Rumi's Four Essential Practices Read online

and gets you very drunk

  you’ve seen what happens when you eat and drink

  let’s see what happens if you fast instead

  fasting will make your neck thinner

  but save you from death;

  food and drink make your stomach full

  but fasting makes you drunk;

  quick, squeeze your waist

  put on the belt of fasting;

  try to obtain the eyes that see god

  with the eyesight of fasting;

  if you keep swimming for thirty days

  back and forth in fasting’s sea in the end, my friend

  you can’t help but find its pearl

  o shams of tebriz

  you’re drunkenness and sobriety both

  you’re the festival with sweet candies

  and at the same time

  the dignity, power, and honor of fasting

  one by one

  messengers came from the kitchen

  saying angels have cooked halva in the sky

  when the body eats halva

  it goes to the bathroom

  but when the soul eats halva

  it flies to the sky

  fasting makes you dizzy

  lose weight

  and become pale

  but this loss of weight and color

  will give you the white hands of moses*2

  yesterday you filled your stomach

  with all kinds of bread and foods

  you became so sluggish

  so sleepy

  what comes of such indulgence?

  either recklessness

  or the need to go to the toilet

  sounds of moans and mourning

  come from the soul while fasting

  but the only sound that comes after a meal

  is a low-pitched rumble from the rear end

  so friend

  if you want to hear what the soul has to say

  then skip the meal;

  if you want to hear from the other end

  then bring the bowl closer to you

  with the help of love’s bread and water

  men and women turn their faces

  away from the wall of grief

  and lose their appetite

  for the bread and water of the table

  drink the wine of eternity

  give up eating and drinking

  be full without food

  at times we fill our belly

  with the sun and the moon

  at times we eat the clouds

  without a belly

  like the sun

  the month of fasting is here

  the table of soul has been set

  we take our hands away from food

  since fasting became our practice

  soul’s come alive again

  since soul comes as a guest

  let’s keep offering our body

  love is what I eat

  it goes down well

  and gives pleasure to my mouth

  I eat a little bit of bread soaked in gravy

  and used to eat a little trotter as well

  but eating trotter

  made me feel unwell

  so from now on

  I won’t have anything to do with trotter

  nor with anyone who’s overly fond

  of the meal and the table

  eating

  drinking

  and a warm loaf of bread

  are the lot of cold people

  joy

  ecstasy

  and radiance

  are the food of lovers

  when you’re fasting with your friends

  you can still drink love’s wine

  the drunkenness from that wine

  is completely different

  from the drunkenness that causes you shame

  and makes you sneak home like a scorpion

  so keep on drinking the cupless, jarless wine

  that doesn’t break your fast

  just know that it doesn’t come

  from grapes, wheat, or barley

  if you constantly throw stones

  with the catapult of fasting

  the castle of darkness

  comes tumbling down

  keep throwing stones with the catapult of fasting

  at the fortress of disbelief

  the towers of darkness

  most people live in the world

  of donkeys and oxen

  they crawl toward love

  if you were truly a lover

  you wouldn’t eat like that

  immersed in darkness

  because of eating and drinking

  your shirt becomes stained

  with the sweat of self

  if you take fasting to heart

  you’ll hear the sound

  I am at your service

  I am at your service

  every time you call out

  my god

  my heart wants the halva

  that brings peace and pleasure to the sufi

  and what a delicious halva it is!

  its smell rises up from the top

  in every breath I take

  you eat this halva

  with your heart

  without touching your hand to your mouth

  just like a fig

  whose mouth remains closed

  this halva comes from the other world

  so eat there

  without your hands

  without your mouth

  time to celebrate!

  the month of fasting is here

  I wish a good journey

  to everyone who keeps company

  with those who are fasting

  I climbed the roof

  to see the moon,

  the lord of fasting got me so drunk!

  I lost my hat

  while gazing at the moon

  and then I lost my mind

  there’s another secret moon besides this one,

  it’s hiding out in the tent of fasting

  so anyone who comes this month

  to the harvest of fasting

  finds the way to this moon

  I’m a doctor,

  and I want you to go on a diet

  fear has made you sick

  and caused you to lose hope

  stay on this diet

  and I’ll make a potion for you

  when you drink it

  you’ll never come back to yourself

  the month of fasting has come

  so let’s not talk about the bowl or jar

  from now on

  let’s enjoy the pitcher of eternity

  and get drunk

  off of that pitcher

  when you’re fasting

  you’re the guest of god

  and are served the meal of heaven

  when you shut the door of hell this month

  thousands of heaven’s gates spring open

  A certain youth in the service of a great king was dissatisfied with the amount of food he was being given, so he went to the cook and scolded him:

  “By the stinginess of your portions, you dishonor our master!”

  The youth wouldn’t listen to the cook’s excuses but wrote off an angry letter of complaint and sent it to the king. The letter was outwardly complimentary and respectful, but it betrayed an angry spirit.

  On receiving this letter, the king saw that it contained only complaints about meat and drink and showed no aspirations for spiritual food. Therefore, he decided it needed no answer, as “the proper answer to a fool is silence.”

  When the youth received no answer to his letter, he was much surprised and threw the blame on the cook and on the messenger, ignoring the fact that the folly of his own letter was the real reason for its having gone unanswered.

  He wrote the king five letters, but the king persisted in his refusal to reply, saying that fools are enemies of God and man and that he who has any dealings with a fool just
ends up fouling his own nest. Fools only regard material meat and drink, whereas the food of the wise is the light of God. Fasting is the food of God, the means by which spiritual food is obtained.

  One day some travelers from another land begged the Prophet for food and lodging. The Prophet was moved by their entreaties and instructed each of his disciples to take one of the strangers to his home and feed and lodge him there. So each disciple selected one of the strangers and invited him back to his home as a guest.

  But there was one big and coarse man, a veritable giant, whom no one would receive, and so the Prophet took him back to his own home. In his compound, the Prophet had seven she-goats to supply his family with milk, and the hungry stranger devoured all the milk of the seven goats (to say nothing of all the bread and meats!) and left not a drop for the Prophet’s family. Understandably, the family was very annoyed—so annoyed in fact that, when the stranger retired to his chamber for the night, one of the maidservants locked him in.

  During the night, the stranger began to feel unwell because of having eaten so much. He got up from his bed and tried to get out into the open air, but he was unable to do so because of the locked door. Finally, he became very sick and defiled his bedding.

  In the morning, he was extremely ashamed, and the moment the door was opened, he ran away. The Prophet was aware of what had happened but let the man escape so as not to cause him further shame. After he had gone, the servants saw the mess he had made and informed the Prophet of it, but the Prophet made light of it and said he would clean it up himself.

  While the Prophet was engaged in this work, the stranger came back to look for a talisman he’d left behind in his hurry to escape. As soon as he saw what the Prophet was doing, he burst into tears and apologized profusely for his filthy conduct. But the Prophet consoled him, saying that his weeping and penitence would purge the offense, and explained how the outward acts of prayer and fasting bear witness to the spiritual light within.

  After being nurtured on this spiritual food, the stranger renounced his gluttony. He thanked the Prophet for bringing him to the knowledge of the true faith and bringing him back to life. The Prophet was satisfied with his sincerity and asked him to sup with him again.

  At supper, the stranger drank only half a portion of milk yielded by one goat and steadfastly refused to take any more, saying he felt perfectly satisfied with the little he had already taken. The other guests marveled at how the stranger’s gluttony had been cured so soon and reflected on the virtues of the spiritual food that the Prophet had served.

  BREATHING DEEPLY

  The most important food our body needs is the oxygen in the air we breathe. We can live without solid food for months on end and go without water for days, but if oxygen is taken away from us for even a few minutes, our body dies, and we move on to whatever awaits us next.

  As critical as oxygen is for our survival, however, most of us suppress our breath and breathe with only a fraction of the capacity actually available to our lungs, and we do this by holding our body still. Each of us has developed a signature holding pattern in the tissues of the body, a unique way in which we tense individual muscles and fascia in order to contain and hold back on the power of the breath. But, in holding back on the breath, we hold back on ourselves.

  In order to accommodate the full power of the breath, the entire body needs to be very supple and relaxed. Have you ever watched how a sleeping baby breathes? The movements of breath can be seen passing through its entire body in a beautifully fluid, wavelike motion. The movements in the head look like tidal waters, which quickly ebb and flow; the little body expands . . . and contracts with movements of human grace and fluidity that you’re unlikely to see anywhere else. Over time, though, as we grow and age, we follow the example of our elders (who followed the example of theirs) and learn how to contain the breath by bringing tension into our body so that this once natural wave of resilient motion no longer occurs. It’s as though the waters in our body start to freeze and can no longer allow the motion of breath to pass effortlessly through.

  But what are we holding back on? And what are we so afraid of surrendering to? The power of the breath is a very potent force, and it wants to breathe us. What might happen if we were to surrender to this most natural of forces instead of holding back on it?

  Like so many other spiritual teachers before and since, Rumi was keenly aware of the integral connection between how we breathe and our condition of mind. While our diminished patterns of breath are still adequate to ensure the continued life of our physical body, they’re not adequate to nurture the ecstatic life of our soul. A cultural pattern of holding that inhibits the breath comes with a high price tag. When we don’t breathe freely, our vitality suffers, we gradually lose touch with the shimmering nature of bodily sensation, and we often end up trapped in the chatter of our minds. But if we’re able to relax, soften, and free up the restrictions to our breathing so we can start surrendering to each and every breath, allowing it to breathe us however it wants—our body becomes energized, tactile sensations come out of hiding, and the involuntary monologue of the mind stands a chance of becoming still. As the chatter of mind quiets down, the energies and sensations of soul start coming out to play.

  Breath can bind you or free you; it all depends on how much conscious attention you bring to it. If you bring none, breath will still go on automatically, but it will almost certainly be contained. Because you can remedy this automatic tendency to suppress the breath by consciously attending to it, and because doing so possesses such a powerful capacity to affect consciousness, spiritual teachers of all ages have used techniques of breathing as tools for spiritual awakening. Common to all of the many diverse schools of Buddhism is the practitioner’s observation of, gradual surrender to, and eventual merging with the breath. Taoist masters employed breath techniques to alter consciousness and prolong physical longevity. The Indian science and art of pranayama, which focuses solely on different breathing exercises, has always been an essential part of a yogi’s practices. And then there are the powerful contemporary breath therapies such as Rebirthing and Holotropic Breathwork, which stem in part from the seminal work of Wilhelm Reich, the first Western psychotherapist to recognize the power of the breath in the therapeutic process.

  Every one of these techniques is powerfully effective, and yet they’re all very different. In some you may be instructed to take long, slow breaths; in others you breathe in rapid staccato bursts. Some instruct you to breathe through your nose, while others tell you to breathe through the mouth—and even others tell you to do both. Some tell you to hold the breath for a certain number of counts during the pauses between inhalation and exhalation; others tell you to avoid the pauses altogether. What these techniques all share and hold deeply in common, however, is their understanding that paying conscious attention to the breath, learning how to explore and tap its power, is an extremely effective way to grow in soul.

  In some of his poems, Rumi sounds like a yogi recommending the practice of deep-belly breathing and a prolonged kumbaka, the holding of the breath, and there are still Sufi schools today that practice the retention of breath as a spiritual discipline:

  god’s free creatures

  touched by his wine and wind

  fill their bellies with their breath

  hold it deep

  and keep silent

  In other poems, Rumi sounds more like a classical Buddhist, reminding us not to let our minds wander off:

  with every breath you take

  remember:

  keep the mind in the middle of the head

  And in others still, he draws on shared Jewish, Christian, and Muslim beliefs by linking our connection with God to every breath:

  if you want to protect your heart

  then remember god

  in every breath you take

  Of all the many references to the breath that occur in Rumi’s poetry, however, and of all the many pithy instructions on breath that Rumi
gives, none is mentioned more often than the breath of love. Sometimes Rumi will also speak of this quality of breath as the breath of Jesus, because he viewed the historical Jesus as a great teacher of love. For Rumi, love was at once both the source and the goal of all spiritual unfolding:

  wherever you are

  in whatever circumstances you find yourself

  strive to be a lover

  Love is the force of attraction that draws us to complete ourselves through union with another. Sometimes this other takes the form of another person, and we rightly speak of this friend as our personal beloved. But Rumi suggests that we also want to consummate our love with the larger energies of the soul—which we feel pressing out from inside us, wanting to burst forth and express themselves—and he referred to this internal courtship as the love affair with the universal Beloved. Rumi viewed these energies as a palpable force of such magnitude that, once you became aware of them, the only sane response would be to submit to them—and, if they tore you apart in the process, so be it. But conventional wisdom views things differently, and so we hold back on these energies and contain the breath, but then are left wondering why love seems so elusive.

  To understand what a breath of love might be like, and how we might practice this breath, first imagine for a moment what its opposite, a breath of fear, would be like. Fear comes in many forms, but it always involves some degree of holding still and some degree of resistance. The classic mime’s expression of sudden fright is a sharp, startled inhalation and, at the very top of the inhalation, the sudden freezing of the whole body. In contrast, a breath of love would be relaxed and fluid with inhalations and exhalations melting smoothly from one into the next. And the body too would have to be relaxed and malleable, able to let the breath billow and blossom and then subside and pass through its entire length with minimal interference or resistance.