Saturday, November 19, 2016

From Firewalker to Streetwalker all in One Day


 View from my seat


As I looked out over the arena I thought, here are 10,500 people all collected together, wanting more out of life, wanting to heal their hurts, wanting to be happy.

Happy people do not kill others for the fun of it. Happy people do not shoot up schools, or cause war. Happy people want to serve, they want to pass on what they have discovered, they want to uplift.

And because of all us attendees at the Tony Robbins “Unleash the Power Within” event, paying our entrance fee, collecting together on a grand scale, the people of the San Jose area received one million free meals.

This contribution probably comes from Tony’s background of growing up without things like FOOD. One year someone gave the family a Thanksgiving, or some holiday, meal. While his father saw it as evidence that he was not adequately supporting his family, Tony saw it as food. That father was one of three to come--most confusing to a young child.

As I sat down at the railing overlooking the main floor, my seat companion said he was from Grant’s Pass Oregon—another Oregonian, what are the chances? He works for the corporation of #Dutch Brothers—the coffee people. 

Paul was a live-wire, a young man, not one who looked corporate. When they asked him if he wanted to be corporate said, “Do you know who I am?

It must have been his enthusiasm.

The Dutch Brothers company uses many of Robbins’s principals in their business, he said, and he was there because the company sent him and 29 others to this event. They sent them on the company plane and put them up at the Hilton.  My kind of company!

I said that the servers at Dutch Brothers are always so nice and asked if they train them.

No, he said, “You can teach a monkey to make coffee, but you can’t teach him to be nice.”

“Don’t sit together, the manager had told their people. “Spread out. Have your own experience.”

I’m going out of the house in a little while, think I’ll have a Dutch Brother’s coffee. We  have a Keogh within a mile of where we live. I am supporting them royally from now on.  Great coffee too.

I looked online and found this picture "#Dutch love that goes viral."




Thank God for Angels:

Earlier that first morning I took the train from my motel into where I thought I was going, The San Jose Convention Center. There were three fellows on the train also going to the Robbins event, and one, who had registered the night before, knew what he was doing. “Follow me,” he said. “It isn’t the convention Center. It is the SAP, the Hockey Arena.”

The train didn’t go to the Hockey center. Our stop was at the convention Center.

Out came the cell phones as the three fellows searched for directions. “It is about a 20-minute walk to SAP,’ my first angel said. “Are you up for walking? “

“Sure, “ I said, backpack on my back, an easy carry. We were warned to bring jackets as the arena would be cold, and bring snacks and water as well, necessary to keep our energy up. Some days there would be no lunch break.  

And then at the end of the day—hey, I bet you thought I was going to give you the low-down on the event. Uh, uh, uh, first you must throw rocks at the hero.

You know we are the heroes of our own story…

Walking on hot coals is nothing compared with trying to find ground transportation in San Jose California at 2:30 A.M.

We got out of the event at around 2 in the morning, as the firewalk occurred around midnight. I wondered how I would be getting home, for I was not walking downtown to the train stop, besides the train had stopped running.

I figured taxis might be standing in line outside the arena, as they do at the airport.

Nope.

I had a UBER app. “No cars available.” it said.

Okay, I called a taxi.

At this time all 10,497 people of the 10,500 event participants had mysteriously blown away like Mary Poppins ‘competitors for the job as a nanny.

Three girls were sitting on the curb.

I was one.

A cab came. We three shared it.

“Take us to the closest stop first," we said. I do believe it was me, but the other girl said it was her, so I said ok. This was after the endless debate by the two girls on where they were going. One had two options, the other fussed with the driver telling him where to go, where to turn, although he had a GPS right before his eyes. The other girl hinted about staying with me, but I only had a queen bed, and I wanted to flop on it---alone.

“Is it closer to Milpitas, or Campbell?” the girl asked. “Give me an address, “said the driver.

After the first girl was dropped off, the driver said, “Now we are closer to Campbell.”

“I am not going to ride to Campbell and back,  said the dragon that reared up inside me. “Take me to my hotel.”

He did…but that’s not the end of the story.

It turned out that there were two motels by the same name, and I was dropped off at the wrong one. 

When I walked to what I thought was my room, the taxi was still sitting in the driveway while the girl debated. Nope, I thought. You are not staying with me.

Something didn’t feel right, so I went into the lobby. There was the same man who had checked me in the night before.

However, I was not registered there.

 “You checked me in last night,” I said.

“It was at the other motel. I work at both.”

 “Where’s the other one?’

“Right down the road.”

I knew I was on the right road, just a wrong street number.

“How far?”

“Right down the road.”

That guy wasn’t much help.

“I’m walking,” I said, and took off.

So I walked the five blocks down 1st street at 2:30 in the morning.

From Firewalker to Streetwalker all in one day.

But I made it home to a hot bath.


To be continued.

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

Come on Baby Light My Fire


No matter what you think of firewalking or how you explain it. This is the view before you. Now, baby, place your delicate white footsie on that.



The firewalking was easy, although it gets the most attention. It’s the drama.  It isn’t about the firewalking. It’s about taking the first step.



Years ago when I first heard that Tony Robbins’ participants walked on fire, I said, “When someone teaches a seminar on how to walk on water, I’ll take it.” But after listening to Tony Robbins tapes some 20 years ago, after reading Robbin’s book Awaken the Giant Within—that was long ago too. After recently watching  Joe Berlinger’s documentary on Tony, titled, “I am Not Your Guru,” I decided. “I’m going.” A twitter user posted the link, and although I don’t know who it was, I thank them.

I was, of course, concerned about walking on hot coals, no matter how many explanations are put on it. I had a teacher in San Diego who burnt her feet walking on hot coals, so I had that image pecking against my brain.

I didn’t know if I would do it, but thought, this is my opportunity to teach myself to overcome fear, and to think that if I could walk on fire I could do anything.

There were 35 fire strips for 10,500 people, I don’t know how many people walked, the majority did.

Tony prepared us for about 2 hours before the walk while videos of flames burnt around the room, on the monitors, on the digital strip around the San Jose SAP Hockey arena.



When images of flames came up, I thought, Hey wait a minute, you said hot coals, not flames. The images were of the burning wood before they settled into coals.

When the time came, the helper said, “Step on the grass,” (There is a strip before the coals.) I gave my chest a pound, shot my fist in the air, focused on the other side and walked.

Hey, that sounds like going for your dream.



Wednesday, November 9, 2016

Do You Know the Way to San Jose?

Trip to San Jose November 9, 2016

It was a beautiful day, clear sky, green fields. I arrived at the airport at 8 p.m. for a 9:20 flight.

Pretty easy huh?

Nine hours later I arrived at my motel in San Jose at 6 o’clock in the evening.

Could I have driven the distance in that time? Maybe. Except I couldn’t have read a novel or napped on the plane.

I felt that I had been dropped into a 3rd world country.

The plane in Eugene was delayed for about 45 minutes. I had brought my laptop that weighs a ton and placed it atop my roll-on suitcase. The weight of it made that luggage sluggish and hard to pull. No problem, just walk down the jetway and board your plane. Right?

Wrong.

There was no jetway.

The plane was a little puddle jumper to Portland, and I guess it didn’t deserve a jetway. It was parked outside.

Okay. No problem. No rain. Except to my surprise once out of the airport gate,  we entered a long outside corridor that was blocks long. (I’m not exaggerating this time.) We could leave our suitcase at the bottom of the stairs but needed to take electronic devices aboard. I lugged my heavy computer case up the stairs, and all was well.

We were off.

Except that we arrived in Portland 45 minutes late, and by the time I dragged that suitcase with the computer down a ten-mile long corridor and arrived at the gate it was closed. Bye, plane. I watched as it pulled pull away from its jetway.

They reassigned me. The next plane would leave in two hours. They told me to go to gate C 9. And where was gate C 9? Back down that ten-mile long corridor, with me schlepping that suitcase while my back swore at me.

And where was the plane?

Parked outside.

To conserve space they offered to check my bag for free, so I did, and we flew to San Jose while I read and napped and told my back all was well.  It could relax.

We arrived around 4:30.

I decided since time was not a problem this evening, to try out my UBER app, and through it arranged for a car. (Only $5,16 they said.) I had planned on registering for the Tony Robbins event at the convention center this evening, but due to the late hour and my exhaustion, changed my mind.  In the morning I would join the great throng of other contestants also registering. (My consultant warned me.)

The UBER site said a car would arrive around 5 p.m., then they said 5:30. I waited and waited, and the phone kept saying they would arrive in 2 minutes, then 3, then 4, then 2. And the phone was down to a 5% charge.

Finally, I gave up and took a shuttle ($25.00) to my motel—not a hotel, a MOTEL.

Usually one has a car when arriving at a “MOTOR lodge.” I had switched from a hotel to save money.  That meant I had to walk to my room, number 183, down a pathway, over a bridge, through the woods, no, but it felt like a mile with me feeling I was pulling a cement truck.

I arrived at my room and decided not to leave it until morning. Among the many food items, packed in my suitcase is power-shake makings, so that will have to do for dinner.  They warned us to bring snacks for there will be no lunch break tomorrow.

At the Motel I had to pay for WiFi, and yes I did need to sign a document from back home, which was one reason I bought the computer.

I’m on the computer now, figuring I should use it since I paid for it.

I’m not complaining, just the facts, and I got in a day of reading, and up there in the sky, I marveled again how exquisite it is to fly. Can you believe people can fly? They can pour themselves into a big heavy bird and sail away. It is incredible, even if ground duty makes it take all day.

And speaking of birds, this morning on the way to the airport husband dear and I saw a flotilla of geese, floating down like eiderdown feathers, and landing in a tight puddle of brown the size of a football field in an immense field of green. And behind them, another group ebbed and flowed in slow motion until they gradually joined the dark sea of Canadian geese sitting down for a feed or a rest.

Tomorrow the event.


To be continued.