Seeking Union
This discipline is our work: to be true to our path at all times.*
How do we come together, hold together, and be together in the face of the many forces that would break us apart? The forces that seek to break us apart seek to co-opt our attention, to bring us into their circle, make us their own. Yet, you want to remain yourself, keep your integrity. How do you create union, the union we all, often desperately seek, without losing yourself? This is the question. Whether it be union with another or with your own body and soul, this integrity of union is fundamental to contentment in this life.
This week’s hexagram, Bi- Hexagram 8 is called Union or Seeking Union. A union can always be found between you and your world, you and your body, you and another sentient being. That union IS living energy. You can live from that place of union; choose to use the energy of that union to inform your action in any situation. If you are, in fact, true to your path, the union of each and every moment provides the fuel for your journey through your own awareness. I call this kind of union, you with your own substance, your insight and energy with the very fiber of your body, I call this strength. This kind of strength made of your connection with both your spirit and your substance provides integrity and resilience for you whatever you might encounter.
Where does this strength come from? It comes from the simple fact of you knowing what you are made of. This kind of strength is literally invincible. Though it may not save you from external storms, it will always provide you with the capacity to find union with your own knowing when you need it. This is real and reliable strength, the strength of knowing your own being. And holding together, being together, through the vicissitudes of life requires this kind of strength.
Over the weekend, I was teaching meditation, the death meditations, as I not so delicately refer to them (when I am being delicate, I call this material “making friends with the enemy”. Learn more about making this kind of friendship here) and I was suffering from a bout of allergies of a kind I have not experienced in years. My head was full, my chest was full, I had little appetite and ached all over. Yet, I felt a kind of strength in our little meditation room that I know came from exactly the kind of integrity I am referring to here. For me, teaching meditation is one of the main joys of my life. Teaching Chinese medicine and meditation together is just about as glorious and joyful as a day could be, so I was simultaneously on cloud 9! Physically, I was beleaguered, but spiritually and emotionally I felt fully functional. A tremendous energy gathered in our union as we practiced together and felt the power of being together. A kind of energy and strength that could only come from such a union.
Dancing with death delightfully!
*Carol Anthony, Commentary on Hexagram 8 - Bi, A Guide to the I Ching