A Vision Unfolds
Finally: 13 people spending 5 days on Durgas's Tiger Land. We come from many countries: From Kazakhstan to Korea, from the United States to England, from Germany and Czech Republic to Ecuador.
The country welcomes us warmly:
As we do yoga on the beach in the morning, a rainbow is seen in the clouds behind my head.
A vision unfolds
In the article "Leap into a new reality" published August 2020, I told how the vision to create a community emerged.
I describe the "leap" as the energy I need to get going. And then?
How does realization of energy move in our lives?
The call for a vision
April 2020. Global gridlock. The international COVID policy has triggered a deep unease in me, the feeling of being at the mercy of decisions that go against my principles. The question: What is my task at this time? What can I do so that the fear of death formed by politics and the media does not eat away at being alive?
I went to the mountain, fasted, asked the "Great Mystery" for guidance. For three days nothing seems to happen. It is cold. I wanted to leave. I felt that all this is useless. But I stayed. Then:
The vision
Dusk. Drizzle in the mist. I was freezing, sitting in the medicine circle. And then, unexpectedly, there was a clear announcement/communication that came to me: "Find a piece of fertile land away from the cities by a small river. Build a community where the experiences of Durga's Tiger Training can be lived in everyday life. Live simply, but well. From and with the land. Permaculture. A café-pub. A school. A temple and meditation place. Art spaces. An integral way of building. To communicate. Sociocracy. Children's laughter. Workshops. Animals. People from different cultures and countries materializing this spiritual space together: growing together, laughing, loving, arguing, talking, dancing, crying, meditating. But above all, creating a different reality. Where celebrating life is the way, every day anew. To let death dance along. To become more aware with joy and perseverance."
Resistance
Yes, all right, I had asked for a vision. But I had wanted to hear something different - more of a powerful affirmation to continue where I am, because my life had found an exciting balance until the lock down set in. A great resistance spreads through me at this announcement:
"Great mystery, thank you, this is a great project - but please find someone else to implement it. Someone younger, more competent. I have other plans. And I am totally unsuitable. I have never bought a large piece of land. I have no idea about permaculture or building. There is no money either. I have to go to Germany - mum is really not well. You know that. I can't let her die alone.... Well, that's not a good idea. There must be another possibility. I thought I heard a friendly laugh in the distance.
"You asked where the personal power lies hidden in the process of growing older. Your task is to direct the energies in such a way that the community comes into being. You are not to do, you are only to channel. It is all there. Trust. You will create a choreography out of the dance of the many possibilities that different individuals bring with them. You've done it over and over again as a director and producer in theatre and filmmaking."
Common sense
As I descend into the valley, my "common sense" comes to my rescue: "Oh, you just imagined it. That's all nonsense". But I had promised myself to follow the voice of the spirit, if I understood it. I can't always interpret the signs for myself. And now? This time the voice was clearer than ever. There was nothing to reinterpret.
Somewhat self-deprecatingly, I tell David, my partner, who doesn't think much of "esoteric poppycock" and laughs with me when he imagines me sitting in the rain with the alpacas on the mountain. Then silence. We both look into the fireplace.
My current reality suddenly feels like the past. Wistfulness.
The decision
David says: "I don't think it's such a bad idea" He stands up. "Well, let's have a look on the internet for land - that's how it's done these days. So what do you want it to be? Fertile, off the beaten track, by a river". "And near the sea," I interject. "You didn't say that just now". "No, that's my private wish now", I say, and have to laugh.
The only freedom we have as human beings is to stick to our decisions. To take ourselves seriously in our power to shape the future. We then grow from the challenges we face on the way to realization. If we cannot do this, our lives become arbitrary. We are torn to and fro by the wind like a falling autumn leaf. We become malleable.
What becomes of our decisions is decided by "Spirit". We can only grow if we don't discard our decision with every new sensation and follow it...only to discard it again when something seemingly "better" appears on the horizon.
Again and again I hear the laughter of my first spiritual teacher, Pir Vilayat Kahn. It brings lightness to my mediations. "When you throw a decision into the future, that future attracts you and supports realization," he once said. I need to think of that now.
Later, at Durga's Tiger Land. We visit the new wooden house where we will live starting February 2022. The sun is shining, the water is clear and we admire the huge tree with its spreading roots on the other side of the river. We stand in the middle of the Rio Verde and sing for the water, honoring the river with flowers. We ask for permission to go further.
Doubts
Doubts are part of the thinking process. And that is right. We doubt, imagine possible realities and their implications. Circling the new idea, spying it out. Doubts can be invigorating, illuminate new aspects of a decision. But I can only decide from the heart, from the connection with the "Great Spirit". Here dwells the knowledge beyond doubts. And so I dance between the paradox: I have to allow the doubts and at the same time keep the distance to them, just like to this inner knowing - because after all it is my subjective I that interprets the information and visions I receive during a ritual, and this interpretation does not always have to be correct. There is a moment when doubt and intuitive knowing coincide. That is the gap. Now I can make the decision, which I then stick to. It is as if I had thrown a stone into a lake - the stone is my decision. I can't get it back. I can only watch the rings spread out on the water and imagine how my decision sets realities in motion. Then I let go and face the new doubts calmly: "It may well be that it would be better differently. But I and I have decided now. Let's first see what comes out of it. Then we'll see.
If I don't do that, the doubts become paralyzing, old patterns creep into the thought process again and again, opposing any change with bogus arguments. My mind then goes against my intuition, finds many reasons against it and a variety of worries spread through me. On bad days, I then get scared and the ideas for implementing the vision shatter against a seemingly impenetrable wall that towers up in front of me. It produces the feeling that I can't do it all. Then the only thing to do is to relax, to do something completely different first. And to trust that the waves will spread out.
After the decision was made, everything starts to flow: my pension savings are in 42 hectares of fertile land. By the river, not far from the sea. The application to Durga's Tiger Foundation winds its way through the bureaucratic maze, because community land must belong to the community. David, my partner, and my father stand by my side as we accompany mother to death. Death Mother Crone came as a friend.
Perseverance
When I have made the decision and learn to deal with my doubts, I need perseverance. Usually, other resistances, other challenges keep popping up. It is as if life wants to test me to see if I am really serious. I can only hold on to my decision, that is, to myself, more precisely to the trust that in a moment of power I made this decision for a good reason and that I am now doing everything I can to make it unfold. Even if nothing seems to happen, or I no longer have the energy and think that nothing will happen anyway - what was I thinking? And then when someone visits me in my Casa Puma, they look around when the sun is shining through the glass pyramid and the cat is lolling sensuously in the square of light on the floor, and then ask me: "and you really want to give up all this? To live in the middle of nowhere?”, I feel stupid.
The thought of being on Durga's Tiger Land as early as 2022 often stresses me out. The land itself exerts pressure: it is fertile. The weeds in the pastures are already as tall as a man. Again, decisions have to be made. Community building cannot be postponed. On the other hand, my personal "wall of impossibility" spoke with the following weighty arguments:
"Who is going to run Durga's Tiger School on Ilalo now, when you want to be on the land with a group of people from January 2022? It's crazy to just leave the school to itself. You can't do that".
2021 in the summer: completely unexpectedly, my replacement quits while I'm in Germany. I want to fly back immediately. "I'll take over," my son says on the phone. "You don't have to come". I am taken aback. But then, to my amazement, everything falls into place so that he can really take over the management, together with the team that is fully behind him, even though he had only worked as a training manager and teacher before. And I didn't have to be present!
We explore the land, the plains, the hills, the ups and downs in the stream bed, with Vladi, a local who knows the land, making music with his machete as he probes the way in the jungle. We are all explorers, helping each other, overcoming exhaustion. Eating the cocoa from the tree refreshes us, and it gives the tired Taylor a turbo boost for the last hill to conquer. Someone later says we hiked 15 km in the countryside. Unbelievable.
Paving the way in the pathless
When we embark on the journey of not following fear and social conditioning, but our inner knowing, life becomes adventurous. I encounter the “not-knowing” at every step. When I am aware that this is so, I can enjoy it. This helps to endure on days with little energy. Using the techniques learned on the tantra and yoga path. Or in rituals where we connect with nature, ground ourselves. Yes, we have to apply everything we've learned and sometimes out smart ourselves when we feel our existential angst taking over. All I can do then is say "never mind, I'll go on anyway" to myself, and then persistently follow my decision step by step. And lovingly watch myself do it.
When we sing on the other side of the river under a grapefruit tree of the earth, it becomes almost kitschy: the cows moo, the horse neighs, and a breeze cradles the bamboo and caresses us for a moment, as if the spirits were singing with us. Even the mosquitoes don't make an appearance as we walk under the big mango trees along bananas and cocoa. The land is simply gentle with us.
Seeking allies
Allies are people who support me. It is important to admit that the proud statement: "I can do everything in my life alone, I don't need anyone" is an illusion. We are group beings. Only a Waorani can survive naked if dropped somewhere in the jungle. But they say that a hunter who has lost his way and only finds his way home after weeks remains a bit crazy all his life. Every Waorani cherishes his clan. They talk about how they enjoy listening to each other's breathing at night in their hammocks under the palm leaf roof. How nice it is to need each other. In the city, we are talked into a pseudo-individualism. I am individual in my small apartment alone when I live without family and partner or friends. But who made my clothes? Where does the food in the supermarket come from? Where does my car come from? Are the hands of the masseuse attached to no one? Hmm - and we say we don’t need anyone.
It's night. The shamans Vlady and Ruth are chanting, and with them all of us sitting in a circle around the fire in the middle of the room, the "navel of the world" that connects us to the "Great Mystery". I ask to be more aware of how I can realize the community vision. As the sun rises, Vlady turns to me: "This community is blessed. It is a reality in the spiritual world. The Chachi Indians and the African Americans, your neighbors, welcome you. This community is already there. Now all you have to do is trust, move forward step by step and allow it to come to Earth.”
With leaves and flowers, we spiral under trees for our commitment to the land and the vision of the community and share our visions in a tobacco ceremony. A sow comes down the wooded hill with her colorful piglets. Close to us she lies down and nurses the little ones with tender grunts. It is clear to me: we are welcome here and will be nourished by the land. No fear.
Small miracles
Then the small miracles happen, which are also called coincidences:
Yesterday: I am unsure - what to do with so much land? Planting a few hectares of cacao would be great. But that sounds difficult. Towards evening I drive to a small roadside restaurant on a rock above the sea. The only guest is a man in a red shirt. He sits with his back to the sea and the sunset, has the fried fish in front of him and is talking on the phone. I find this funny and ask if I can take his picture. We start talking: he sells persimmon seedlings, brings them to the finca and later buys the harvest. I learn everything about organic persimmon. Over the next few days, I get information on all the questions I have and can make decisions to keep the land from going wild until the first community pioneers arrive in February.
In the neighboring village of Chonta Duro. We made friends with Doña Sofia and Yajaira, who cooked the best crayfish with coconut sauce for us. We danced and laughed together. Now if you feel like doing something brand new in 2022 and building community with us, alone, with partners, with kids - come. The "Encocado" will taste good to you too....
Go to www.durgastigerland.com