A Spiritual Burrito, Editing One Emotion, And What On Earth Is “Wholeness”?

I love burritos. Everything you want in the meal in one complete package.

It just wouldn’t be the same if you left out the Guacamole, or the Salsa, or the Black Beans, or the Carnitas, or the fresh Lettuce and diced Veggies, or the Mozzarella Cheese. If you left out any one ingredient, it just wouldn’t be the same.

And if I understand the Buddha correctly, this is a perfect analogy for our lives.

And likewise, with the palette of emotions we can experience.

My first life was in the theatre, and I studied acting with an amazing, awesome, insanely inspired teacher named Ted Liss. And he always used to say to us, “If you edit one emotion, you edit them all.” Translation, “You have to let yourself experience and be in all emotions to be truthful on stage. 

So, this brings me to the question, “What is Wholeness?”

Let me digress.

My first life was in the performing arts, the theatre, as I like to say, as a struggling, performing artist. And my second life has been in the healing arts, as a struggling, healing artist. (I’m not complaining, I’m very rich in Spirit!)

So, I have spent most of the last 20 years studying health and healing and self-actualization in one form or another – Yoga Philosophy & Practice, Chinese Medicine Philosophy & Practice, Meditation, Chanting, Archetypes, Movement, Clean Eating, and the philosophy of “Living According to our Nature”.

To be more accurate, the last 40 years of my life have been a quest for healing myself, and working tirelessly to facilitate healing in others.

I have also worked as a Shiatsu Practitioner, Massage Therapist, and Yoga and Meditation Instructor for 17 years for an Integrative Medicine Program (Housed within a Western Medical Corporation), where the bulk of our patients are in advanced disease states – Cancer, Heart Disease, Diabetes, Auto-Immune Disorders, Survivors of Multiple Surgeries, and on numerous drugs. I have seen advanced disease states up close in all their manifestations, and it’s a sobering experience.

So, I ask myself, “What gets in the way of our healing?”. I’m not talking about “curing” disease, but about healing on the deepest levels.

Maybe the first question we need to ask is, “What is healing?” “What is health” “What is wholeness? 

For me, wholeness is acceptance of everything in our current experience, and choosing to live with love, gentleness, kindness, and forgiveness.

“Surrendering to what is” is one of the great teachings of all Wisdom Traditions.

Why is this so difficult for us?

Because we don’t want to be in pain, we don’t want to suffer, we don’t want to be uncomfortable.

But it is in the “being with what is”, i.e. the whole enchilada (in this case burrito), that begins the process of healing.

Allowing ourselves to truly, fully, experience what we are experiencing, without internally censoring, or commenting on, or getting all involved in the dramatic internal dialogue in the thinking mind.

So, this brings me to a guiding light in my life for many years – the practice of meditation.

And what is meditation, but the resting in the soul, in the deep inner wisdom within, and allowing ourselves to be gentle with our path on this earth in this human body.

Being fully with what is. Ram Dass said it best, “Be here now.”

Without the director’s commentary, the thinking mind’s point of view, the jaded dissatisfaction with all that is. Without the preconceptions, the expectations, the past history’s shadow on the mind.

Instead, it would do us well to heed the Buddha’s instruction to be here now with an open mind and an open heart (The Boddhisatva).

To practice emptiness, receptivity, reverence.

Yes, to be childlike, curious, open, and smiling at the world.

So, I offer you a simple Buddhist affirmation to work with today,

“Breathing in, I calm my body, Breathing out, I smile.”

May you walk through this day in wholeness, and for goodness sake, eat the whole damn burrito!