If you read the title to this post and went, “What?”, I’m right there with you.
Or at least I was before I studied with Little Bear and Red Feather, the former Native American and the latter his white wife who adopted native ways.
I learned about Little Bear through other teachers. Everybody said he was quite knowledgeable and powerful. Everybody said he was an incredible teacher.
And everybody said he was difficult, opinionated, irascible and definitely wouldn’t take on a BDWG (“Big Dumb White Guy”) as a student.
So, of course, I had to study with him.
It took about five years of asking. I made it a point to go where I knew he’d be and just sat patiently, watching as he danced or talked with others, not getting in his way, just letting him know I was interested. I showed him honor (I asked Red Feather, who was much more forthcoming, what his favorite tobacco was and bought him a tin of it, for example. I made him some Regalia, things like that).
It went from him saying “No” to him telling me what he charged to teach.
I couldn’t afford it. By a long shot. But I kept being patient and patiently asking.
Then one day he said, “Can you wash dishes?”
What?
“Can you wash dishes?”
Of course I can wash dishes.
“Then meet me …” and he gave me directions and a time. “You wash dishes and maybe we’ll talk about me teaching you.”
ALL RIGHT! I WAS IN!
Yeah, right. I’d never seen so many dishes, pots and pans in my life. Never! And I’d learned to cook for fleets up north!
We’d meet in training facilities, VFW posts, places like that. He’d teach 10, 20, 30 and more people in the meeting rooms, in the hall, sometimes outside on the grass or under the trees, and part of his teaching would involve feeding them. I would listen at the door or leave the kitchen door or window open so I could hear him while I washed.
It was great stuff.
And when he was done and everybody was gone, it would be him, Red Feather and me in the kitchen. He and I would wash dishes, Red Feather would sit in a corner and knit. Usually in a rocker.
And the things he taught me, my hands deep in soapy, oily, stinging hot water…things about moving through time, moving through fields of space like walking through fields of ripening grain, feeling the betwixt and between of stars and galaxies like seeds and pollens through your fingers, listening to my hands in the water, feeling the different energies that people had left on their plates, glasses and cups, feeling the energies left in the pots and pans and forks and spoons and knives and ladles, …
Wouldn’t it have been easier to use paper plates and plastic knives, forks and spoons? Paper cups, maybe?
“Yes, but then what would you learn?”
And each time we met he would quiz me on what I’d learned the last time, how much I practiced, what else did I want to learn, what was going on in my life, what personal troubles was I having that were blocking me from practicing further, stuff like that.
Sometimes Red Feather, rocking in a corner, listening and knitting, would chuckle or laugh out loud at something he or I said. Sometimes she nodded. Once in a while she’d comment and I never knew if she was correcting him or me.
Then one day he said, “Do you ever wonder who uses all these pots and pans?”
Well, I hadn’t really thought about it. I assumed it was him.
“Tell me more.”
Study and you’ll learn that’s one of the most powerful incantations around, “Tell me more.”
The energy in the pots and pans was different from the rest. Much more confident, much quieter, almost like a purring, a waiting. Definitely much more powerful.
He shoved his hand in the water and grabbed mine. For an 80yr old guy he had a grip that could bring tears to your eyes.
“Is it my energy?”
Hmm…well…umm…no…now that I’m paying attention. It’s not yours. It’s…womanish?
“Excellent. Do you know how to cook?”
Well, yeah. I’d learned to cook from my family, in my travels, yeah, I knew how to cook. Maybe. A little.
“Good. Time for you to learn how to cook and my wife’s a very good cook.”
He dried his hands, picked up a magazine and walked towards Red Feather’s rocker. She put down her knitting, stood up and walked over to me. He sat down and my new lessons with a new teacher started.
She taught me how to sense the “rightness” and “wrongness” of things, meaning “right” and “wrong” in the sense of what is good for you and what’s not as good for you. What things to eat to do what to your body, stuff like that.
And mostly she taught me to pay attention to what I do for others, such as cooking, preparing meals.
Long ago I was interviewed for a podcast. The interviewer learned that I love making pizza for friends and asked what the secret was to making great pizza.
Easy. You have to care about the people you’re cooking for. Love them, the pizza will be great. Don’t care about them, the pizza will be just like any other pizza.
“No, what’s the secret?” She didn’t understand. Caring about the people you’re feeding wasn’t good enough. That couldn’t have been the secret. Okay, then do x, y, z and you’ll get a decent pizza.
But that “caring about the people you’re feeding” is part of the secret. It’s almost all of the secret. You’re doing lots more than giving them food. You’re teaching them how to be.
Now, depending on the student and depending on the lessons required, we teach what we call “The Pizza Meditation”.
It’s not about making pizza (although that’s what you do and it always tastes great), it’s about being aware of the yeast rising from rooms or even miles away, from smelling the dough (we make pizza from scratch, the shells and everything) even though you’re no where near it, from listening to it rise and hearing it tell you it’s ready for kneading, to putting on the toppings and tasting them through your fingers so you’ll know how much of this and how much of that and what tastes go with other tastes in ways delicious and unexpected (ever had a feta chicken pizza? Yumm!), to listening to the pies bake and hearing them call you when they’re done and thanking everything on them as you eat and taste and savor and feel all the energy and love and caring the cook’s put into them so you can enjoy them.
It’s a day long meditation, from first proofing (of the yeast) to enjoying them hot from the oven, and the entire meditation is about expanding your awareness and sensory perception.
And the things you learn about energies and foods and people (you always ask the students to help you. That’s something Red Feather insisted on, no matter what you were making. That way they can learn and you can learn from them)!
So that’s The Pizza Meditation.
Maybe, just maybe, depending on what we’re learning and where we’re studying, we can meditate together someday.
Pizza Meditation – Ah, just the name of it evokes fond memories. I have been a recipient of this meditation many times (as Joseph wrote, he’ll make pizza for friends and often just for us) and can attest to its fun, delicious nature and benefits of eating the end product. The pizza meditation became part of a training on energy work we were doing. It was interesting to be in the middle of an exercise and have either Joseph or in this case, Dan, raise their heads and exclaim that the dough needed attending to. Sure enough we’d go into the kitchen and the dough would be overflowing the bowls. The exercise was on learning to feel the energies of things that weren’t part of you – the “not you” – in your body, to move those energies around and be aware of them. What better way to practice then to make pizza! Feeling the energies of the dough through your hands and exchanging your energy back into dough.
As a cook I can appreciate the process of mixing the yeast, proofing it, kneading it and finally making the pizza. It’s a long process and it is SO worth it. The dough takes on the energy of the person making it. It’s light and fluffy, unlike commercially prepared dough. The smells that are a part of the process are wonderful. The kneading of the dough is a meditation process in itself…responding and listening to what the dough needs.
My role is to cut up the ingredients that go on the pizzas and all things communicate to you and share their energies. The makers, Joseph and Dan, decide what to use. Part of the meditation, as I said before, is to listen to what the dough needs, does it need more water, more flour, more time to rise. And as a finished product does it want to be a cheese pizza, Northern White, Pepperoni? All are delicious and well worth the effort.
I would recommend a pizza mediation for everyone…the results are always satisfying.
The Pizza Meditation taught me to pay more attention, to sense what’s going on, even when it’s not within the range of my normal senses – especially when it’s not in the range of my “normal” senses.
The senses engaged were multi-varied. There was smell, there was hearing, there was an amorphous knowing. There were different signals being communicated to me in different ways at different times, and they were all being communicated clearly.
And at the end of the day, I was tasting more than the pizza. I tasted the energy and intention that went into it’s creation. I tasted the life in the pizza, I tasted the energy, intent and care I had put into the pizza.
I also tasted Joseph’s pizza. There was a different energy to it, and as Susan mentioned, it was in the sense of “not me”. It was equally delicious, but my pizza was clearly “of Dan”, and his was definitely “of Joseph”.
I learned that energy is something I can put in, take out, grow from, learn from. It’s part of me, and it’s part of everything else. It’s a thing that can influence me, I can influence it, and that I have to pay attention to my energy so that I can get the best outcomes. In pizza and in life.
I learned that you get out of it what you put into it. Put love into something and you’ll get love back out.
It’s that last part, the “you get out of it what you put into it”, that’s true in all things, me thinks.