The Wizard in the Park

The oddest things occur in Union Square. The park situated between 14th & 17th St at the northern end of Manhattan's East Village is a rather ironic spot. Numerous yoga studios, including a new fusion of Tai Chi and Yoga, Tao Yoga, have recently opened; same for spas, organic restaurants and, of course, Whole Foods. Most major political and social rallies in NYC are either centrally located or pass through this area. Every night hundreds of NYU students, after workers and random passerby stop for a moment or hour to sit on the grass, watch hackey sackers and capoeiristas or eat a meal. And yet, even in the midst of this dymanic community, the NYPD house a holding cell underneath in the subway system. Beneath all festivities a prision lives.

Yesterday was one of those nearly summer days filled with sunshine and serenity. I had a break between classes and was sipping on chai, watching four guys play hackey sack over a handail - a NYC version of the California game "Net," which is basically a hackey sack volleyball (based on the Thai Buka Ball). Out of the corner of my eye I spotted someone dressed in some, well, unusual attire. While I was surrounded on all sides, I felt his eyes find me. He began talking, seemingly random, though I knew it was directed at me. I kept watching the makeshift game, certain a conversation was inevitable.
"The greatest way to find adventure is not to look for adventure." I knew he was building toward something, and I turned when he said this. In front of me was a medium-sized black man wearing a wizard's cape, long white beard-on-a-string, skirt and wielding a cane. I love New York.

He sits down next to me and immediately, as if language was something savored and not merely blurted out, says "So you are drinking tea from Avalon." I had purchased my daily dose of the incredible Chai Seduction from Tavalon, a killer tea spot that recently opened on 14th St. As I looked at the cup my right index finger, unbeknownst to me, was covering the "T." Fitting.

We chatted for a bit, mostly about the Dialogue Project, which had made a home in the square, as well as the upcoming Mermaid Siren Festival in Coney Island. He feared it was going to be the last one since large corporations were trying to "mall-ize" the boardwalk. He mentioned the blog he runs (wizards have to keep up with the times), though in all honesty I forget what it is. That opening comment, however, remains with me.

Not that it's anything new; he was merely pointing out Malroy's old maxim in Le Morte de Arthur. Ironically, however, all the knights did indeed go out questing, most often choosing the darkest patch of forest to enter. The chivalrous route was never known to take a path easily laid before them. To find the holy grail, which was an analogy for finding the true Self in this world of fragmented selves, the knights had to take the road less traveled. And it was certainly a conscious decision that Galahad took, even though he was the only one to attain the prize.

Yet I knew well what my new wizard friend was speaking about. Sometimes strangers clue you in to things you need to hear, even if they don't realize it. If the grail, Self-knowledge, is attainable by all of us, then there's something deeper than casual meetings among random folk; it is an unconscious force driving us together. On occasion we get a glimpse into the path of another and lend a hand, a quick reminder that in order to attain your goal, you have to give up the desire to attain it. Only then do you pursue it from a place of purity. If the knights of old knew one thing about the quest, it was that they had to be purified by the process. Those that weren't inevitably failed.

How to acquire something you do not desire? If only these things were easy to explain! However, the Katha Upanishad offers a great summation: "When the wise realize the Self/Formless in the midst of forms/Changeless in the midst of change/Omnipresent and supreme/They go beyond sorrow." The riddle to our wizard's answer: meditation. Upon the realization that everything is complete stillness within movement, you realize that the quest is for nothing external, not continual states of pleasure and excitement (though this proves the greatest temptation!), but for a calmness of mind.

The most difficult posture a yogi will perform in class is meditation. Every day I watch countless people on treadmills, watching overhead TVs, reading magazines and listening to iPods - at the same time. What, exactly, is being "worked out?" With such habits, is it any surprise we develop no control over our emotions, reactions to surroundings, the constant sense of heaviness the world presents to us? How is it, then, that we develop ekagrata, that single focus yogis tout as the way to Self-realization? By finding the stillness in every movement, noticing the silence embedded into every sound, such a goal does not seem daunting. It feels quite natural.

Take a few moments to notice the way rain becomes consumed by a lake. Or the reflection of sunlight on a glass building. Or the way a kitten moves into your outstretched hand. There is much strength in gentleness, just as there is tender softness in a firm mind. Through meditation, noticing the subtle gestures of life, the heaviness lifts. Soon all the resistance becomes something strong inside of you. You use tension as leverage as a bridge hovers over an abyss, not as the sinking feeling that everything is rallying against you. By trying to stop getting everywhere all at once, you allow the world to come to you. When this occurs, the quest is never without you again.