First, let me thank everyone who has encouraged me so vociferously to return to blogging. There's is no motivation like the encouragement of friends!
And second, let me tell you what has been filling my time over these several months. Just as a long exhale must be followed by deeply breathing in, teaching for any length of time must be balanced by seasons of learning, and I have been entranced by a few sources in particular of sweet, rich nectar.
The first was the inimitable Sienna Kathryn, a yoga teacher who has traveled the world for her learning, and who has long graced our Midwestern town with the fruits of her wisdom between pilgrimages. She is the kind of teacher who lets the practice take her like a trance, lets yoga be the teacher while she just gets out of the way and sits in the same awe of the ancient as her students. She is all human, all raw and soaking in the reality of what it's actually like for spiritual creatures to have a human experience. It's liberating teaching in the example of a woman like that, and it's a quality Kandi at Moon Belly shares: where the great majority of the standard American dance teachers under whom I've studied have prided themselves on their conformity to a standard, these women have defined their greatness with their unshackled individuality. Their students love them because they are unabashedly their own, and they love being in their own skin. May we all be so unabashed, and free those around us to embrace the same liberation.
The second has been a book Sienna actually recommended, by Erich Schiffmann, called "Yoga: The Spirit and Practice of Moving into Stillness". He's another one-of-a-kind, a red-headed surfer with long, curly hair, and a body much bigger than most expect a yogi's to be, but he is as peaceful and Zen a voice as I've ever read. His major thrust is reminding his reader that the reason we come to the mat is to quiet our bodies enough that their stillness can reveal the eternal, unchanging center that keeps on humming. The thing we share with the divine, and that makes us human, the thing that watches us think, and dream, and live, and is itself unchanged by the constancy of our changability, is the thing we seek to learn to hear. He crystalizes books and books on Hindu meditation and Zen Buddhism in his first few pages, and then lingers over practices for getting there. His whole practice is about getting our bodies out of the way, and it has been quenching to a thirst I didn't even know I had.
And most recently, there has been a Meisner method acting class taught by Kirsten Olsen at the Moon Belly studio. The thrust of the Meisner technique is, instead of acting, or going to all the work of manifesting something and rehearsing it, just to let go enough that you are genuinely reacting as the scene unfolds around you. To let the scene play you. The drills are all about reacting to the unexpected, maintaining the genuineness and spontenaety of your reaction amidst varying stimuli, and they are alarmingly revealing! But I have loved their relevance to everyday living.
I've embraced the practice of shedding a character I might be tempted to play, and just letting the scene play me. I've embraced the practice of pushing beyond the familiar as I approach my yoga practice, and letting the breath breathe me. And, I've devoted myself to the practice of being unabashed in each of these things, so that I may revel in the juice and freedom of being freely who and what I am. I am loving the experience of, in the words of Erich Schiffmann, the divine expressing itself as me! Namaste!
Friday, September 23, 2011
Friday, March 11, 2011
A Few of My Favorite Things
Having a tendency toward the philosophical, I don't often talk about the practicalities of yoga unless I've been asked a direct question. But it also occurs to me that some of my favorite yoga helpers are things people wouldn't ever think to ask about in a hundred years and, come on... a hundred years is just far too long to hold out! So, a list of my very favorite things, in no particular order:
1. Coconut Oil
As a red head, I am dry by nature, and incredibly sensitive to the chemistry of the things I put on my skin. Fragrances and alcohols turn me pink and red, which is both unflattering and uncomfortable, and so coconut oil has become my all-purpose moisturizer. I use it on my face and my body, and places that I have just accepted as destined-to-be-rough, especially in the winter, smooth right out, and stay smooth all day! I also use just enough to coat the inside of both hands on my hair when I get out of the shower, and it keeps my hair from getting staticky or rough when I blow it out.
Coconut oil is incredibly beneficial dietarily, as well, as it stimulates metabolism and eliminates unhealthy fats from the system. Since no one in my family is fond of the taste of coconut oil, I don't cook with it, but I do swallow a teaspoon full in the morning and at night, and notice that my digestion and skin are much happier for it. I use oil refined for medium heat, as it is still fragrant, but slightly lighter than straight coconut oil.
2. Apple Cider Vinegar
This is another dietary supplement, useful for fighting inflammation, and for alkalizing and cleansing the whole system. It is also a significant source of enzymes and potassium, and powerful for stimulating immunity and keeping skin clear. My skin definitely knows when I've run out, and starts telling me all about it almost immediately! It's harsh to take on its own -- I take about a tablespoon 3 times a day -- but is much gentler in apple juice or with water and honey.
3. Vocabulary
As a college English major and a life-long lover of literature, I am keenly aware of the power of words to profoundly affect my mental landscape. The same way songs and images get lodged in our psyches, the words we use and hear create our mental scenery. For me, this is true both on the large scale of things like (deliberate and inadvertent) mantras, and on the small scale in the words I use and hear in my daily conversation. Yoga teaches us to tune our attention to the subtleties, both in the nuances of tension and ease in our body, and to the shifts in our mental chemistry, and there is nothing that changes mental chemistry as quickly or as decisively as a topic of thought.
Take, for example, the topic of forgiveness, and the difference the object of our focus can make: If, in the process of forgiving someone, our goal is to try to minimize the wrong done, then the wrong is getting all of our focus, and is therefore much more likely to grow and become even more grotesque in our minds than to diminish. On the other hand, if we are to focus on the value of the friendship we have shared, and our desire to see that friendship continue on the other side of whatever the impasse or collision, the friendship is what will grow and fill our attention, and forgiveness seems a much more attainable feat.
I apply this to everything, but find it even more relevant on the mat, when I am trying to saturate my body with the chemistry of positive emotions: I talk about health instead of sickness, freedom instead of pain, joy instead of grief, light instead of darkness, and keep my head filled with the images to which I want to grant the power to move me.
4. Facial Expression
This is closely tied to favorite thing #3, but is powerful in its own rite. Just see for yourself whether relaxing your face while you're driving, scrubbing, thinking, watching the news... doesn't change the way your whole body is reacting. My first and favorite yoga teacher told us all the time to smile, and let our bodies feel our smiles, too, and she was absolutely right. Yoga teaches that relaxing our faces allows our parasympathetic nervous systems to relax the things we can't consciously relax, and saturates our bodies with the chemistry of happiness!
5. Barefoot Yoga's Eco Mat
LOVE this yoga mat, even though at $40 it is the most expensive mat I've ever bought. It is make of woven jute, and made soft and grippy with Poly-environmental resin, or PER, which is completely biodegratable. It relaxes out of being rolled up quickly, it doesn't stretch, doesn't slip, and gives just a bit more cushion than a standard mat. And I. Love. It. With all my fingers, toes and knees!
6. Pandora
Music is another powerful influence on mood, and can make or break a yoga session for me. If I'm trying to cram myself into a style of music that doesn't fit my mood, I'm more likely to leave the mat either aggitated or bored. Enter the technological and cultural masterpiece that is Pandora radio! For a girl who is only just finding her own musical muses, being able to kick open the doors through which I've only caught a quick peak (Shazam often provides the toe in the door that I need, and has earned my jumping-up-and-down thanks more than once!) has been such a gift! My current favorites for time on the mat are:
Snatam Kaur or Krishna Das (really interchangeable, as they both bring all the Kirtan singers out to play)
Carlos Nakai (Native American flute... I'm a prairie girl, incurable, turns out)
Mumford and Sons (beautiful lyrics, new indy-folk, equally uplifting and contemplative)
and, on a very feminine day, Astrud Gilberto, the queen of Bossa-Nova :)
7. Local Teachers
I love, love, LURVE (Woody Allen) taking another teacher's class!! And Columbia has grown some beautiful, bright and shining teachers! Everyone who teaches is giving something precious of themselves -- an insight into what makes them love their practice, and so an insight into something lovely about practicing yoga generally. And each student resonates with each teacher differently, and so draws something different out of them. Every class is an organic and entirely unique interaction, and I love it every single time!
1. Coconut Oil
As a red head, I am dry by nature, and incredibly sensitive to the chemistry of the things I put on my skin. Fragrances and alcohols turn me pink and red, which is both unflattering and uncomfortable, and so coconut oil has become my all-purpose moisturizer. I use it on my face and my body, and places that I have just accepted as destined-to-be-rough, especially in the winter, smooth right out, and stay smooth all day! I also use just enough to coat the inside of both hands on my hair when I get out of the shower, and it keeps my hair from getting staticky or rough when I blow it out.
Coconut oil is incredibly beneficial dietarily, as well, as it stimulates metabolism and eliminates unhealthy fats from the system. Since no one in my family is fond of the taste of coconut oil, I don't cook with it, but I do swallow a teaspoon full in the morning and at night, and notice that my digestion and skin are much happier for it. I use oil refined for medium heat, as it is still fragrant, but slightly lighter than straight coconut oil.
2. Apple Cider Vinegar
This is another dietary supplement, useful for fighting inflammation, and for alkalizing and cleansing the whole system. It is also a significant source of enzymes and potassium, and powerful for stimulating immunity and keeping skin clear. My skin definitely knows when I've run out, and starts telling me all about it almost immediately! It's harsh to take on its own -- I take about a tablespoon 3 times a day -- but is much gentler in apple juice or with water and honey.
3. Vocabulary
As a college English major and a life-long lover of literature, I am keenly aware of the power of words to profoundly affect my mental landscape. The same way songs and images get lodged in our psyches, the words we use and hear create our mental scenery. For me, this is true both on the large scale of things like (deliberate and inadvertent) mantras, and on the small scale in the words I use and hear in my daily conversation. Yoga teaches us to tune our attention to the subtleties, both in the nuances of tension and ease in our body, and to the shifts in our mental chemistry, and there is nothing that changes mental chemistry as quickly or as decisively as a topic of thought.
Take, for example, the topic of forgiveness, and the difference the object of our focus can make: If, in the process of forgiving someone, our goal is to try to minimize the wrong done, then the wrong is getting all of our focus, and is therefore much more likely to grow and become even more grotesque in our minds than to diminish. On the other hand, if we are to focus on the value of the friendship we have shared, and our desire to see that friendship continue on the other side of whatever the impasse or collision, the friendship is what will grow and fill our attention, and forgiveness seems a much more attainable feat.
I apply this to everything, but find it even more relevant on the mat, when I am trying to saturate my body with the chemistry of positive emotions: I talk about health instead of sickness, freedom instead of pain, joy instead of grief, light instead of darkness, and keep my head filled with the images to which I want to grant the power to move me.
4. Facial Expression
This is closely tied to favorite thing #3, but is powerful in its own rite. Just see for yourself whether relaxing your face while you're driving, scrubbing, thinking, watching the news... doesn't change the way your whole body is reacting. My first and favorite yoga teacher told us all the time to smile, and let our bodies feel our smiles, too, and she was absolutely right. Yoga teaches that relaxing our faces allows our parasympathetic nervous systems to relax the things we can't consciously relax, and saturates our bodies with the chemistry of happiness!
5. Barefoot Yoga's Eco Mat
LOVE this yoga mat, even though at $40 it is the most expensive mat I've ever bought. It is make of woven jute, and made soft and grippy with Poly-environmental resin, or PER, which is completely biodegratable. It relaxes out of being rolled up quickly, it doesn't stretch, doesn't slip, and gives just a bit more cushion than a standard mat. And I. Love. It. With all my fingers, toes and knees!
6. Pandora
Music is another powerful influence on mood, and can make or break a yoga session for me. If I'm trying to cram myself into a style of music that doesn't fit my mood, I'm more likely to leave the mat either aggitated or bored. Enter the technological and cultural masterpiece that is Pandora radio! For a girl who is only just finding her own musical muses, being able to kick open the doors through which I've only caught a quick peak (Shazam often provides the toe in the door that I need, and has earned my jumping-up-and-down thanks more than once!) has been such a gift! My current favorites for time on the mat are:
Snatam Kaur or Krishna Das (really interchangeable, as they both bring all the Kirtan singers out to play)
Carlos Nakai (Native American flute... I'm a prairie girl, incurable, turns out)
Mumford and Sons (beautiful lyrics, new indy-folk, equally uplifting and contemplative)
and, on a very feminine day, Astrud Gilberto, the queen of Bossa-Nova :)
7. Local Teachers
I love, love, LURVE (Woody Allen) taking another teacher's class!! And Columbia has grown some beautiful, bright and shining teachers! Everyone who teaches is giving something precious of themselves -- an insight into what makes them love their practice, and so an insight into something lovely about practicing yoga generally. And each student resonates with each teacher differently, and so draws something different out of them. Every class is an organic and entirely unique interaction, and I love it every single time!
Sunday, February 13, 2011
-Ness
We are, all of us, works in progress, and sometimes the lessons we learn can feel so urgent that we can't wait to get back out into the world to implement them, and in some cases, even feel compelled to apologize for what we have been before the lesson came to us. I'm going to fight that temptation in this case, but I'll explain to you what I mean.
Being a basically shy girl, and having been groomed to teach in dance studios and yoga schools with very structured classes, I realize I have done a bit of hiding behind the yoga: teaching yoga as a flowing series that keeps me busy on my mat, and keeps me from engaging very deeply at all with the experiences, physical and otherwise, of the people who have gathered for my classes. It was a partial recognition of this fact about myself that inspired this blog in the first place! Writing is a way I can share the philosophy I so love without having to get so emotionally bare in front of a class of people I've only just met. My motivation has always been physically, anatomically sound, but it has cheated the classes I have taught of the thing I love most about yoga in my own practice, and that is just a shame!
In my own practice, and in the classes I take that I most love, there is time to linger, to sit long enough with an asana that it becomes a room to move around in, and lets us be unbothered by what's coming next long enough that the stillness of our bodies can reveal the motion of our minds. There is so much chemistry, and so many subtle shifts of energy going on in a practice... so many nuances of alignment and breath, that talking to students about what all of that is, and how to access those shifts strategically outside of class ought to be my whole purpose for being present in the role of teacher. It's the most precious of the fruit my own study and practice has borne in me, and should be the thing I'm most eager to share with anyone who's gone to the trouble of coming to my class!
Have you ever seen the movie "You, Me and Dupree"? When Owen Wilson's character has his breakthrough moment, it is calling out Matt Dillon's him-ness (his Carl-ness) that turns the story around, the idea being that every person's most powerful asset, and most valuable contribution, is their own passionate expression of who they are, and what they love. It's so YOGIC! Our own expression of the divine in us... the wisdom we glean from our completely unique perspective and study of the world... is really the only thing we have to offer. Everything else is impersonation, or something to hide our most essential selves behind.
Well, no more for this little yogi! I'm too happy to be so wide awake to keep it to myself any longer, even if I have to overcome some residual childhood shyness to share it. So, while I grow into the space this new understanding has opened up around me, I want to thank you all for the love you have shown as students to this point, and to offer myself as a humbled, but wide-open and overflowing guide into the juiciest parts of yoga, both on and off the mat. See you soon!
Being a basically shy girl, and having been groomed to teach in dance studios and yoga schools with very structured classes, I realize I have done a bit of hiding behind the yoga: teaching yoga as a flowing series that keeps me busy on my mat, and keeps me from engaging very deeply at all with the experiences, physical and otherwise, of the people who have gathered for my classes. It was a partial recognition of this fact about myself that inspired this blog in the first place! Writing is a way I can share the philosophy I so love without having to get so emotionally bare in front of a class of people I've only just met. My motivation has always been physically, anatomically sound, but it has cheated the classes I have taught of the thing I love most about yoga in my own practice, and that is just a shame!
In my own practice, and in the classes I take that I most love, there is time to linger, to sit long enough with an asana that it becomes a room to move around in, and lets us be unbothered by what's coming next long enough that the stillness of our bodies can reveal the motion of our minds. There is so much chemistry, and so many subtle shifts of energy going on in a practice... so many nuances of alignment and breath, that talking to students about what all of that is, and how to access those shifts strategically outside of class ought to be my whole purpose for being present in the role of teacher. It's the most precious of the fruit my own study and practice has borne in me, and should be the thing I'm most eager to share with anyone who's gone to the trouble of coming to my class!
Have you ever seen the movie "You, Me and Dupree"? When Owen Wilson's character has his breakthrough moment, it is calling out Matt Dillon's him-ness (his Carl-ness) that turns the story around, the idea being that every person's most powerful asset, and most valuable contribution, is their own passionate expression of who they are, and what they love. It's so YOGIC! Our own expression of the divine in us... the wisdom we glean from our completely unique perspective and study of the world... is really the only thing we have to offer. Everything else is impersonation, or something to hide our most essential selves behind.
Well, no more for this little yogi! I'm too happy to be so wide awake to keep it to myself any longer, even if I have to overcome some residual childhood shyness to share it. So, while I grow into the space this new understanding has opened up around me, I want to thank you all for the love you have shown as students to this point, and to offer myself as a humbled, but wide-open and overflowing guide into the juiciest parts of yoga, both on and off the mat. See you soon!
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Metta Karuna
So, civility has been a big theme in the national discussion lately. And people talk about it like getting to that place would be a major accomplishment, and involve real sacrifice and transformation. As I've listened, I've thought, shouldn't civility be the very lowest requirement for human interaction? If all we strive to do is keep the hostility we still entertain simmering just below the surface, and only strive to be civil, to quote Phish, it's a bit "like trying to heal a gunshot wound with gauze", isn't it? The ugliness is still gonna fester!
So, while the national conversation has been asking so little of our public figures, I came across an article in Yoga Journal this week that can inspire the rest of us to lift our intentions a bit higher. It's by a teacher of Zen Buddhism named Frank Jude Boccio, and is about a Buddhist practice called "metta karuna". It's a practice that we as individuals can undertake to make love and compassion our default mental position... something that would be infinitely more transformative to a culture than simple civility!
It is a progressive meditation, and it starts with the expression of love for ourselves as individuals... tender appreciation, love for our strengths, the recognition that even the desire to be happy comes from a healthy place in us that deserves our appreciation and nurture. This part of the practice all by itself is something people need acutely in our culture at the moment: just like the heart pumping the most oxygen-rich blood to itself first in order that it be healthy enough to provide health to everything it serves, this practice invites us to sit and be deliberate in loving and manifesting gratitude for the good in ourselves. It asks us to feel our heart center, and without judging it as good or bad, wish it happiness, peace, wholeness, health, relief from suffering, and watch how those words and phrases feel as we receive them. Which ones do we resist? Which ones bring the most gratitude and emotional relief? Sit with ourselves (which is a holiday in itself!) and just nurture and garden our own internal landscape.
Then, it's from that place of having salved our own raw places that the meditation on metta karuna turns outward. Looking out over our landscape of people, we can start with the people it's instinctive and easy to love: may they be happy, may they hold themselves tenderly, may they be free from suffering and the roots of suffering, may they be safe, may they feel the love of the people around them. And, from there, the meditation shifts to a neutral person, and from there, to a person it is not easy to love.
When I did this meditation for the first time, I was surprised both by the person who came to mind when I thought of who it was hard for me to love in that moment, and by the process that happened in my head as I went through the meditation for that person. I felt my own hard edges melting, where I didn't even know they had been hard. After all of that self-nurturing, there were still places in me that felt as dangerous as swallowed pieces of glass. And, as I nurtured my hard person in meditation, the same forgiveness that was necessary for me to extend outwardly in order to be honest in the meditation, became something I also had to extend to myself.
I think that's what Ghandi must have been talking about when he encouraged people to "be the change [we] want to see in the world", and what Jesus meant when he said to judge a tree by the fruit it bears. We can only really ever change ourselves, and will drive ourselves crazy trying to control or change anyone else, but when our tree is healthy, the fruit we bear is so much more nourishing to the people who sit in our shade and enjoy it!
Frank Jude Boccio's article is absolutely worth the study, and is the just the first in a series of three. Here's the link, with my best wishes! http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/2601
So, while the national conversation has been asking so little of our public figures, I came across an article in Yoga Journal this week that can inspire the rest of us to lift our intentions a bit higher. It's by a teacher of Zen Buddhism named Frank Jude Boccio, and is about a Buddhist practice called "metta karuna". It's a practice that we as individuals can undertake to make love and compassion our default mental position... something that would be infinitely more transformative to a culture than simple civility!
It is a progressive meditation, and it starts with the expression of love for ourselves as individuals... tender appreciation, love for our strengths, the recognition that even the desire to be happy comes from a healthy place in us that deserves our appreciation and nurture. This part of the practice all by itself is something people need acutely in our culture at the moment: just like the heart pumping the most oxygen-rich blood to itself first in order that it be healthy enough to provide health to everything it serves, this practice invites us to sit and be deliberate in loving and manifesting gratitude for the good in ourselves. It asks us to feel our heart center, and without judging it as good or bad, wish it happiness, peace, wholeness, health, relief from suffering, and watch how those words and phrases feel as we receive them. Which ones do we resist? Which ones bring the most gratitude and emotional relief? Sit with ourselves (which is a holiday in itself!) and just nurture and garden our own internal landscape.
Then, it's from that place of having salved our own raw places that the meditation on metta karuna turns outward. Looking out over our landscape of people, we can start with the people it's instinctive and easy to love: may they be happy, may they hold themselves tenderly, may they be free from suffering and the roots of suffering, may they be safe, may they feel the love of the people around them. And, from there, the meditation shifts to a neutral person, and from there, to a person it is not easy to love.
When I did this meditation for the first time, I was surprised both by the person who came to mind when I thought of who it was hard for me to love in that moment, and by the process that happened in my head as I went through the meditation for that person. I felt my own hard edges melting, where I didn't even know they had been hard. After all of that self-nurturing, there were still places in me that felt as dangerous as swallowed pieces of glass. And, as I nurtured my hard person in meditation, the same forgiveness that was necessary for me to extend outwardly in order to be honest in the meditation, became something I also had to extend to myself.
I think that's what Ghandi must have been talking about when he encouraged people to "be the change [we] want to see in the world", and what Jesus meant when he said to judge a tree by the fruit it bears. We can only really ever change ourselves, and will drive ourselves crazy trying to control or change anyone else, but when our tree is healthy, the fruit we bear is so much more nourishing to the people who sit in our shade and enjoy it!
Frank Jude Boccio's article is absolutely worth the study, and is the just the first in a series of three. Here's the link, with my best wishes! http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/2601
Friday, January 14, 2011
Beauty at the Edge of Fear
Recently, I set sail on an adventure for which some of my dearest and most consistent supports were unable to accompany me, and so it also set me thinking about the mental yoga of playing at the edge of fear. Jnana yoga is the yoga of challenging the mental rigidities that keep us locked in patterns that are only ours because they are familiar, not necessarily because they are healthy. Jnana invites us to reach mentally beyond what is familiar. Just like on the mat, when we dance at the edge of what's comfortable, and learn to breathe and relax, and build the strength to exist steadily in new territory, the simple experiences of everyday living ask us to move beyond what is familiar, and free our minds to grow and become flexible.
Yoga teaches that, the same way pain is the sign post for the body's edge, fear is the sign post for the mind. And the beauty and wisdom of physical practice therefore becomes a powerful teacher, and invitation to exploration, for the mind. In hatha yoga, we follow our energy body in the direction of physical freedom and strength, opening places where our flow of energy has been blocked, and energizing areas that have been allowed to remain limp in our every day living and moving through the world. Just the experience of bringing blood and oxygen, extension and strength to a place in our bodies that has been lacking it is invigorating. So, following the same spirit of exploration into the act of living, and learning to exist with integrity and deliberate attention even at the edge of fear, can be transformative.
As I began to recognize that this change was coming whether I wanted it or not, my first reaction was nearly paralyzing fear. I wept with it, fought it with my logic, my prayers, spent incredible amounts of energy pushing it back. It was actually on the mat that I recognized how full of tension and resistance my body was. My body, that I know so well, and that usually moves with eagerness and fluidity, loving its breath and welcoming wide open ranges of motion, was positively locked up with resistance. And, it was breathing and relaxing my body's edges that broke the dam, and all of the emotion I had been piling up against this change came crashing out of me on that sacred little mat.
The beautiful thing about this new experience has been the recognition of that calm, solid, wise and unshakable thing that remains at my center, guiding my thoughts, my words, my impressions and organizing my memories, as unchanged even while the supports on which I had so depended were removed. Yoga calls it Shiva -- the part of ourselves that is modeled after and linked to the Divine, and that will remain after the destruction of our bodies. The Hindu chant "Om namah shivaya" pays tribute to that divine center. There is always stripping away in life, and there are always shifts in the proximity and definitions of the elements that surround us, but it is only the degree to which we, in our attachment to our favorite parts of a world that is by its very nature temporary, resist the changes that determine how traumatizing those shifts are. In life, as on the mat, resistance is the thing that makes us suffer. Without resistance, when we finally allow ourselves just to step out into the unknown and learn to breathe freely and stand steady, we extend the limits of the possible.
So bon voyage, my fellow explorers, vaia con Dios into the wild unknown!
Yoga teaches that, the same way pain is the sign post for the body's edge, fear is the sign post for the mind. And the beauty and wisdom of physical practice therefore becomes a powerful teacher, and invitation to exploration, for the mind. In hatha yoga, we follow our energy body in the direction of physical freedom and strength, opening places where our flow of energy has been blocked, and energizing areas that have been allowed to remain limp in our every day living and moving through the world. Just the experience of bringing blood and oxygen, extension and strength to a place in our bodies that has been lacking it is invigorating. So, following the same spirit of exploration into the act of living, and learning to exist with integrity and deliberate attention even at the edge of fear, can be transformative.
As I began to recognize that this change was coming whether I wanted it or not, my first reaction was nearly paralyzing fear. I wept with it, fought it with my logic, my prayers, spent incredible amounts of energy pushing it back. It was actually on the mat that I recognized how full of tension and resistance my body was. My body, that I know so well, and that usually moves with eagerness and fluidity, loving its breath and welcoming wide open ranges of motion, was positively locked up with resistance. And, it was breathing and relaxing my body's edges that broke the dam, and all of the emotion I had been piling up against this change came crashing out of me on that sacred little mat.
The beautiful thing about this new experience has been the recognition of that calm, solid, wise and unshakable thing that remains at my center, guiding my thoughts, my words, my impressions and organizing my memories, as unchanged even while the supports on which I had so depended were removed. Yoga calls it Shiva -- the part of ourselves that is modeled after and linked to the Divine, and that will remain after the destruction of our bodies. The Hindu chant "Om namah shivaya" pays tribute to that divine center. There is always stripping away in life, and there are always shifts in the proximity and definitions of the elements that surround us, but it is only the degree to which we, in our attachment to our favorite parts of a world that is by its very nature temporary, resist the changes that determine how traumatizing those shifts are. In life, as on the mat, resistance is the thing that makes us suffer. Without resistance, when we finally allow ourselves just to step out into the unknown and learn to breathe freely and stand steady, we extend the limits of the possible.
So bon voyage, my fellow explorers, vaia con Dios into the wild unknown!
Friday, November 19, 2010
Taste the Rainbow
Have you ever been presented with an idea that just keeps appearing, until all at once you've been mulling it over for days? The latest such idea for me first appeared in a Yoga Journal article called "The Essense of Life". Its author was talking about how the palette of human emotions can be likened to the palette of flavors we use in cooking -- all of them serve a unique purpose, and all of them can ruin a dish if they are used too much. The revolutionary part of the idea for me was the suggestion that not only is no emotion inherently bad and another always necessarily good, but that we have it as much within our control which emotions flavor our days as which seasonings flavor our soups!
Then, just on the heals of reading about that idea, I came to the section of "Eat, Pray, Love" (I'm reading it with friends, and recommend it heartily...) in which Elizabeth Gilbert describes the blue pearl of consciousness. The blue pearl is the still concentration of mental activity in the center of the mind that yogis have been describing for years, and that modern brain imaging has just been able to observe as an actual glow of blue in the center of an otherwise calm brain. It happens when meditation is finally able to still the chattering activity of the mind and just allow for still, non-judgmental, recipient observation, non-reactive, peaceful. She describes that perspective as the one that is always aware, but exists behind our personality... the awareness that can watch us dream and report back to us what we dreamed about. It is also the awareness that can elect which emotions to deploy at which moments, rather than letting whichever leaps from the water first dictate both the moment and our prevailing mental state. It is also our most essential, lasting, universally connected self.
So, fascinated with the prospect of being so calmly in control of emotions that have the potential to toss me around like a raft on an ocean, I have started letting emotions be the focus of my meditation: Emotions as ingredients... flavors... tools to be used when what a circumstance really needs is a touch of anger tempered by compassion, or full-body laughter and gratitude, or silent receptiveness. I still love meditation that only quiets the mind, and concentrates attentiveness to the silent center where we become spacious. But without the guidance of a formal guru, I'm not ashamed to admit that I approach that space with a little timidity. And meditations that teach me to be calm and non-reactive in order to train and remain in control of my reactions has been so very fruitful! So, for the moment, here I am.
And so, I'll end this post by sharing the formula that has been shaping my meditations, and my hope that it is as much a blessing to you as it has been to me:
1. Begin with a few Sun Salutations, just to warm and lubricate everything, flush and oxygenate your soft parts, and properly align the hard ones, in order that you may have a comfortable body to sit in.
2. Find a seated position you expect to be able to keep for at least 10 minutes, supporting knees or back or whatever you imagine will be the first parts to complain about sitting.
3. Establish your breath, inhaling deeply into your diaphragm, and exhaling for at least as long as your inhale took to complete itself, if not a few counts longer. Lengthening the exhale lowers blood pressure, and signals to your parasympathetic nervous system to release subconscious tension. Shoulders, neck, face all relax, and breath deepens.
4. Once you have arrived in this quiet part of your brain, start watching your thoughts. Non-reactively at first, until you find one that is repetitive, or sets the theme for the dialogue that runs repeatedly in your head. Without judging it as right or wrong, just ask yourself: Is this thought positive or nagative -- edifying or destructive? If it is positive, sit in gratitude, and apply that smiling, grateful awareness to every part of your body (like the Indonesian man tells Elizabeth Gilbert, "Smile in your liver").
If it is negative, just observe the way your body reacts to it: where are you holding? what aches? does your breathing change when you stay with that thought? Then, carefully and attentively, replace that negative mantra (because even our most firmly held beliefs about what makes us suffer are often either lies we just keep repeating to ourselves, or a careful ignoring of a truth that would serve our psyches much better... but for better or worse, the phrases that get the most mental air time are our mantras) with a healthy mantra that will encourage and rebuild what the old, negative mantra has eaten away at.
5. Then, sitting with your deep breath and your new mantra, watch your body. Let the chemistry of your smiling mind wash over every part of you, and picture it healing, cleansing, soothing, relaxing every little corner of your body and mind. Let this part of the meditation last a least a few minutes longer than you spent in searching. Soak in it.
It is a place to start in the quest to live peacefully in a human body and mind, as we learn to establish the mental rooms in which we can exist calmly in tumultuous circumstances. Enjoy! ...And Happy, Happy Thanksgiving!!
p.s. Links to the Yoga Journal articles that I've been mulling over:
http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/2516?utm_source=DailyInsight&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=DailyInsight
http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/2544
Then, just on the heals of reading about that idea, I came to the section of "Eat, Pray, Love" (I'm reading it with friends, and recommend it heartily...) in which Elizabeth Gilbert describes the blue pearl of consciousness. The blue pearl is the still concentration of mental activity in the center of the mind that yogis have been describing for years, and that modern brain imaging has just been able to observe as an actual glow of blue in the center of an otherwise calm brain. It happens when meditation is finally able to still the chattering activity of the mind and just allow for still, non-judgmental, recipient observation, non-reactive, peaceful. She describes that perspective as the one that is always aware, but exists behind our personality... the awareness that can watch us dream and report back to us what we dreamed about. It is also the awareness that can elect which emotions to deploy at which moments, rather than letting whichever leaps from the water first dictate both the moment and our prevailing mental state. It is also our most essential, lasting, universally connected self.
So, fascinated with the prospect of being so calmly in control of emotions that have the potential to toss me around like a raft on an ocean, I have started letting emotions be the focus of my meditation: Emotions as ingredients... flavors... tools to be used when what a circumstance really needs is a touch of anger tempered by compassion, or full-body laughter and gratitude, or silent receptiveness. I still love meditation that only quiets the mind, and concentrates attentiveness to the silent center where we become spacious. But without the guidance of a formal guru, I'm not ashamed to admit that I approach that space with a little timidity. And meditations that teach me to be calm and non-reactive in order to train and remain in control of my reactions has been so very fruitful! So, for the moment, here I am.
And so, I'll end this post by sharing the formula that has been shaping my meditations, and my hope that it is as much a blessing to you as it has been to me:
1. Begin with a few Sun Salutations, just to warm and lubricate everything, flush and oxygenate your soft parts, and properly align the hard ones, in order that you may have a comfortable body to sit in.
2. Find a seated position you expect to be able to keep for at least 10 minutes, supporting knees or back or whatever you imagine will be the first parts to complain about sitting.
3. Establish your breath, inhaling deeply into your diaphragm, and exhaling for at least as long as your inhale took to complete itself, if not a few counts longer. Lengthening the exhale lowers blood pressure, and signals to your parasympathetic nervous system to release subconscious tension. Shoulders, neck, face all relax, and breath deepens.
4. Once you have arrived in this quiet part of your brain, start watching your thoughts. Non-reactively at first, until you find one that is repetitive, or sets the theme for the dialogue that runs repeatedly in your head. Without judging it as right or wrong, just ask yourself: Is this thought positive or nagative -- edifying or destructive? If it is positive, sit in gratitude, and apply that smiling, grateful awareness to every part of your body (like the Indonesian man tells Elizabeth Gilbert, "Smile in your liver").
If it is negative, just observe the way your body reacts to it: where are you holding? what aches? does your breathing change when you stay with that thought? Then, carefully and attentively, replace that negative mantra (because even our most firmly held beliefs about what makes us suffer are often either lies we just keep repeating to ourselves, or a careful ignoring of a truth that would serve our psyches much better... but for better or worse, the phrases that get the most mental air time are our mantras) with a healthy mantra that will encourage and rebuild what the old, negative mantra has eaten away at.
5. Then, sitting with your deep breath and your new mantra, watch your body. Let the chemistry of your smiling mind wash over every part of you, and picture it healing, cleansing, soothing, relaxing every little corner of your body and mind. Let this part of the meditation last a least a few minutes longer than you spent in searching. Soak in it.
It is a place to start in the quest to live peacefully in a human body and mind, as we learn to establish the mental rooms in which we can exist calmly in tumultuous circumstances. Enjoy! ...And Happy, Happy Thanksgiving!!
p.s. Links to the Yoga Journal articles that I've been mulling over:
http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/2516?utm_source=DailyInsight&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=DailyInsight
http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/2544
Monday, July 12, 2010
Cloud Sculpting
Sweet, sweet summertime, and lying on the driveway watching the clouds go by has inspired me...
In Christian scripture, there is a principle that finds a beautiful parallel in yogic meditation. The address for the Biblical gem is Paul's second letter to the church in Corinth, II Corinthians 10:5, when he teaches that they can take every thought captive in order to make it obedient to Christ. I know obedience isn't a popular idea for many at the moment, but if we exchange the phrase "obedient to Christ" for something like "benevolent", "compassionate", even "positive" or "healthy", it starts to blend right in to a yogic worldview. As a matter of fact, even the kind of jihad that is the Muslim battle for self-perfection echos the same idea. But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Back to the mat:
When we practice, yoga teaches that we are meant to let ourselves surrender to each position, breathing into what we are trying to strengthen, while we relax everything else; never tensing against a stretch, never engaging more than is necessary to exist in a place with ease and smooth breath. As well as being everything else it is, physical practice is a practice of non-reaction. So, extending the same practice of non-reaction to one's mental state, yoga teaches practicioners to let her thoughts (called chitta vritti, or mind-chatter) pass in front of her consciousness like clouds in the distance. She practices being a calm, peaceful, smiling observer of her thoughts as things seperate from herself, in order that she can choose which clouds to focus on, and make shapes with.
It's liberating, really... the realization that I don't have to feed and carry around every thought that pops into my head, especially since a good number of those thoughts are just the left-over, drifting clouds of harder, sadder storms that have already passed by.
(I know I'm getting ready to mix my metaphors, but it's such a nice transition from my last post, I can't resist!) It's like decorating a house: selecting which thoughts to cultivate and make mantras... which impressions we will let turn into definitions of the world around us, and of ourselves, is like choosing what will make our mental houses beautiful, nurturing, healthy and happy. And when we have practiced living in our brains this way long enough, what castles and gardens we will have to roam around in, and retreat to, and entertain in!
In Christian scripture, there is a principle that finds a beautiful parallel in yogic meditation. The address for the Biblical gem is Paul's second letter to the church in Corinth, II Corinthians 10:5, when he teaches that they can take every thought captive in order to make it obedient to Christ. I know obedience isn't a popular idea for many at the moment, but if we exchange the phrase "obedient to Christ" for something like "benevolent", "compassionate", even "positive" or "healthy", it starts to blend right in to a yogic worldview. As a matter of fact, even the kind of jihad that is the Muslim battle for self-perfection echos the same idea. But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Back to the mat:
When we practice, yoga teaches that we are meant to let ourselves surrender to each position, breathing into what we are trying to strengthen, while we relax everything else; never tensing against a stretch, never engaging more than is necessary to exist in a place with ease and smooth breath. As well as being everything else it is, physical practice is a practice of non-reaction. So, extending the same practice of non-reaction to one's mental state, yoga teaches practicioners to let her thoughts (called chitta vritti, or mind-chatter) pass in front of her consciousness like clouds in the distance. She practices being a calm, peaceful, smiling observer of her thoughts as things seperate from herself, in order that she can choose which clouds to focus on, and make shapes with.
It's liberating, really... the realization that I don't have to feed and carry around every thought that pops into my head, especially since a good number of those thoughts are just the left-over, drifting clouds of harder, sadder storms that have already passed by.
(I know I'm getting ready to mix my metaphors, but it's such a nice transition from my last post, I can't resist!) It's like decorating a house: selecting which thoughts to cultivate and make mantras... which impressions we will let turn into definitions of the world around us, and of ourselves, is like choosing what will make our mental houses beautiful, nurturing, healthy and happy. And when we have practiced living in our brains this way long enough, what castles and gardens we will have to roam around in, and retreat to, and entertain in!
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