by Pushkara Sally Ashford
Welcome to my new page. Now in my 8th decade on Mother Earth, I have less to lose in sharing my personal story, though it’s taken me a long time to come forward with it. From time to time, I will be posting stories, poems, songs that chronicle my journey which I've named, "My SingPeace! Pilgrimage."
After publishing an article, “In Search of a Voice,” in 1979, I found myself in the peculiar position of searching for my own. Forty-five years later, I’m still searching!
Up to that point, as a singer my entire life, performing musician, teacher, psychotherapist, and community organizer, I was devastated to be losing my best friend, my comfort and most constant companion. It began as an imperceptible interruption in the sound that clued me that something was weirdly wrong. A singer knows her voice! There would be no easy way through or around it. I was diagnosed with spasmodic dysphonia.
In those first weeks, a friend kindly offered shiatsu, Japanese acupressure, to me at my home. After one session, she asked me, "Why do you think you're losing your voice at this time?"
"I don’t know,” I replied. “I think I'm supposed to shut up and listen for a change."
"How will you do that?" she pressed.
I’d been reading a book, “How to Meditate,” by Lawrence LeShan. "I don't know; I've tried meditation: 1-2-3-4, 4-3-2-1...nothing happened."
"Meditation is my favorite thing," she offered. "Why don't you come over some morning before work and we'll meditate together?"
That very week, I knocked at her door. We sat on the floor opposite each other as the dawn's rays streamed through the lattice panes of French doors. I recalled her words to me at our last meeting: "Go inside to that place within which is peaceful, entirely undisturbed by worldly cares."
‘Inside what?’ I wondered.
I could not imagine such a place. The story of “The Princess and the Pea” came to mind. ‘It must be very small,’ I thought, a pea sandwiched between so many piled up mattresses. The heaviness I was feeling appeared to be the weight of all those people I felt responsible for--my family, my clients, friends near and dear to me. My mind flashed like a lighthouse beacon: past-present-future, past-present-future. The list of things to do, and undo, was very long.
In desperation, I stifled a sob. ‘Don't let her see you cry,’ my ego voice admonished. She rose and came around behind to work my shoulders down, releasing tension and torrents of anguish. Then, C-R-A-C-K; I heard a loud sound in the region of my heart. A brilliant light burst forth from the center of my chest. Instantly, everything stopped; perfect silence, only peace remained.
An hour passed though it seemed only minutes later when we said goodbye. As I climbed into my van, my mind flashed on the photos in the corner of the room--her meditation master: 'Did you do that?' I addressed him for the first time. 'Did you do that?'
I'd been reading in LeShan’s book that some paths of meditation require a guide and when the time was right, he or she would put in an appearance. I was of two minds about that prospect. I knew of this Guru, but it seemed the closer he came, the harder I dug in my heels. Religion was a crutch, after all, “the opium of the masses.” Or so I’d been raised to believe.
In my desperation to do something to fix my voice, I attended a 2-day meditation workshop only a few days after the light broke through my crusty heart. We sat before a large photo of a bald man clad in orange. Chanting the syllables of a Sanskrit mantra, Om Namah Shivaya, my soul cried out to him: 'Help me!' I felt a sudden elongation, as though rising and falling at the same time.
My first thought was, 'This is gonna be a good one.’
A tender intoxication arose from my toes to my head. I lost track of my physical body. It seemed to have disappeared. In its place, I saw a shell--an egg-shaped pewter-like vessel wide open to the front. I felt a sweet vibration, as though being strummed like a thousand-stringed instrument. I was suspended in an emulsion of love. Inside and out, only awareness remained, pure being.
My thoughts had slowed. ‘Now I have something to let go to,’ was followed by another, ‘Now I have something to give to my children.’ I could see my mind as it spun on its own axis off to my left side, trying to figure out what was happening. ‘Where could anyone put their hands to create such a sensation of pure ecstasy?’ Who was this Cosmic Lover? I'd never in my life been made love to like this!
I was never going to leave that spot. After quite some time, I reluctantly opened my eyes. Something entirely new had taken place there--something sacred. I could not speak of it as I joined the others outside for a light lunch. Yet, I rolled on the ground in ecstasy and delight. I spent the two days of the meditation workshop on my back as the energy literally floored me.
This great awakening continued in the same way, for months in fact. The week following, I conducted a vocal workshop during an art therapy symposium at Antioch University. I saw divine love shining through each person's eyes. I knew each of them from inside out. There was no sense of difference or separation among us.
I crept out of bed at all hours to meditate in waves of bliss that, day and night, coursed through my being. Walking down the street, I saw love in the eyes of strangers. Friends brought me gifts in honor of this amazing event.
My perception of “reality” was permanently altered. As in a developing photograph, black became white and white became black. What had been easy before was quite challenging. At the same time, a dimension that had been inaccessible to me, nonexistent from my former viewpoint, was now apparent and within reach. Whereas music and song--sound--had always held the highest value for me, its source and a listening heart wedged their way into my daily life.
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