de Deken, Fer

I love donkeys. They so belong in the Spanish landscape. A little dreamy and very willing, until you overstep their boundary. Then they will show you how stubborn they can be and that is no laughing matter. I recognise myself in them, but I never expected that a donkey would give me the most important spiritual lesson of my life.

This is how it began. In 2005 I walked from Vezelay to Le Puy, a rarely used path with every 4 days or so another pilgrim. So lots of space to walk in silence. It happened near Issy-l’Eveque, where I experienced a oneness and wholeness with what is and a knowing that all is fundamentally well. At first I was so shocked that in my mind I consulted a diagnostic psychiatric reference book. What was happening to me? It was sweet and beautiful and confusing at the same time. Three weeks later I finished my hike and got on the train in Cahors and realised that this was the most wonderful moment that had ever happened to me. It took me half a year before I dared to talk about it with Rev. Baldwin. He reassured me that this was no psychiatric disorder but an experience of wholeness that can occur when we are training for a while. This was an early experience in my case as I did not yet know of a context in which to place this experience; hence my shock.

The experience was so beautiful and overwhelming that I thought: “I want this again!”

In 2007 I got that chance. I was walking the Camino de la Plata from Seville onwards. Now I did understand that some conditions were necessary to make these kind of experiences possible. Becoming still, emptying the mind, letting go of the concerns about home etc. Usually this happened as a matter of course to me after a couple of hundred kilometres. After starting out, the well-known pilgrim’s life became familiar once again. Eating, sleeping, a bit of washing and each day around 25 km of walking.

After about 200 km I thought “Well, this is it, it can happen now. I am ready for it.” But no, nada, nothing. Yes, I was enjoying the walking and the contacts, but experience … nothing. After 250 km I thought “It should really come now, I have met all the conditions!” But nothing happened. Of course, I thought “It’s because I am expecting it to come. So, expect nothing!” To the rhythm of my steps I now had the mantra ‘ex-step-pect-step-no-step-thing’. For kilometre after kilometre. I was quite busy in my head with that. After 15 km I realised: no, this also doesn’t work. There must be silence so stop thinking. After 5 km I found out that this intention did not work either. Now what?? I felt desperation coming up. This was never going to work. And then the thought “forget it, nothing will come from this whatever you do, give it up” arose. Stop wanting something, forget it. Enjoy the walking! But these commands also did not have the required result. Meanwhile I had arrived at the Embalse de Alcantara, which has a beautiful new inn. It was early in the year so I phoned the caretaker. He told me: “You’ll find the key on the flat pebble roof underneath three stones”. It sounds easy but try and find three stones in a labyrinth of thousands of others.

The next morning, after having put the key back, I peacefully walked out of the valley up to the blue sky in the direction of Canaveral. Having arrived at the top I saw three donkeys standing in a fenced-in little meadow. The mother had just given birth to a foal. With hair as soft as a newly hatched chick’s down. With colours from beige to deep dark brown. And his stiff legs, still locked, emphasising with each step his wobbliness, makes him so comical and invites me to stop and feed him some stale bread. I put my hand with the bread through the fence and start sweet-talking. How beautiful he is, how lovely his mom, his legs, etc. My attention is below my belly button and then spreading, I look somewhat passed him. Without thinking I let the words roll out from my lower abdomen and let them come together in many coloured beads on a cord winding around his upright ears. Ears that in the early, still low morning light have a sort of halo in their fine hairs. In that atmosphere of kindness he felt free to explore and with stiff steps he comes closer. Though it is not the bread but my hand that tempts him and with an unreal warm soft snort his nose touches my hand. When I look surprised the moment has passed immediately
because of the act of looking.

For me this is a key metaphor for what I have come to understand:

Don’t look for anything, because if you do, it disappears.

Don’t try to understand it, because by grabbing with words, it dissolves.

You cannot force it, because it comes whenever it pleases to.

You cannot tempt it, because it is insensitive to temptation.

The only thing you can do is to attentively take the position of being and being aware.

This article is available only as part of the Summer 2020 Journal of the Order of Buddhist Contemplatives.  

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