Nonduality Salon (/ \)

issue number two - October, 2000

Nonduality Salon Magazine

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THE CITY DOESN'T CARE

by Polar, Judit Dawn, David Hodges, and Mark Otter

POLAR

The way I see it the nonduality experience can easily become a comfortable place for the sleepy unaware ego to hang out in. In
large part it is a projection on the enlightend state encouraged by students of Indian mystics who were looking to escape the realities of everyday life in the West. Fair enough - but nowadays some are returning home and realising (yes)there is
more work to do. Hmmmmm.... Encouraging the idea of nonduality is only telling half the story. Try: "Sorry I was late today boss and we missed that $10million contract but we are all one so it doesn't really matter does it..." Or: "Sorry I fucked your friend last night but I love him/her also and we are all one aren't we..." Or: Scenes from the Serbian war which don't need to be gone into here.... ... you know what I mean from your own life I'm sure. Nonduality is a beautiful space but it's easy to get stuck there, and it is really poor without the shitty richness of separation on the planet we actually live in. New York City...wow...gas stations and everything... So today there is a creation called heaven and yesterday there was one called hell. Is there any difference? Damn right there is - pain and separation are a part of this thing called life and that's where I see the challenge to bring the nonduality experience back into this place called home.

JUDIT DAWN

Dear Polar,

in the late hour of the early night I am pondering over your words "shitty richness of separation", it is that, that keeps me up late in the night sweating to find the right words, trying to connect, looking for approval, feeling guilty of not being able to create more beauty of nonduality, yes I guess I just love that creation.

Love Judit

DAVID HODGES

Yeah, the city...the city doesn't care. The city will break your heart. Just when you think you have found a nice apartment the city will raise your rent. Just when you get used to parallel
parking your car, the city will break in and steal your radio. You'll be walking along having a fine nonDual walk and the city will roar past in a big fume-spewing bus. Or the city will jump in front of you demanding spare change. The city...you'll find a lover there for a night but in the morning she'll leave and never come back. You'll go out to the park to get some sun and some jerks will be playing rap music too loud. You try to meditate and about a million fire trucks go screaming past your house. The damned city. Too loud, too noisy and you can never get enough of it.

The city is like the deity in the Old Testament...on moral grounds, undefendable, so the only thing you can do is give it
praise.

Wait..what about Duality?...well...Duality sleeps in the nearly hidden dry canal bed under Orange Street, shivering with the homeless people. Duality sits on a bar stool at 2 AM Saturday night still hoping against hope to get laid. Duality stays all day in the library looking for answers in dusty old books. Duality argues with the meter maid and duality smokes its big
cigar in the park on a fine Autumn afternoon. Duality is always
hungry and Duality is afraid to die. Duality is about to alienate its last friend by borrowing 20 bucks which it knows it
will never repay. Duality is out looking for those guys who are
hiding out in NonDuality and is going to kick their ass.

MARK OTTER

Yeah, the country doesn't care. The country will break your balls. Just when you think you have found a nice rock to sit on,
the country will send a mosquito to get your itch going. Just when you get used to gazing at the sky and the clouds, the country will distract you with flowers and other sexual safety deposit boxes just bursting to get your seed. You'll be walking
along, having a fine Dual walk and the country will grab you with spider webs and prickly seeds and velcro imitations meant to spread the word. The evangelist country will take your heart and open it wide. Open hearts bleed. If you're wide, you can't afford to make pickles and jam. You can't afford to have a dog named Jake and domestic hens to give you eggs you won't fertilize with your patient love and feed with your placental hopes. You can't take the time to slow down to meet the season's needs. You live in the city and can never get enough of it because it does not exist.

The country is like the Torah, you must argue with it for months on end just to reap a crop of cautious agreement on the
definition of terms. And even then, you know you will talk for
years to know the truth. The only thing you can do is take the other side and argue it with joy for the learning that will come.

Well, what about Nonduality? Nonduality sits in the dried up
stream bed and waits for the spring that it is. Nonduality throws an acorn at you and chatters in tongues hoping you will leave well enough alone. Nonduality asks for ice and responds to steam. Nonduality rises just to fall. Nonduality loves this word play and you. (and so do I)

The above exchange occurred on Nonduality Salon email list

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