Bliss and Drumming: The Slow Enlightenment of the Hard Rock Drummer

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, Clementine reads this post: http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/11/rock-addled-brain-goes-repeat/. She also mentions www.awakeningthetrueself.com

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Years ago, I spent some time meditating on on my inner critic, and an image of a woman in a gray suit and a tight bun on her head emerged. I have no idea where the image comes from, but it’s been helpful to put a face on her. When I asked her what she needed from me, she said she didn’t want me to fail. This is why she was so incessantly belligerent, and why she thought it would be a good idea to just not ever produce any work for which I would be so vulnerable.

After a while of sitting with her, we made a deal. I promised that I would work as hard as I could on anything I produced, and she said she would shut the hell up and let me work.

From the blog www. blissanddrumming.com, this piece is read by Clementine. She also references www.awakeningthetrueself.com

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What a profound teaching. As we go through the world, the mind is constantly judging: looking backward to see how Now compares, looking forward to anticipate what might come. Every moment is judged with past or future, and every being is judged according to others we’ve experienced, or by wishing them to be different. This constant activity of the egoic self is what we believe life to be, this constant comparing and assuming. We are constantly creating our own reality, that often has nothing to do with what the other people in the room are experiencing.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this piece is read by Clementine. She also references www.awakeningthetrueself.com.

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I did love to float on my back and just watch the sky. Once or twice I made it there as the sun was rising or setting and the sky was a marvel. Those moments were worth it all. I didn’t think about what was underneath. I just watched the rose clouds blossom and change, and I allowed that peaceful, floating-on-my-back joy to wash through me. Eventually though, the thought of those fit folks and their steady paces behind me brought that old shame to the surface: I can’t keep up. I’m a failure. Or suddenly, my vision would drop below me, to the bottom looking up, and I would see my body up there on the surface, with all that space and darkness in between bottom and top. I would flail about with a kind of vertigo, panting. I would berate myself, power through, fall into a stroke to mimic the real swimmers out there, finding strength and pushing away the fear for short bursts. Then, the recognition that I was kidding myself would dawn on me. Then, I would paddle in defeat in to shore.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this piece http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/10/finding-compassion-behind-drumkit/ is read by Clementine. She also references www.awakeningthetrueself.com.

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What is really interesting is how much easier it is to be compassionate to others than it is to oneself. On the stage, when I fall out of the moment, what is there is a berating voice, warning of upcoming potential disasters, or negative thoughts of defeat. I’ve always felt that any harsh criticism of my playing could never be as wounding as the things I hear in my head. Anything hurtful you can say about my playing can never be worse than what I’ve heard already, upstairs.

I know by now that these thoughts are my ego, trying to protect me from disaster. I know that it’s that deep layer of shame at the bottom of my personality, nagging me to give up before I begin. I’m grateful that my years of meditation have clued me in to these patterns and have given me a way to step back from them, observe them and let them dissolve.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this post: http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/10/deeper-feeling/ is read by Clementine. She also references www.awakeningthetrueself.com.

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This week I wrote a treatise on this idea, of finding the field of bliss energy beneath all the light and dark, but really, the discussion of bearing suffering feels trivial in the face of current events. So I will do what is required of all beings on the planet, in this moment, and then in this one. I will just keep breathing. I will move to where I am called. The band will play on.

This week was the week I was to release the first music video for my new project with Adrian Conner, Beaux Cheveux. As luck would have it, it was a terrible week to release such a lighthearted and joyful tune. Hurricanes, fires, shootings: the last two weeks have brought with them a litany of misery and it felt like the best response should be to stay in bed and hit the crying emoji on every Facebook post encountered.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this post http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/10/ten-ways-awesome-studio-musician/ ‎ is read by Clementine.

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As someone hired for the session, the primary thing that matters to me is that I get in and get out as quickly as possible. In most sessions with Rob, there is a feeling of celebration. The studio is hallowed place in which each person gets to bring a lifetime of work and all of their creative energy and let it shine for an afternoon, or a few days, or however long you are gifted with studio time. In this time, the culmination of your creative voice is laid down on something that stands to be heard by the world. So there is a tendency to want to milk it, to bathe in the connection with the other musicians, drink a beer when your part is over, hang out and see how the rest of the recording goes down.

That’s not your role, though.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this post: http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/09/comes-goes-rock-roll/ is read by Clementine. She offers guided meditations and energy healing at www.awakeningthetrueself.com.

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For a moment, I got lost in dread and stress. Worried for my dear friend and her health. Worried about having to cancel the shows, and the dread of inflicting stress on the venues and promoters. Anxious then about the reputation of my band and business, and then the pain of having to tell my dear booking agent about all her work lost. Heartbroken for the people who had been looking forward to our rare visit in these areas. The ego panicked for a short time and my brain spun around and prevented any coherent thought.

Then, I took a breath and remembered. Be Here Now. My whole day, my whole life, has been pointing to this moment. Here, a wave of pain. Here, underneath, awareness.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this post: http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/09/to-protect-and-border-and-greet-each-other-musings-of-love-at-an-island-wedding/ is read by Clementine. She offers guided meditations and energy healing at www.awakeningthetrueself.com.

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What would it be like to love unconditionally? The first step is to realize that love the emotion is not what is required for this state. An emotion always has an opposite, and to depend on the emotion love is to eventually fail. At times, love becomes its opposite. It wanes, changeable. We no longer find the warm feelings of the beginning of the relationship, or we become so attached to the way the emotion felt at an earlier time that how it appears later becomes unbearable. Expectations are always broken, it is their way.

The love that is required to love unconditionally is energy, not emotion. It is the open, neutral, boundless and infinite energy at the bottom of our true self. In this place, love energy expands exponentially: in fact, there seems to be no beginning or end. There is no requirement of the other, and no ego to be hurt or needy. It is pure love that accepts the other entirely.

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, this post: http://blissanddrumming.com/2017/09/in-praise-of-great-women/ is read by Clementine. She also refers to www.awakeningthetrueself.com.

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When I was a teen, my mother’s positive outlook drove me crazy. I was reading Rimbaud and Camus and Dostoevsky, and life seemed so much wider and darker than she knew. I thought I knew so much better with my dark vision of the world. Now, I only aspire to her way of being, this light and joyful way of meeting every moment in life and seeing no point in dwelling in the darkness. In times of difficulty, I see her batten down, get ferocious. When she was ill many years ago, I saw her jaw set and meet the illness with a kind of steel will. Then, after it was over, this happy spirit bounced back and prevailed. She is happy at her center. What else could you wish in a life?

From the blog www.blissanddrumming, read by Clementine. She also refers to meditation guidance and energy healing at www. awakeningthetrueself.com.

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I know that the path of enlightenment is one of contradiction, and this ego of mine has its heroes: Bukowski, Bacon. The color of the futility of living for the future burns deep in me. I can’t help but order the drinks.