time to recharge...

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="338" caption="a small family in Ubud's Sacred Monkey Forest"][/caption]

There isn't a single thing I could think of that ever gave me the impression parenthood was going to be easy. There isn't a single time that I ever thought it would be easy. I'm still not about to complain, if I ever feel an urge to, one thought my Dharma Brother and it's gone, but...

I think the best way I can sum it up is through Barry Briggs' explanation of dukkha, "during the Buddha's time, the colloquial meaning of dukkha referred to a potter's wheel that was off center and out of balance." It's amazing how such a small being can throw things so out of balance! I suppose that's not entirely accurate, not responding entirely to the situation would be a little closer to the center... As EunBong and I adjust the best we can, it's like be visited by the Life Style Repo Agency. I find myself asking, "You're gonna take that away, too?" (actually, that kind of sounds like a complaint...)

In an effort to bring things back to the middle, I followed Chong Go Seunim once more the the traditional doctor in Seoul for a check up. He pressed a dull-pointed, metal utensil into various points on my left hand and wrist while placing his other hand on my right ankle. It didn't take him long to determine that, by Chong Go Seunim's translation, there's no water left in the reservoir!" He then did the same as before, placing a series of different types of Korean medicine in my hands and feeling how my body reacted to them. I tried to pay attention to the feeling I got from them, but all I could feel was my forearm cramping. He began to chuckle  and I commented to Chong Go Seunim that it did sound good... For the sake of the fourth precept, I'll paraphrase, but I was basically told that my body was going Ape [] for the medicine.

Fortunately, he told me that my body type will respond quickly to the medicine, and my energy will be back soon. I'd been a bit puzzled by my recent inability to meditate. I thought that it would be a good way to recharge, but the moment I sit, my body just tells me that I should go sleep. I don't fall asleep sitting, but I often find my eyes glued shut after just a couple of minutes. He told me that meditation requires a minimum amount of physical energy to begin with, and right now, I need to get that up first. Another example of a need for balance...

It's kind of one of those things, you feel it, you know, but it takes someone else telling you for it to really get you to respond. The first time I visited him, he told me there was a dark cloud hanging over me. Although he told me my energy was very low then, too, I'd choose low energy over a dark cloud any day!