I have been a fan of the ‘here and now’ since a visiting Gestalt psychologist in college led us through the peeling of an orange. We felt the weight of the orange, observed its color, felt its texture. We watched the first spray of citrus oil as a fingernail slit the outer skin. Felt the sticky juices on our fingers. Smelled the intensity of its fragrance. And so on until we touched a plump juicy segment to our lips, tasted, and swallowed. Then the class was over.

I walked across campus from the classroom building to our apartment. Or floated, for my mind was liberated of care, my body was light and pain free. Trees, sidewalks, people were fresh and unfamiliar. I was unbound.

High for hours. Because of an orange.

Self versus self-less. I have been fixated on this issue for so long now. In yoga, we get in touch with ourselves and gain this egoless state*, the loss of self. Get in touch with self and achieve the loss of self.

In the same way, the writings of Rodney Yee with Nina Zolotow suggest to avoid suffering, follow your pain. Stay with the pain. Feel pain and achieve the loss of suffering.

It’s about the here and now, the living in the moment. If you are alive to the sensations within your body, and alive to what is around you, there is no space for suffering, for what if, for if only, for what’s wrong with me.

There is no longer the passage of time, the loss of the past, the fear of the future.

And there is no longer loneliness, that wall between self and what is around you.

You are one with the orange.



*(I was given these words ‘egoless state’ in September--an unexpected gift, a key. I want to acknowledge this gift, and that the coalescence of the ideas within this writing has resulted from exchanges with Patrick Bouchaud, a teacher of Shintaido and a friend.)