Dancing With Shiva - part 1

[McArthur]

I never really liked school and English was one of my worst subjects. This is part 1 of a rough draft of me attempting to describe something that happened over Christmas. Should i even try to write this down? I dunno.
The day before, Boxing Day, i had another experience i may write up some day. Reminded me of shadow boxing. It ended with me shaving off my shoulder length hair. I always liked my hair long.


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It was 26th December i went out drinking with an old childhood friend, John. We went to his parents house first so he could get changed and he lent me a green top with the words 'Nike' in white emblazened across the chest. I had slept at his place the night before after coming from a party elsewhere, so I needed the change of clothes.

His father gave us a lift to the pub my friend frequents. It's a gay bar that is part of a gay niteclub nearby. I bought the first round, a Newcastle Brown for myself and a Lager and lime for John, and we sat at a table listening to the music. There were two DJ's, one playing the records, and the male owner, dressed as a female silvery Christmas tree, working the mic.

Even before we arrived i could feel things... changing? I felt happier than i had for a long time and there was that unmistakable background feeling of love. As we sat at the table my heart chakra began to blossom and fill my chest with the most amazing glow of warmth and bliss that would eventually envelope my entire being. John was too busy scanning the guys to have a conversation, which suited me well because i was busy exploding into a state of utter Bliss that is difficult to describe. I never really talk to John about my spiritual experiences, and he has no interest in that area anyway, so how could i say to him, "John, i think i'm having some form of samadhi/Kundalini experience?" At the time it seemed perfect that John had no interest in the things i do.

I just sat there with what must have been the biggest grin in the entire pub and went with the flow. The warm liquid feeling in my chest rose up to my crown chakra and it felt as though a soft warm flame was emanating from my head like a fountain. The Blissful loving sensation made me feel like i was glowing as brightly as the Sun and, glancing around, i thought to myself "Can they feel this?". I also thought, "Has someone spiked my drink?" (LOL!) but i knew no-one had because it started before we got there.

John went off to chat to someone at the bar and i sat at the table trying to look normal. I had urges to close my eyes and melt away into nothingness and pure bliss, but i couldn't in a bar full of people. So i just sat there quietly, gently holding back the tears of joy that wanted ever so urgently to wash my smiling face.

So i watched and observed everything around me. My attention went to the music and every word, every note played, became a direct dialogue with God. Every movement of the people in the bar, every expression on thier faces, every laugh or noise or flash of light from the disco lights was an expression of the Divine. I asked myself, "Can these people see what i'm seeing right now?" It was as if there was no difference between what i saw and what they saw. We were all like fingers in some mult-fingered Cosmic glove where the fingers Know but the glove does not. Thier Outer selves carried on as normal but i could see, and was conversing with, thier Inner selves on some level. Is this what is meant by the lifting of the veil of Isis? The glove being the veil and the fingers the Ultimate Reality? How many veils are there?

I felt like i was in Heaven and The One was saying, "Look, see! There is nothing wrong, everything is Perfect! Enjoy life, be happy, Love thyself!". And i silently replied, "I see you, i see you in all of this, there is nothing that is not you. How playful you are! how loving! How perfect!". And i smiled even more. My eyes would occasionally meet with someones and they would smile back and i asked them silently, "Do you know? Surely you can feel this? How could you not feel and see all this?" And the answer? "Shhhh. We choose not to." And that too, is perfect.

The DJ dressed as a Christmas tree, wearing the top of the tree as a hat, asked for requests. Something in me made me stand up and i went over and asked for 'I Feel Good' by James Brown. I felt like dancing now. I wanted to express the Cosmic Dance of Shiva (*see note) i was seeing all around me and to let go into the Bliss that was calling. To feel His limbs, His fingers, dancing all around me.

John had come to sit back with me but i don't remember what, if anything, we talked of. As i was experiencing all of this, the answers to innefable questions in the blink of an eye passed through my consciousness. I wanted to remember it all but knew that somehow i wouldn't. I do remember one song held some Cosmic symbolism i wanted to remember and asked him the name of the song. He told me but i still don't remember. So i just relaxed into the experience rather than grasp at it. It wasn't as if i was floating downstream, it was like being an empty reed in the stream feeling it tickle me and gently flow over me on its never-ending journey.

to be continued (i went to the nightclub)
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*note: For those not familiar with the Shiva symbolism here is a quote from "The Hero with a Thousand Faces" by Joseph Campbell. It descibes the symbolism of the usual statues of Shiva (picture below, see link);

"Briefly: the extended right hand holds the drum, the beat of which is the beat of time, time being the first principle of creation; the extended left holds the flame, which is the flame of the destruction of the created world; the second right hand is held in the gesture of "fear not", while the second left, pointing to the lifted left foot, is held in a position symbolizing "elephant" (the elephant is the "breaker of the way through the jungle of the world", i.e. the Divine Guide) ; the right foot is planted on the back of a dwarf, the demon "Non-knowing", which signifies the passage of souls from God into matter, but the left is lifted, showing the release of the soul: the left is the foot to which the "elephant-hand" is pointing and supplies the reason for the assurance, ´Fear not´. "

"Fear not, for all rests well in God. The forms that come and go- and of which your body is but one- are the flashes of my dancing limbs. Know me in all, and of what shall you be afraid?"- Shiva, Lord of the Dance.

http://www.worldtrans.org/CyberSangha/BUD-HIND/SHIVA.GIF