Three narratives told on Yoga Day

The Magician’s story

In town only four days, she serendipitously had met the hostess of the Yoga Day USA open house just hours before. Now she stood in the suburban basement, surrounded by strangers sitting cross-legged on mats, and talked about her lineage.

She is a descendant of ancient Jewish high priests and of Dakota Sioux. She told us she could tell we had peace in our hearts and that we sought healing and happiness. A Kabbalist Shaman, she said she possessed energy given to the high priests and conserved over the centuries through her lineage. We will need it. The earth is unsettled, and 2012 is only two years away.

John’s story

A child of the ’60s, silver-haired John talks about the brilliance of Bob Dylan during a break between yoga sessions. “How many times must the cannon balls fly?” he asks. “It took just one war to move us to action back then. Now, we send our children to war after war and we’re proud when they’re killed.”

Things are getting bad. “We’re the frogs in the boiling water, not noticing the gradual increase in heat until it’s too late.” Architects and engineers know that jet fuel alone could not have brought the towers down. Cash for clunkers is likely a plot to get the old cars off the road so electronics-jamming attacks are made more effective. And how can we allow all the cell phone waves to go passing through our heads?

My story

This Yoga Day open house attracted people who sense something is wrong. We’re nervous rabbits before an earthquake; frogs who have noticed  it’s getting a bit hot. Some of us have created elaborate narratives to make sense of how we got here and to map a way out.

I don’t think the narrative need be complicated at all. The bus has no brakes and it’s barreling down the hill. The passengers who are partying have to stop and look ahead; the passengers who are sleeping have to wake up. And if that takes a Kabbalist Shaman, I’m OK with that.