Since I returned from SFTX (San Francisco Tango Exchange) where I became unplugged from the Tango Matrix, my experience of Tango has altered.  I can sum up my experiences as “living between the Tango beats.”  Years ago I became aware of how much exists between the beats in Tango music.  Now I sense that I just entered the space between the beats of Life.  Here is some of what has altered.

Tango Transformation is Life Transformation

I used to dance mostly two Tandas with a woman, now usually one.  I have chosen to dance with women that I have not danced with in a long time.  I do not enjoy some woman as much as I used to.  I am more conscious of the unconscious behaviors of people working to get dances, relate, learn and love.  I love Tango music even more.  I am more aware as an observer of my own dancing.  I do not compromise my posture and balance for any woman anymore.

I do not enjoy some things I used to enjoy in my Tango vocabulary or musicality choices.  I am much less interested in dancing, yet am dancing more.  I am dancing with more less skilled dancers, and aware how some of the skilled dancers just don’t interest me as much for they don’t follow as I thought.  I have noticed how many follows are not truly following, but just recognizing patterns and performing them.  However, the less skilled follows actually follow more for they do not know what to expect so they are listening.

And as in Tango, as in Life – as I have become unplugged, I am exploring how I want to make my way in the world.  My view has been altered, and therefore I need to walk a different path.  Here is a story that exemplifies some of my more common experiences these days.

On my way down to Denver on last Tuesday, I called a friend to say hi.  He asked me where I was, and upon telling him I was 30 minutes from a destination in Lakewood, he replied that he was a quarter mile away from my destination, waiting for people to join him for lunch.  He invited me to join him.  I happened to be on my way to a business appointment, but decided to be 45 minutes early to work on Tango DJ’ing.  So I conveniently had the extra time and joined him.

What wonderful timing – synchronicity at work.  This man happens to be finishing a book, which imparts life wisdom and great how-to’s on safety from a collection of stories during his important work in government agencies – VERY important work.  Because of his work, we are all safer when we fly in airplanes.  I admire this friend in no small way.  Not only is he brilliant, artistic, creative, funny and a good man, he MAKES A DIFFERENCE in peoples’ lives.

I used to want to make a big difference.  I volunteered a good amount of time in noble pursuits such as initiating men into manhood through the Mankind Project, or staffing for LGAT’s (large group awareness trainings) such as Landmark Education Corp. or fun pursuits such as leading trips for a large ski club in Madison, Wisconsin – Hoofers.

I guess I made a difference here and there.  As a therapist I know I made a difference.  However, I let my clients go for most of them did not do their homework.  They really did not take action to make their lives better, but just wanted me to make things better for them.  Why did I bother?  5-10% of my clients actually did their homework.  Perhaps everything I did was just for the 5-10%.

Why am I even writing on this subject of making a difference?  In the Tango Matrix I am staring at foundational beliefs of how I think the Universe works.  I call this an ontological cosmology.  So I am experiencing a clash of cosmologies where I have a choice of different cosmologies, but the choice I want to make is radical.  Really radical.  I will make different life choices depending on the cosmology I choose.

Ulysses left me with these words, “Breath more between the beats.  Follow your desire.  Allow your calling to call. You will collide with treasures waiting for you at one of your next turns…”

Unplugging from the Tango Matrix, one sees behind the curtain of just a dance...

Metaphorical wires connecting me to the Tango Matrix appeared as I began to wake from a long sleep.  I experienced more joy than I had in quite awhile.  My recent adventures in San Francisco with Alice, my energetic Australian friend, transcended mere walking, eating and Tango training.  An obvious bond had sprung up, relating a knowingness that we seemed destined to meet.  Synchronicities abounded as I became unplugged.

On Wednesday afternoon, Alice and I met up at the Donatello hotel, and as my last name is Donatiu, the serendipity was not lost on me nor Alice.  I called my father to let him know the name of the hotel as I sat in the lobby waiting for Alice to come down- he enjoyed hearing of the coincidence.  Alice had usually chosen the Donatello hotel when she traveled through San Francisco.

Which is the dream?  Was it mere coincidence that her hotel’s name was the closest hotel in San Francisco that one can get to my last name?  Or was her hotel choice a harbinger of our meeting and magical times to come?  Alice and I worked on her Tango foundation for 90 minutes, had Thai food and got a cab with a crazy non-stop talking driver to Cellspace for the milonga that night.  The next day conjured magic.

Thursday began with 90 minutes of Tango training, sushi for lunch, a walk around the city – mostly Union square, and then some special work on what I call Urban Tango Training.  As we ascended very steep hills I taught her solid fundamental technique on how to fully load the weighted hip while relaxing the free leg and hip – full weight transfers from free leg to free leg.  When weight transfers are done correctly up and down steep hills, one is not tired but actually more energized, relaxed and easily able to ascend and descend while feeling pleasure in the hips, legs, ankles and feet.

We both acknowledged that we wanted really good coffee, and quickly found just the right European bistro.  Over the delicious coffee drinks, we realized we had both participated in Pulpo’s week in 2005 in Buenos Aires.  She related that she watched me dance and wanted to someday take lessons with me.  Upon first meeting me in Boulder for privates, she mentioned to her daughter who drove her to the studio that I looked like a guy from Pulpo’s week – then she did not think it was me and never mentioned anything again until at the bistro.

Back at another 90 minutes of training, and then we went off in search of a restaurant to celebrate Alice’s new Tango transformation and understandings.  We wanted just the right restaurant, and knew we were both willing to wait, for the right place anticipated us.  After 25 minutes of walking and checking out over 17 restaurants, we saw in the distance what we both though would be the right establishment.  And sure enough, we walked into a high end grill/ steakhouse with an Argentinean flair – Italian architecture, great meat and Italian items on the menu, and black and white photos on the wall commemorating snapshots of almost a century of history this restaurant witnessed.  The meal entranced me with just the right spices, tastes, smells, texture, sweet and savory flavors, and fulfillment.  Happy man!

Alice and I said our goodbye’s, and I headed back to SFTX.  The rest of SFTX got more interesting, for as I disconnected from the Tango Matrix, reality and dream co-mingled, meaning I noticed more connections and synchronicities.  In addition, I felt more gratitude and connection to my Self and others.  This disconnect from the Tango Matrix brought me closer to living in dreamtime space.

And then events occurred that I hoped for one day, but did not expect…

My recent experiences jarred my reality to the point where I have needed time to just adjust to a different perspective concerning – which is the dream? What I knew before SFTX (San Francisco Tango Exchange) is that I had swallowed the RED PILL.  What I did not know at the time were the outcomes and ramifications of my ingestion, which began to uncloak themselves during SFTX.  Though I intended to blog sooner, I needed to assimilate and calibrate – I am still in process.

On a sunny and cool Thursday afternoon in the heart of San Francisco, Alice (a vibrant Australian tanguera) and I witnessed the unfurling of our interconnectedness.     As we enjoyed our distinctively non-American coffee drinks (they were strong) at a European bistro, we expressed our enchantment at how our synchronicities spanned 2 1/2 years.

Our first visible layer of connection started in August 2008.  Alice called me to inquire about Tango privates.  She was in Boulder visiting her daughter and wanted instruction.  She chose me from a list of Tango instructors listed on Tango Colorado’s website, and confessed that my website’s name, Tango For Life, called to her with a knowing that I could teach her.

We worked together for about 12 hours in less than 2 weeks in a remodeled basement made into a Tango studio complete with a sprung oak floor, two walls of mirrors, a bathroom, and a spare bedroom for visiting instructors or tangueros/as.  At the end of our time together, Alice proclaimed triumph and amazement at her Tango transformation through our work.  Later upon dancing in Australia, she detailed the delight dancers displayed at her new-found dance skills.  I revealed to her my joy at being a facilitator of her process, and underlying fulfillment in how well we worked together.

We kept in touch via e-mail.  Then on May 11th this year, Alice informed me she would be traveling through Colorado and would like to take another round of privates.  After a few e-mail exchanges and phone calls, Alice synchronized her schedule to meet me in San Francisco on her way back to Australia while I was at SFTX.  I was not sure of my schedule to Salt Lake City or San Francisco until a week before I left, but Alice needed to book her ticket so she did and hoped we would meet.

Alice wanted to meet enough that she made sure we could meet in a far off city, if even for a couple of hours of instruction .  Showing up is one of the traits I treasure the most, and I respond to people showing up.  Alice called me four hours after I arrived at Berkley, not knowing if I had even left Colorado.  What she also did not know is that I had planned on meeting her before the Cellspace milonga that night.  I had to go out of my comfort zone to get to her hotel in SF from Berkley using public transportation.

Two things propelled me to go out of my comfort zone – one is that Alice showed up, and two, I felt drawn.  It seemed events were lining up to meet with her, as I began to follow dreamtime space.  Only rare occasions has life compelled me to follow and allow myself to be guided by dipping briefly into dreamtime space.  In dreamtime space I just let my environment be a metaphor of what and how I am creating my experience.

What does dreamtime space look like?  As an example:  as I now write, I am sitting on my California king bed in my RV with my kitty snuggled up on my right, laptop upon my lap, the Fantastic Fan drawing outside air through the RV interior, and I am still a little hot.  Three lights are on, 2 high spectrum florescent, 1 normal florescent.  Allowing myself to drop into dreamtime space, I acknowledge I have a loyal companion at all times for me (cat), the lighting is low and surreal where I am in a bit of a limbo with my own sight of which is dream, and being a little hot I am a bit stale in my life, needing a fresh breeze of movement, and the fan’s incessant background noise reminds me of the noise I create that blocks deep listening.

So which is dream?  Even though I am making meaning and metaphor out of my environment, perhaps this meaning (dream) is more accurate than what appears in life (reality) thereby making reality actually the dream.  Some would say this is so – that what I see “reality” is the dream- for what I see is just what I have created, not reality.  And what is more real is the fact that I as source can dream and create experiences and events very different than what is appearing now.  Some would say EVERYTHING I have experienced, including all events and people are just my creation – the dream, different than the origin of the creation – I as source – reality .

Which is the dream?

I have snatched cubic centimeter of chances.  One of these special portals to vast life change appeared at night in Madison, WI as a friend mentioned some small psychotherapy learning program.  I felt something inside compel me to ask its name and location.  Shortly thereafter, I called this program in Boulder, CO, applied to it and set up a visit.  A couple weeks later I visited the school.  Three months later I moved, engaged in full time classes in a 2 year Masters program in Jungian, Archetypal and Transpersonal psychotherapy from this learning center named Avalon Institute.  Obviously my life executed a profoundly different beneficial trajectory ushered from the cubic centimeter of chance I seized.

As a psychotherapist, life coach, seminar facilitator and attendee at many personal growth seminars, I had the privilege to witness 1000′s of people endeavor and work at consciously evolving themselves.  During this time, I also witnessed dozens of individuals pass up potential cubic centimeter of chances.  The same occurs in Tango, as in the course of my Tango travels I have glimpsed possible portals to vast life change present themselves to individuals.

Yet, what fascinates me is how many people in Tango do not see nor seize their cubic centimeter of chance.  In effect, they take the blue pill of the Tango Matrix by leaving Tango or allowing Tango to be just a dance.

The Blue Pill offers bliss in ignorance, but also potentially leads to unexplainable dissatisfaction in Tango & Life

For years a phenomena in Tango has yanked me to disturbing confirmations, time and again.  I refer to this phenomena of when Tango enthusiasts grow dissatisfied with Tango and eventually quit.  I recently read a defunct blog where the tanguera describes in many of her last entries a growing dissatisfaction and fears with Tango.  Did she wonder if a lot more exists in Tango, and Tango is truly a metaphor of life?  I wonder how often how one deals with their dissatisfactions in Tango is akin to dealing with their dissatisfactions in life?  How often is giving up on Tango taking the blue pill?

I e-mailed a draft of this entry and the last to Ulysses.  He responded with these gripping words:

For many of your readers, your entries, particularly the cubic centimeter of chance and the blue pill, WILL BE THEIR cubic centimeter of chance, their portal!  They will feel a tug, hear a murmur, see a shimmer, taste a morsel, smell a whiff or sense that these words promise a  deeper truth of a portal.

But sadly most will dismiss this tug, murmur, shimmer, morsel, whiff and promise as whimsical, wistful or wishful.  They will miss their cubic centimeter of chance, perhaps the last one to tender itself  in their Tango world.  And they may even swallow the blue pill, forever cut off from the power Tango holds.

Notwithstanding, a few will seize their cubic centimeter of chance – their red pill awaits...

I am alert for a cubic centimeter of chance to come my way as I flirt with swallowing the red pill to access the Tango Matrix.  Don Juan in Carlos Castenada’s book, Journey to Ixtlan, explains the cubic centimeter of chance:

“All of us, whether or not we are warriors, have a cubic centimeter of chance that pops out in front of our eyes from time to time.  The difference between an average man and a warrior is that the warrior is aware of this, and one of his tasks is to be alert, deliberately waiting, so that when his cubic centimeter pops out he has the necessary speed, the prowess to pick it up…  Usually we are too busy, or too preoccupied, or just too stupid and lazy to realize that that is our cubic centimeter of luck.  A warrior, on the other hand, is always alert and tight and has the spring, the gumption necessary to grab it.”

CUBIC CENTIMETER OF CHANCE --- Will you see and grab your chance before it quickly passes, forever gone?

In my own words a cubic centimeter of chance is a portal to vast life change that opens but for a short time – a few seconds to perhaps a few days.  Once that portal closes, it is closed forever, and you may have to wait years before another comes your way.  However, once you step through this portal, your life immediately executes a profoundly different beneficial trajectory.

Throughout the world of Argentine Tango, I believe these special portals emerge more often than with other activities, because what Tango demands.  Tango demands of its participants: greater intimacy; reflections of social status; a look at social behaviors; greater awareness of personal beliefs of self and others; examination of relationships with friends and significant others; and understand and feeling more deeply our own body.  Tango demands act as lightening rods, attracting portals to vast life change, similar to how psychotherapy and other personal growth modalities attract portals.

I have missed possible portals, or cubic centimeter of chances.   For example, I once stood in line at a Wild Oats grocery store in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  A woman and I made eyes at each other.  I felt some knowing and depth with her, way more than simple chemistry.  A portal opened, yet I did not jump through it by talking with her.

I wonder to this day if my life would have taken a profoundly different beneficial trajectory.  Perhaps in talking with her we would have hooked up, I would have begun an amazing relationship and moved to Santa Fe.  Perhaps she would have imparted life changing information, or conceivably nothing would have come of it.  I still wonder…

What other cubic centimeter of chances have I missed?  What if a portal I already let go offered a red pill to the Tango Matrix?

Do I really want to take the red pill if a Tango Matrix exists, and deeper truth is to be found?   Ulysses led me to believe that knowing more of what really goes on in Tango offers fierce realizations that could eliminate a large portion of joy from Tango.

In response to my entry, The Tango Matrix Part 1- Red Pill, one of my friends e-mailed me- “yeah, I hear you but I just think, screw it – let’s dance.”  I interpret this statement as a recommendation on taking the blue pill.  After all, dancing Tango is bliss so why try to understand it?  Is ignorance bliss?  In the movie Matrix, being unaware and living in its modern civilization (being unaware of the matrix – ignorance is bliss) seems hugely more appealing than the alternative of living in the apocalyptic world of bland goop for food, no sun, living underground, and being mercilessly hunted by machines.

However, in taking the red pill one gains freedom from the Matrix, and thereby gains choices based on deeper truth, not illusion.  Is life better when one makes choices based on deeper truth?  My question remains- will the quality of my experience in Tango and life be increased significantly to offset the potential costs of taking the red pill?  Perhaps this question comes down to a cost/ benefit conversation.

Historically, I have gone for deeper truth in several areas of life.  When I say deeper truth, I do not mean THE truth!  I don’t believe it is possible for THE TRUTH to exist.  However, I believe deeper truth involves gaining a greater complexity and thereby simplicity, accuracy of information, explanation, relation, organicity, and  growing evolution of whatever I pursue deeper truth in.

Here is a simple example of deeper truth- for 9 months I sold T.V.’s among other electronics.  I questioned almost everyone- what was the best T.V.?  I reviewed Consumer Reports, read other information, and interviewed repair personnel in the company I worked for (they repaired T.V.’s).  I discovered the following:

• Useful selection criteria, and the practicality of the selection criteria such as how bright the white truly is, and how much of a difference it really makes
• Actual data on reliability of the major brands for different years and models
• I became the person with the most information and possibility to answer the question in depth – my peers came to me when they wanted to buy a T.V. themselves  - they did not buy what they were pedaling to customers
• Management and most personnel knew the “answer” to be – whatever makes you the most money and what is in stock AND the management told me this was THE answer!
• And the most important realizations- I experimented and found:
  • almost every customer did not care for the answer (did not want the truth), but really wanted an illusion of a good T.V. and what they could take home immediately (what was in stock)
  • I sold the least when I told customers the truth, for they would not want to process the information and usually walked away confused
  • I sold the most by uncovering the customer’s illusion of what they thought a good T.V. was (NOT facts/ data/ great selection criteria/ actual reliability) and then selling that illusion

My desire to uncover deeper truth in other areas of life (time management/ nutrition/ finding one’s purpose/ sex/ creating a career) has led to similar results where: I discover great selection criteria; useful data; became knowledgeable on the researched subject; and most importantly, that many people did not really want deeper truth, but some illusion of what truth they imagined and therefore wanted to see!

Worst of all, usually when people started to receive deeper truth, I witnessed the following:

• Denial with a good rationale for the denial – too much info, not important, doesn’t make sense
• Whatever they were asking about they lost some good measure of interest in- a person, a hobby, an industry, a job, a question
• Shooting the messenger, which took various forms- disliking, hating, gossiping, not returning communications, etc.

Therefore I realize that pursuing deeper truth around Tango presents hazards.  But what are the benefits?

I e-mailed Ulysses (not his real name – he wants to remain anonymous) and asked what benefits show up in taking the red pill.  What he sent back elicited two responses: he delighted me with an opportunity to find things out for myself; and floored me with the brilliance and simplicity of his proposal:

“At your upcoming festival do these two things, and open your eyes to what you see.”

Last Thursday Ulysses threatened and unraveled my Tango world by presenting me with the choice of a red pill or blue pill.  For those of you that do not recognize the reference, it is from the Movie, Matrix.

The Matrix’s plot brief explanation from Wikipedia: Computer programmer Thomas A. Anderson leads a secret life as a hacker under the alias ”Neo”, and wishes to learn the answer to the question, “What is the Matrix?” Cryptic messages appearing on his computer monitor and encounters with three sinister agents lead him to a group led by the mysterious Morpheus, a man who offers him the chance to learn the truth about the Matrix.

Neo accepts by swallowing an offered red pill, and subsequently finds himself naked in a liquid-filled pod, his body connected by wires to a vast mechanical tower covered with identical pods.  The film describes a future in which reality perceived by humans is actually the Matrix: a simulated reality created by sentient machines in order to pacify and subdue the human population while their bodies’ heat and electrical activity are used as an energy source (for the machines.)

Ulysses is a man I met in a Buenos Aires milonga 2 1/2 years ago.  We talked enough where we both felt a connection worthy of staying in touch.  On Thursday, I skyped Ulysses explaining my frustrations and confusion over various behaviors at Stone Soup.  Ulysses asked me to go into more detail about my experiences at Stone Soup and other Tango festivals.

I could offer all of you the details of a long rant, but it is quite negative, ugly and full of anger, sadness, and depression.  I can sum up my rant with the following:  I have known for some time that I have sensed that something beyond my conscious awareness is at work, and if known, could explain ALL of the behaviors behind my rant.  I believe my frustrations, shortcomings, insecurities and lack of full alignment and joy with Argentine Tango are of my making.  However, I have been unconscious of what I have been doing to create these consistent experiences I would term – non-aligned with my Soul/ Psyche.

After Ulysses patiently listened to my long rant of 3 1/2 years of frustrations with Tango, he responded with, “Dave, hold on.”  After more than a couple of minutes, and more frustration on my part, he came back to the screen with two pills – one red, one blue.  OK, they were not the same pills as I saw in the Matrix, being obvious pharmaceutical over-the-counter drugs, but I got the chilling reference.  In disbelief I shared with him how I have sensed some hidden stream of information that could fully account for what I have witnessed, experienced and heard in Tango, AND several experiences in my personal life, which is mirrored in Tango and its milongas and festivals.

He looked me in the eyes – which means with Skype, you need to look up into the camera, not at the computer screen.  So he seemed serious when he said something to the gist of- we have talked only a few times in the last 2 1/2 years, but I know enough about you to be able to offer you a choice – red pill or blue pill.  I smirked, and said, great, tell me the red pill stuff!

He responded to my smirk, “wait – you don’t think I’m serious?”  I retorted, “Of course not Ulysses, but if you have some great info that would explain what I have been experiencing and/ or creating, bring it on!”  He countered with, “I want you to think carefully about the possibility that a Tango Matrix exists.  Knowing the truth of what really goes on in your world of Tango will change your Tango world and life.”

At this point thoughts ran through my head shouting: “You heard this before from more than a few supposed Gurus and spiritual teachers”; “Is this guy serious at all?”; “B.S.”; “I had a friend who got all mystical and mysterious on me and bugged the shit out of me with his B.S.”.

However, Ulysses put forth the following – What if in taking the red pill you could find out:

• What is behind mens’ and womens’ choices of who they dance with
• Why there are cliques
• Why you and so many people are drawn to Tango
• Why many will never get much better in Tango
• How you could get really good
• What men and woman really want
• What most people believe about Tango that is false, but do not realize is true of Tango
• You can’t share the Tango Matrix because you will piss a lot of people off, and they will not like you, not dance with you, nor hire you
• What you are personally lacking in social skills
• You will have to face ugly truths about yourself
• More than half of the magic, joy and pleasure of Tango will disappear, possibly for good
• And the worst possible thing- you may become so turned off to Tango, that you give it up and find that you’ve wasted a lot of time and money

And then he added, “I can’t even tell you many of the things that taking the red pill will show you, but think about what I have said.”  He said he had to get back to work.

Great – is this guy for real?  And then I launched into thinking WHAT IF?