Something is supposed to have changed since August. No going back to the status quo. No going back to the mess of a life that was the status quo. So I hunkered down to a steady regimen of reading, studying, sitting, and general mindfulness. I think I done OK. Although it has made me hypersensitive to the lack of compassion I witness in every day life and through blog reads on the web. Makes me sad.

So no status quo. So now what? Oh, I got a response from the monastery, too, so I am now face-to-face with persuing that option, or . . . ? It should be a no-brainer, I got a response from the monastery, set those wheels moving, send in registration to begin my trial periods, get the medical check up and blood test they require. It's not that I'm balking, it's just . . .

The word that comes to mind from this past month is "obscurations". Karmic obscurations can have the effect of making moving forward or bettering karma difficult or even impossible in a given lifetime. That concept did resonate.

I'm sick of the norm, the matrix, this illusion we call life and living, and the only reason I'd want to live would be either to head down the monastic path or get locked up in a loony bin. Yet, there is something not resonating about the monastic path, it just isn't feeling right. I still have strong attachments to the material world. My life has been so much more about self-absorbed flailing and wandering aimlessly without the focus and discipline required for the monastic path. So now what?

So now what?

I'm not gonna re-live last month either. I won't subject anyone to any of that again.

Madoka just wrote me telling me that she's taking time off work and will be spending a significant portion of that in L.A. She didn't provide any more details and she's off of email for this entire week. That doesn't have anything to do with anything and won't affect anything I decide. But if she comes to the U.S. sooner rather than later, I would head down in a heartbeat to visit her.

Resting in Tiburon mid-ride:


My trusty ride: