Updates

It has been another glorious week in the woods. My posts have not been posting though. This week I've seen deer, snakes, larger snakes, huge snakes, a baby bear, cows and a lot of cool song birds and hawks and eagles. The other day we descended upon Paris! Land of baguettes lattes and French kissing. Pearisburg is a beautiful southern Virginia town. We stayed at a lovely hostel there.

Day 5- we'd- Davis trail camp- 13.6 mi
Day 6- thu- chestnut ridge pond- 19.2 mi
Day 7- fri- laurel creek- 18.6 mi
Day 8- sat- Jenny knobb shelter- 19 mi
Day 9- sun- wapiti shelter- 15.2 mi
Day 10-mon- docs knobb shelter- 9.4 mi
Day 11- tue- holy family hostel- 11 mi
Day 12- wed- 300 mile hitch hike.
Day 13-thu- Ed Garvey shelter- 8 mi
Day 14- fri- Ed Garvey shelter- 6 mi
Day 15- sat- 8 miles
Total: 191.9 miles

Hitch hiking is an art. It takes patients. It takes hiding your dread locks and your crazy. We got two rides Wednesday before this wonderful girl pulled over and said she would take us wherever we wanted to go. She was just driving. I think i fell in love instantly. The people i have met these past few weeks have rebuilt my faith in humanity. I cant wait to develop my film from my holga 35mm camera my friend Jason gave me(thanks buddy, it was light weight and fun). It has been great to let my weird hang out and have a good time with people of all ages.

Sent from my brain

Discipline

"Discipline in action surpasses renunciation of action"
-Bhagavad Gita

Be disciplined in your actions. Be aware of motives and morals. If compassion is a principle, think of others before you act. Act with integrity.

Sent from my iPhone

Update!

Pain is weakness leaving the body.... They say
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger... I've heard
No pain no gain.... Yeah yeah yeah

Long days with a 40+ pound pack up and down mountains is hard work. Left Damascus on Saturday morning. Had lots of beautiful views and met some special people.

Day 1 -Saturday - pond - 12 mi.
Day 2 - Sunday - Thomas knob shelter - 16.6 mi.
Day 3 - Monday - hurricane mtn shelter - 16 mi.
Day 4 - Tuesday - partnership shelter - 19.3 mi.

Today we head into Marion for a resupply. I keep losing things but i believe it is the karma i have taken on from my trail name "the sadhu" but only time will tell. By the end of the trip i may have nothing left. Considering mailing my camera home. I have a small bag of stuff to mail home to lose some weight.

Sent from outside Marion Virginia

Hitch hiking

One ride from harpers ferry West Virginia to Damascus Virginia. By three hikers going to trail days!

Sent from a random strangers blessed car

Gettysburg

Weeding of the sacred garden

Weed the garden of self much like you would weed the sacred gardens around a holy place. It is beneficial for you to take a close look at the positive and negative in your life. After looking at labels and extremes you may still see things that are just not good in your life. Such things are people, feelings. Emotions, places, substances, ect. I would say anything that is hindering your personal, mental, physical, spiritual or emotional growth and development is negative. These are all things you need to weed out of your life. I like to use the weeding analogy after spending many long days weeding the flower beds surrounding the "Buddha circle" on Mouna farm in Hawaii. I realize i need not only weed this garden but also myself. I then met for the first time the Buddhist monk that was coming to live with us on the farm. He saw me weeding this beautiful and sacred garden and told me that what i was doing was great, but the most beneficial weeding is done within yourself. When you removed evasive weeds from a garden you free up root space and allow the plants you want to grow to get more soil space and water. What happens? The plants you want to grow, that are beautiful and beneficial to you burst and bloom in a colorful display of love for all senses. This is what happens in ourselves, when we rid ourselves of negative things we allow the positive more room and attention in our lives to help us flourish into beautiful children of god.

This passage was written on a bus to New Jersey. Om radhe radhe

Polar-Extremes

"Perform action, established in yoga, and discard attachment, O Arjuna. Remain balanced in success and failure. Yoga is defined as equanimity."

-Bhagavad Gita Sloka 48

This equanimity is known as the science of uniting the individual consciousness with the Ultimate Consciousness. The human mind has a tendency to see things in extremes. As people we are very opinionated and want others to know this. When we address any situation or experience we are conditioned to label it. "I love this" "i hate them" "this feels horrible" "this is great". And while being descriptive and showing like or dislike is how we distinguish ourselves, i believe we take ourselves out of the true experience. When things go negatively we are hurt and let down. This could just be our ego speaking. We have ambition to be better than others around us, no matter who gets hurt or slandered on the way. We want to beat out others for a higher position or title. We always want to come out on top with a "if your not first your last mentality." As people we care more about our personal gain and less with the needs and feelings of others. This reminds me of a poem that truly encompasses the message in the Gita.

"If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster,

And treat those two impostors just the same." 

"If" by Rudyard Kipling

we can chose to not let our life be run by extremes and chose instead to let things just be as they are. When early in sobriety i was having a really hard time dealing with the emotions and feelings i had suppressed with drugs and alcohol for so long. When i would complain about feeling uncomfortable there was one person who would always point out that it was just unfamiliar. Feeling those feelings wasnt a bad thing, it was beautiful. The duality of it being that i just wasn't used to it and wanted to instantly label it as bad. Which leads me to today, a beautiful day in Maine. Every day i have taken a walk around noon and every day i have seen flowers blooming and trees budding. Today i saw many bust out in beautiful colors and BAM! I got hit with intense allergies. The duality of such beauty and misery all at once. Does this mean the flowers are any less beautiful, the trees less magnificent? No, so why label it as such. I chose to use my vocabulary to describe experiences and situations that occur today instead of label them instantly as a polar extreme. I try to be not attached to the result of experiences and therefor hold a solid foundation within myself to not me moved and swayed by winnings and losings of the constant ego-battles with the world. Just for today i will let things be as they may be, and not let them exist in extremes. Everything is perfect and happens exactly as its supposed to, despite what i might think. 

Om