Namaste, Asshole

Sometimes, just to uncoil my Kundalini, I go to a converted warehouse on the west side, off of Bundy, behind the Roger Dunn Golf Shop. I meditate at Siddha Yoga.

You park on the roof and only on the roof. If you park elsewhere, you will loose your shaktipat when you walk out of the mother ship of bliss to find that your car has been towed. Apparently Siddha Yoga people can’t align their carbon burning vessels properly on the tarmac and have thus infuriated their neighbors.

I like this place because it’s commitment free. No contracts to sign, no service to perform, no need to go door to door, work the airport, or jangle your tambourine at the Farmer's Market - just a friendly come as you are vibe. Newcomers can go to the newcomer table for Q and A and the world’s most delicious cookies. This is not a superlative I’m tossing around like last season’s sari. If they wanted to, they could easily finance the entire operation from the sale of these cookies. Supposedly they are vegan, organic and blah blah, but I detect notes of bacon in them.

The cookies are the primary draw, and the meditation is a decent by product. I can chant Sanskrit phrases I don’t understand at home, but I’ll never make cookies this good.

When you walk in, what you are really doing is participating in HEAVEN: THE RAINBOW DRESS REHEARSAL. You won’t be greeted by some catty twenty something in an 80s potpourri of blindness and shoes bought on credit like at Fred Segal. Here, a wizened soul, in a waterfall of loving color and open toed sandals greets you with warmth and anticipation as if you are arriving from a harrowing, centuries-long journey. I give them the devil horns. They’re cool with anything.

I head straight to the back where the eats hole is situated. It’s vegan world back there, but last week they served an incredible pizza selection. It blew the regulars away, and me too. I was expecting chick peas and echinacea, but what we got were cornmeal pizzas from Krishna’s own wood fired oven.

This famous hair stylist is a regular pracitioner. I try to avoid him because his peace and love aura is a little smug for my taste, but he is a good friend of my friend, Heather, so I have to rap with him before the cosmic ho-down.

At five minutes ‘til pranayamathon, someone walks up and down the corridor ringing a bell to signify that the medi-jam is about to blow up and that we’d better empty out all of our holes, take off our shoes and get comfortable for the rock-tastic ride to the infinite.

We all shuffle in to the sanctuary in silence. The sitar is already blazing, along with the drums, the harmonium and the other chanters. The opening chant is in Sanskrit and projected clearly with translations. I go with it, and I sway with the rhythm even though I look and feel like a platinum club member, frequent flyer on the Magic Bus.

There is a brief announcement followed by a reading. This is the part where I tune out. I don’t much care for readings, particularly when delivered in breathy awareness, with eager anticipation of the spiritual punch line. Laughing within – one hand clapping like a mutha.

At some point in the parade of symbols, a lady, usually the white kind, wearing a sari, comes from the back with a plate full of candles to light another set of candles. It is not mandatory, but it seems to me that you must follow her with your gaze when she comes around, otherwise something terrible could happen to you. I do it because I’m not here to fuck with the program or to innovate, just saying yes to everything.

Then the lights dim and we begin the high-production value, hour-long chanting session followed by 30 minutes of meditation. The chant usually translates into Oh Guru, light my candle, or I want to know you – your basic stuff brought back to the 4/4 time world by George Harrison.

It’s the sitar and all the other instrumentation that really gets me. They start slowly and almost imperceptibly build up to this maddening hindu jazz Temple of Doom crescendo that makes me feel like a rhesus monkey hopped up on goof balls. It takes all my will power not to jitterbug. Many many times, tears have streamed down my face from the sheer elation generated within the room and I’m surprised more people are not moshing/levitating, but just lightly swaying like tranquilized palms in a breeze. I can’t help but be reminded of the time I saw Fugazi perform at the Watsonville Vets Hall. The force of the music was so pure and clear that I bawled standing on a bench next to Tara Jepsen. These Siddha Yoga guys should take it on the road.

They take you to this peak of whateverness, and then they gradually take you down down down to meditation city. I find the come down sad and the meditation boring. It’s thirty minutes of getting to the oneness, and last time, I spent most of it envisioning my next orgy.

I’m relieved when the wake up chime starts jingling and the lights gradually come up. Anyone is welcome to kiss the feet of the big statue. I get to the shoe rack before someone decides to go home in my leather dress shoes. Heather told me that once someone took her shoes. I guess meditation can also cause amnesia.

I don’t feel transformed, I don’t feel any more closer to the universe, and I certainly am not closer to liking the countless photos of the guru ecstatically meditating on a block of ice in the mountains. But I do feel that it’s worth it. One day, I’ll be whacked in the back of the head by Ganesh’s trunk, but for the time being, I’m going to look busy with the others.