It appears to be starting again--no fear, no attachment, just breath!

Ashram Lily 

I was just thinking, wow, no unusual visions, no extreme energetic downloads, maybe I am settling into some sort of peaceful groove...Until a few days ago, the heart expansion process began again.  It feels like I need to crack open my ribcage, so there is more room for my heart. There wass a continuous pain in my heart chakra that didn't appear to be related to heartburn or a heart attack.  I decided to explore this in combination with the sedated state I have been experiencing--try surrendering to it all and see what happens.  I found a quiet place to sit (where if I did tip over or went into some deep sleep mode that it wouldn't disturb anyone) and started to breath into my heart area--deep, slow breaths.  This has helped before and it seemed to start breaking up some of the congestion.  I also made a point to throw more onto the surrender pile--not sure how much more there is since to get to this point has taken up a fair amount, but I made as sincere of an offering as I could--open and soften.  Well that seemed to lead down(?)/up(?) some remarkably deep, dark tube.   Remarkably when I came back,  I felt a limitless and expansiveness in my heart chakra that I hadn't felt before--there were no boundaries.  Interesting to be in a limited body, but feel a limitless expansiveness internally.  I tried to trick it, but the space was holding steady.  How cool is that.  I did find my legs and started to mobilize the outer construction.

Beauty in simplicity

So I have noticed that anything I have resistance to means that is the direction I most likely need to head.  Honestly,  I still don't get the Guru feet situation, so I have started to put some pressure on myself to deal with this somewhat phobic situation.  In the world where I grew up, feet were covered, unsanitary, and not to be acknowledged. In principle, if I can pack up and move to India than I should be able to dismantle this limiting belief too.  As a start, I have been trying to really notice how everyone deals with his feet, stay present, and observe without hopefully being disrespectful.  Next, I have been making a point to touch his feet 85% of the time during pranam. And also on the list is to actually look at his feet while I am sitting and give them some mental acknowledgement from afar.  So today, I started the third point on the list:  all small but steady steps.  As I go to "embrace" them mentally, I get some massive energetic download into my heart chakra, it feels like two giant granite blocks are pressing on my chest, and I am having a difficult time breathing.  In the meantime, for whatever reason pictures of Jesus Christ are sorting through my visual field:  the nails through his feet, his long walk barefoot, and the images of feet being washed in yogurt/milk (that visual is probably from looking at the Guru Full Moon pictures from the night before which were stunningly beautiful.)  So this is the second or third time some dynamic experience came from "getting to know" Gurudev's feet, but I am not giving up.  As I kept with the steady, deep, slow breaths, the blocks started to shift and the intensity retreated.  A feeling of tearful tenderness for the unquestioning love and acceptance from these Divine Beings was what settled in.