As we were walking back from the ice truck to the BURNIVERSITY, our home away from home, one of our newly-made Canadian friends said:

Albert is burning really hard.

Albert (name subtly changed to protect the innocent), who by that time had presented his first improv theater workshop at our camp, had struck me as a brilliant and already open-minded human being.

To me it was surprising that he required any burning, let alone burning of that intensity.

The last week of April was overflowing with more lessons.

I learned that even when I try my best because I am at the Burn, I am unable to take part in a kundalini awakening. I am sorry. Science has seeped too far into my atoms.

I learned that running in the desert is even more amazing than my wildest expectations.

I spent the whole week in my sandals. Besides the “official” runs, I broke into spontaneous running multiple times per day.

We ran a lot.

We learned (again) that people respond superbly to being encouraged to learn together in the desert. The BURNIVERSITY saw many burners pass through its hallowed halls, both as students and as teachers.

I learned (again) that modern humans yearn for disconnection and focus now and then. I could see their eyes light up as they realised the implications of successfully eating an expensive chocolate with mindful attention, direct experience mode fully activated.

We learned that people yearn even more to understand happiness. It was clear that BFAM’s workshop on the (neuro-)scientific basis of happiness hit home, quite hard, in spite of its unavoidable information density.

I learned that our yoga teacher was in fact able to radiate even more serenity than she already did last year. Students leaving her class every morning glowed. Yes, glowed.

We learned that you can come back more healthy from the burn than when you started. Eat like royalty (thank you D and H, it was amazing to see you create together), do yoga, meditation and exercise every day, connect with other humans and get your sleep every night. The eternal party is just one of the many facets of the Burn, and should be treated as such.

Maintain balance.

We learned that it is indeed possible to squeeze so much disconnected experience into a single week that it starts feeling like a micro-lifetime.

Thank you friends for making all of this happen.

Footnotes