Becoming Untrapped (Pico Iyer)

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So first I just want to tell you quickly about Pico. Pico Iyer is one of the most beautiful writers working today. He came on Pulling the Thread in January, 2023, to talk about his book, The Half Known Life: In Search of Paradise, and now he is back. So we can talk about his new masterpiece, Aflame: Learning from Silence, which for me has been quite prophetic. We'll come to that in a minute and I just want to apologize for the audio. I am in a hotel room with my three cats because I have been out of my house evacuated from my house for a week.

In the past three decades, Pico has made more than 100 retreats to a small monastery above the sea and Big Sur, it is a place I would love to go to one day. And after you hear how Pico describes it, I think you'll feel similarly today, Pico shares what he's learned from his time at the monastery, how he's found the type of silence that most of us truly seek. Why a recollection? Remembering what you already know on some level can be more profound than a great realization and how we might see the people in our life differently and more clearly. Interestingly, Pico says that it was during a stay at the monastery that he realized he wanted to get married. So a big part of the flame, as the title suggests, is forest fire and Pico. And I spoke, I'm looking right now just so I can give you the exact date on November 29th.

They're right, it was the day after Thanksgiving and scheduled the episode for this week, which is the episode that his book comes out. So in 1990, and Pico writes about this beautifully in his book, Pico's house burned down in what at the time was the worst fire in California history. And he tells us the story in this episode. I'll paraphrase it for you here. And so in this conversation you will hear us talk about living adjacent to these high fire zones and the implications of natural disaster in many ways, the difference between stuff and home and losing a home. At this point, we'll see how the rest of the week goes. I have not lost my home. And for that I am incredibly grateful. I'm going to record a solo episode about this experience as well later in the month. And then there's just stuff.

And if you go through this process of evacuation, which Pico and I discuss, you realize that most of the stuff in your life is not something you would even bother buying again. But Pico mentioned that he had lost eight years worth of work. This is before you could digitize anything. And all of his book notes were three books burnt in front of his eyes. And so his voice was in my head as I evacuated and I brought my work. I'm not sure I would've thought to do that, so I'm just going to read a bit and then we will get to the episode.

He writes:

“All chores complete. I sit out in the bright sunlight before lunch and the long drive home. I remember, jogged perhaps by my talk with Paula, accelerating down the road under our burning home. After those hours in the midst of flames, houses smoking on every side, the shattered hooks of cars littering the way I'd had to call my mother away in Florida visiting her nephew to tell her that all her 59 years of photos keepsakes, all her jewels, her lecture notes, were gone.

“There must be something.”

“No, I say it's gone. All gone. Everything we owned is ash.” Then I'd driven to a friend's house to sleep on the floor. Before I did, I asked if I could use a computer. My job at the time involved writing back page essays for Time Magazine and I just had a front seat view on the worst fire in California history. My small piece ended with a poem I'd picked up in Japan. Intuition seemed already to be reminding me that no event is simply good or bad.

My house burned down.

I can now see

better the rising moon.

I'm very tired, but that makes me very emotional. Alright friends, so let's get to our very special thinker, Pico Iyer.