"Bloodless," Andrew Bird
Conversations with the Teacher about Covid, praying, and the politics of spirituality.
Hello! You’ve found Faye’s Wing, a series of multimedia scenes about the creative quest for fulfilment beyond a fixed spiritual identity. It comes out every Wednesday, and features music and visuals from contributing artists. If you are new here, I suggest you start at the beginning and read the story sequentially. You can also check out my project overview for more info, or view the list of scenes you might have missed.
“They’re profiting from your worry
(…) They’re banking on the sound and fury1
Covid takes centre stage again. In shops, smiles fade, people recede into themselves, forming body armours with their baskets, crashing trolleys into displays with attempts at two-fingered steering. Dystopia closes in as a rumour builds around mandatory vaccination. Throughout the boys’ early years in rural Virginia, I carefully weighed the pros and cons of each jab, building on my naturopathy studies. Three home births, two of which were unassisted, confirmed that listening in and letting nature take the lead yielded the healthiest results for my babies and myself. In those deeply personal choices, I wasn’t reacting to negative outcomes or on a crusade against the medical system, nor was I advocating for everyone to do the same—it simply felt safest for our family.
Equating safety with minimal medical interventions, I trusted the body’s ability to overcome most childhood and seasonal illnesses, waited for my sons’ immune systems to mature, and had a less-is-more approach vis-à-vis conventional medicines. Blessed with overall health, their ailments responded well to home care, dietary adjustments, acupuncture. And so the threat of mandatory vaccination is terrifying. The idea of compromising healthy constitutions with unproven, last-minute lab fumbling strikes me as irresponsible, especially since our life out here, by the ocean, remains quite sheltered.
If only the Teacher would refute my apprehensions or, at least, tell us clearly where she stands. Surely, with so many teachings about the sacredness of the body, she wouldn’t support such a violation. But, forbidden from discussing individual circumstances during our online gatherings, there is no visibility on how any of my Devi sisters are handling these loaded considerations. At a core level, I see our spiritual beliefs as timeless and apolitical. Indeed, the Teacher constantly urges us away from headlines, warns us against the vacuum of worldly debates. Even when Notre-Dame went up in flames, my tears were dismissed as attachment to another tradition, and I was told to turn within rather than get caught up in nostalgia.
Yet here we are, suddenly catapulted into worldly considerations, glued to the news, unable to avoid political stances. I do my best to prevent polarised shouting matches from seeping into my safe space, learning to shield against panic and viral contamination. Oddly, meanwhile, the Teacher develops an “end of times” trope in her talks, no doubt in response to the jumble of fears voiced by her students in private. Talking heads call out the absurdity of official narratives, but they too are tainted with hysteria. In the shortage of common sense, and longing for trustworthy reassurance, I feel boxed in and alone with my concerns. I refuse to slot in with crazed conspiracies, yet what if some of their fears turn out to be valid? More worryingly, the erosion of freedoms and recent talk of a vaccination passport might prove one of the wildest predictions of the early pandemic days to be true.
One evening, perhaps sensing my anxiety, the Teacher writes.
Teacher: I feel you poking around at something. Are you unhinged by the pending move?
Me: No… The move conjures spaciousness, like a deep breath out, compared to the tight vice here in France.
I’ve been rattled by a documentary sent by a uni friend not usually prone to gullibility. Taking the Teacher’s question as an invitation to address my concerns, I pick up my laptop and type a long message.
Me: Today I watched four hours of investigative journalism featuring Nobel winners in chemistry and medicine, pharmaceutical researchers, doctors, pharmacists, a former Minister of Health, a member of parliament, philosophers, sociologists, former intelligence agents, anthropologists, IT specialists... all at the top of their field. France is small, but it is a country of thinkers. This was not the usual YouTube sensationalism, it was a detailed, thorough report. These people would not risk their reputation for a minute of sketchy fame.
The film explored the ramifications of Covid... France now has a not-so-secret group of defence advisors who override constitutional democratic processes. Not to mention its well-established pharmaceutical industry lobby.
The documentary showed a graduation speech (in the public domain, easily found online) from the École Polytechnique, which shapes France’s future ruling elite. In it, graduates are told that the world is fractured between those who know and those who are “useless”. Literally, that chilling word. Then came a montage of the elderly locked in care home rooms, barred from hospitals, with evidence of a euthanasia drug legally rolled out just before the pandemic. It showed women in masks as they were giving birth, the most epic effort a human being can make. Only a few months ago, toddlers cried if their carer was masked—they are now terrified of uncovered faces. Why has unadorned humanity become a threat?
I digress… The film showed an apocalyptic nightmare. Every panic wheel in my system ought to have been screeching. Yet things were calm inside, knowing that the Goddess has got this covered, that all will somehow be well... Not because unicorns and fairies will come and save us, but there was a sense of safety in the eye of the storm if I stay focused on what matters.
Love, kindness. Helping one another. Clean air and food. Birdsong. Something tells me that staying the course, acting on our instincts, deepening on the path are more essential than ever.
I hope you don’t interpret this as me freaking out and talking crazy sh—. I’m calm.
I’ve also been feeling into Rātri, the wisdom name you’ve given me, asking Her for clarity, courage, and trust in the dark night. Regardless of the truth, I won’t be bullied, and I don’t want fear to cloud my life.
I take a deep breath and wait.
Teacher: You may be calm, but you are telling yourself stories. What a long message you’ve written.
Me: It was long because I don’t want to hide my feelings from you.
Beneath the global worries looms the fear of losing my place in the Kula and my relationship with the Teacher. If she were to tell me to get the jab, would I be cast out for refusing? Disagreements signal danger, the possibility of rejection. Her messages light up my phone in rapid succession as I ponder.
Teacher: Let go of trying to understand in order to feel safe. It only winds you up, absorbs life force. It won’t work. All the time and energy you spend on this topic, when you could be focusing on the Goddess.
Have I ever pushed you away because we disagree? That's an old family habit and needs healing.
Please, dear love, please. Don't make me into the bad guy.
Breathing out, I type a reply.
Me: I see that my fear does not apply to the Teacher-student relationship, that I’m safe with you.
Teacher: You create a lot of drama around the fear of rejection, and then push people away. Please stop now.
Look, we had a moment, and I'm still here, right?
Sacha pops his head from his bedroom and mouths, “Good night.” Seeing his curls over his ever quizzical eyebrows, I am overwhelmed with love, and leap up to give him a big hug.
‘Thanks, Mom. Love you,’ he says, burrowing under his duvet as I shut his bedroom door and pick up my phone again.
Me: Where should we place our trust, when values are turned upside down? As Tantrics, we live in the world, even if we don’t look for truth or safety in the world. We have families to look after...
How do we live responsibly in the face of chaos? I feel most responsible for my loved ones and my community, by staying level-headed. I can’t change much of anything else. Is that shallow, or selfish?
Is there not a duty to share the blessing of Ireland, by offering an apolitical natural refuge to kindred spirits?
Teacher: Regardless of your interpretation, people are suffering. Dig deeper into your practices and focus on alleviating suffering. Where you put your attention, where you spend your energy, is what you become.
Isn’t that what I was saying? I feel like I’m being scolded for saying the same thing using different words. It’s late now; I feel drained, at a loss for words.
Me: Thank you, I will contemplate this.
Teacher: You are welcome. Still feeling fussy with me?
I don’t really want to carry on, but I won’t be able to sleep until I’ve cleared my head.
Me: I’ve always been a good girl, a good student. You’ve told me off about this. For once, I’m voicing my anger, even if it feels dangerous, like I might be cast out of the Kula. And you’re scolding me for speaking up.
Teacher: Rebellion isn’t useful.
Nothing we understand as lowercase truth is actually True. Focus on Truth, instead of on the shifting machinations of human politics.
Rest in the Truth of the Goddess's cosmos and engage in politics from a different standpoint. Anything else lands you in continual psychological turmoil. Take a multiple lifetime view.
Me: What about sending prayers and good intentions for all this to resolve?
Teacher: Are your 'good intentions' perhaps partial, colonial, privileged?
How can you know what a good future will look like? Tell me what is "good”? Doing something 'bad' now can have a 'good' outcome later and vice-versa. It’s presumptuous to think that you know.
Me: Surely sending loving thoughts is okay, though?
Teacher: Even these are based on a personal idea of what counts as 'love'. How do you know they are welcome? It's colonial to imagine you do.
Colonial? I understand what she’s saying; it’s in every left-leaning paper these days. The repercussions of colonialism must be righted, but does that fall within the remit of a spiritual teacher? I came to both of my teachers for spiritual guidance, not for their political views. I’m being told off for engaging in politics via a word that is specifically time-stamped with contemporary issues, and steeped in a specific social construct… Is the Teacher contextualising thousand-year-old chants, or should they somehow be preserved from anachronistic interpretations? To what extent have the values of social justice identitarianism leached into the Shakta heartlands? Have the Goddess’s pīṭha, the sacred seats where She resides on the earth’s body, shifted from Nepal and Bengal to Californian yogalands? Are the teachings even compatible with how we live today? I am so frustrated I could scream. I thought she understood me, could read my heart. Could this be another test?
Me: What about our prayers, are they colonial, too?
Teacher: From the Goddess’s point of view, they are intrusive and restrict the free will of others. You must always ask for permission before you pray. Don't just send them out to everyone.
Me: But how can we possibly ask for permission from the earth, Gaia, and all of her people?
Teacher: Gaia is our name for Her. That's not necessarily Her name for Herself, you know?
We want to feel like we can make a difference, yet all we can do is to work on ourselves, put on our own oxygen mask first.
Tears well up. It feels like the Teacher is picking a fight over words. How can I get through to her?
Me: I think we understand each other...
Teacher: I want to address the question under your question.
The real solution is to eradicate your fear. A single fearless person can change a community. It’s a full-time job to heal wounds, to eradicate fear, to let go of beliefs.
My job is to focus on your inner landscape and eliminate anything that hinders the unfolding of your Goddess nature.
Go deeper.
I think of the stories I’ve heard of my Jewish grandfather during the war. Having reached the free zone, he could have played it safe. Instead, he was an early joiner of the Resistance who brought parachuted English soldiers to safety. I’m not sure I have even half his courage, but doing nothing feels wrong. Again, the Teacher’s answer is dismissive:
Teacher: So he did brave things in difficult times.
Times are different. Change starts with us.
I am overwhelmed by a tangle of emotions—gratitude and guilt about my blessings, with a longing to share whatever goodness manifests in my life. A new life in Ireland has landed in my lap like a gift I didn’t even know I wanted. There, I will be sheltered by nature from illness and political madness. Feeling into this future, into potentially living in safe community, makes the back of my neck tingle in excitement.
Me: In that case, I want to share my privilege. What about creating an apolitical refuge until the dystopia is over?
Teacher: Use your privilege for ultimate good rather than focusing on the ripples of the world. Individual healing would eliminate global catastrophes.
Though it may look like I am not doing anything, my life’s work is to help people ease their suffering and be closer to the Goddess.
If just one of my students actualises the path, the ripple effect will help the whole world.
“Bloodless,” © Andrew Bird, My Finest Work Yet, 2019.
I completely feel Marguerite’s frustration. I hope she finds peace in Ireland and trusts her own instincts.