To go from paying ¾ of my income for rent to not using money at all is a beautiful feeling. I did have to pay to live here, but it works out to roughly $6 a day, which includes daily yoga classes, three meals, and a 15’ by 15’ room with bathroom/shower. With that portion paid in the beginning, the only time I need to touch money is when I go off the land to do laundry. (My life in New York cost $40 a day. That sum included shelter, food, transportation, and cell phone. Yoga was extra).
I don’t remember the last time I went two solid weeks without spending money. When I am out in the world I keep a small notebook with me at all times for list making, and often things that require spending money dominate my ‘to dos.’ Here, I don’t carry anything around except a water bottle.
There have been a few weak moments when I open the computer to write and find myself window-shopping online: mostly camping store websites. (Already I am settling into my west coast ways). I last about as long online shopping as I do in department stores before I start to feel a pit swell in my stomach and must find the closest exit. This wasn’t always the case, but ever since I collected unemployment back in 2003 I have been reconfiguring my brain wiring that tells me I need things.
This week I decided to push the idea of what I need a little further and take a vow of silence until Thanksgiving. There are a few residents that have been silent for over a decade. Babaji has been silent since 1957. I spend a lot of time on my work shifts with one man who is silent. He’s been teaching me truck mechanics. For someone who doesn’t speak, he talks quite a bit. He writes his thoughts on a very small chalkboard so when he has to explain something to me with detail, like Wednesday when I got to drive the big truck, we didn’t leave the driveway for five minutes.
Silence is draining. It requires a lot of focus, which I did not anticipate. I consider myself a pretty good listener, but when I’m speaking with someone I am not just listening. I’m formulating a response, empathizing, and searching my memories for stories or relationships to get closer to what I want to say. And with all of the thinking going on while I’m listening, I risk not hearing them at all. I perceive what is happening based on my desire to associate someone’s story with my own. With that comes all the stuff one brings to any relationship. The silence slows me down and is helping me let go like nothing ever has.
