sometimes at the same time.
I don't think I could of done it without all the support I recieved, from my grounds work group, from Noah's heart practices. He gave us meditations to work with and practice. We did a lot of forgiveness exercises. I think I invited everyone into my heart and maybe overdid that. We did compassion, awareness, kindness and equanimity practices. Which I gave the acronym C.A.K.E. too. Which interestingly enough in the Buddhist tradition I was coming from, Shambhala, they have formal practices of offering torma, which is cake, to ones demons essentially. So, there was some overlap there, I was giving C.A.K.E. to all my demons in my life, the things I didn't like or couldn't forgive and accept. Bring compassion, awareness, kindness and equanimity to all my issues.
The best part of all this was the friendship and support I recieved. This was our Heart of Buddhism. Thanks Noah and Dharma Punx. This was the best group I have ever been a part of, even if there was some serious crazy for cocoa puffs(me).
This was right after my first Native American sweat. Vinny is behind me joined with other work scholars and Alex. I had a near death experience! My pulse was out of control.
Basically one month de-stabilized me, so I wasn't ready to go back to society, so I signed up for a second work scholar month and got into Presence of Touch, which presented the basics of Craniosacral work led by Suzanne Scurlock.
Suzanne and her team were amazing, they facilitated some major breakthroughs and I got to work on trauma stuff. It was exhausting and meaningful.
The last week of my stay, Esalen shut down to the outside and we had staff week. A week of fun and partying. I sang Karaoke. All that she wants. Ace of Base.
To be completely honest, after 6 weeks I was beyond ready to leave. I was tired of no personal space, alone time and not having my own schedule. I am so grateful to Esalen, the people there and the rollercoaster ride of the work scholar months. I have noticed that all spiritual communities seem to end up sharing a common lingo that distinguishes them. The word of Esalen is the process. Processing emotions, experiences, lifetimes. Touching on the human potential and allowing people to be present for themselves, their community and learning how to interact and be a part of a system. I still have a long way to go before I feel I will be a present, useful person for society and my community. Through my process and journey I think I will be eating a lot of CAKE!
