"For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult task of all...the work for which all other work is but preparation." (Rilke, as quoted by Jack Kornfield in A Path with Heart)
As you practice today, remember that no matter how hard it gets, it is nothing compared to staying calm in the face of a frustrating interaction, remaining loving when someone close to you pushes your buttons, and being kind even toward those who seem to wish us harm.
Do the work that prepares you for that most difficult task. Embrace the challenges and obstacles on your mat so you can be ready for the challenges to loving and showing that love. Take a long shavasana at the end to let it all sink in, so you rise from your practice knowing that you are ready for the task and the privilege of loving others.
(I highly recommend Kornfield's book, by the way, if you'd like to read further.)
25 August 2010
17 August 2010
We are what we repeatedly do.
"Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit."
I don't usually put much stock in Aristotle, who was deeply and unfailingly dualistic in his view of the world and has helped embed our western world in that way of thinking for centuries. But this quote strikes me as quite yogic.
Practice one or more of the techniques of yoga--asana (posture), pranayama (breath and energy expansion), bhakti (devotional chanting and acts), dhyana (meditation), karma (service), or some other-- and soon we realize excellence.
Not necessarily a perfect backbend or a divine voice or an entirely still mind, although these will come with time, I hear.
But excellence in ways that creep up on us without us forcing them: we can be a little kinder, we feel less grasping for things we don't have and more gratitude for those we do, we stay calmer in the face of disruption.
This is because we practice these difficult things, little by little, even when we seem to just be bending and breathing on the mat. (And the bending and breathing help prepare the body for these broader changes as they bring to an optimal state all its systems: nervous, digestive, muscular, cardiovascular, endocrine, and so on.)
Aristotle was saying something quite in line with the yogis: It's not all about genetic gifts, and it's not about what you believe or think. It's about what you DO.
Do your best, each time, with what you have. Such a cliche, but so true. And if it is something you wish to excel in, do it over and over and over. The yogis were talking about daily, committed, intense practice. (They weren't talking about a six-week workshop and then a video once in a while.)
As the Gita reminds us: Put forth effort and let go of your attachment to results. And then do it again. And again. And again....
I don't usually put much stock in Aristotle, who was deeply and unfailingly dualistic in his view of the world and has helped embed our western world in that way of thinking for centuries. But this quote strikes me as quite yogic.
Practice one or more of the techniques of yoga--asana (posture), pranayama (breath and energy expansion), bhakti (devotional chanting and acts), dhyana (meditation), karma (service), or some other-- and soon we realize excellence.
Not necessarily a perfect backbend or a divine voice or an entirely still mind, although these will come with time, I hear.
But excellence in ways that creep up on us without us forcing them: we can be a little kinder, we feel less grasping for things we don't have and more gratitude for those we do, we stay calmer in the face of disruption.
This is because we practice these difficult things, little by little, even when we seem to just be bending and breathing on the mat. (And the bending and breathing help prepare the body for these broader changes as they bring to an optimal state all its systems: nervous, digestive, muscular, cardiovascular, endocrine, and so on.)
Aristotle was saying something quite in line with the yogis: It's not all about genetic gifts, and it's not about what you believe or think. It's about what you DO.
Do your best, each time, with what you have. Such a cliche, but so true. And if it is something you wish to excel in, do it over and over and over. The yogis were talking about daily, committed, intense practice. (They weren't talking about a six-week workshop and then a video once in a while.)
As the Gita reminds us: Put forth effort and let go of your attachment to results. And then do it again. And again. And again....
10 August 2010
Get a grip. Then let go of it.
"If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you let go a lot, you will have even more peace." (Achaan Chah)
Where do you feel yourself holding on, maybe even gripping tight? I feel it in my hip flexors--the fronts of my hips-- and in my lower back. Maybe you feel it in your jaw, or in your shoulders, or in your pelvic floor. Maybe you feel it most in your mind, holding on to a goal or an idea of how things 'should' be.
Chah is speaking in the Buddhist tradition, but the yogis have their own way of saying the same thing. They claim that the best way to catch a monkey in the jungle is to simply put out a jar of treats with a narrow neck. When the monkey finds it, he will thrust his open hand into the jar, grasp the treats, and try to pull his fist out. The narrow neck will prevent him from extricating himself. He will try like anything to free himself with his fist grasping the prize, and remain stuck no matter how hard he tries...because he is unwilling to let go.
I don't know if this is true of real monkeys; the yogis are talking about the monkey mind. And there the story holds true, at least in my experience.
In your practice today, watch for what you're grasping, gripping, holding. Maybe you notice a relationship between what you're mentally grasping and someplace you are physically tightening--but that's not necessary. Just noticing either the mental OR the physical holding gives us an entry point for letting go of it. That's the beauty of raja and hatha yoga.
Notice the tightening. If it's physical, you can even exaggerate it to really make it conscious and volitional (this is the PNF or "resistance" method I teach sometimes, for those of you who have learned it). If it's mental, do that, too! Focus on it, let it really percolate up.
Then let it go.
Where do you feel yourself holding on, maybe even gripping tight? I feel it in my hip flexors--the fronts of my hips-- and in my lower back. Maybe you feel it in your jaw, or in your shoulders, or in your pelvic floor. Maybe you feel it most in your mind, holding on to a goal or an idea of how things 'should' be.
Chah is speaking in the Buddhist tradition, but the yogis have their own way of saying the same thing. They claim that the best way to catch a monkey in the jungle is to simply put out a jar of treats with a narrow neck. When the monkey finds it, he will thrust his open hand into the jar, grasp the treats, and try to pull his fist out. The narrow neck will prevent him from extricating himself. He will try like anything to free himself with his fist grasping the prize, and remain stuck no matter how hard he tries...because he is unwilling to let go.
I don't know if this is true of real monkeys; the yogis are talking about the monkey mind. And there the story holds true, at least in my experience.
In your practice today, watch for what you're grasping, gripping, holding. Maybe you notice a relationship between what you're mentally grasping and someplace you are physically tightening--but that's not necessary. Just noticing either the mental OR the physical holding gives us an entry point for letting go of it. That's the beauty of raja and hatha yoga.
Notice the tightening. If it's physical, you can even exaggerate it to really make it conscious and volitional (this is the PNF or "resistance" method I teach sometimes, for those of you who have learned it). If it's mental, do that, too! Focus on it, let it really percolate up.
Then let it go.
07 August 2010
Top down or bottom up
Next time you have a chance, read some of the Hatha Yoga Pradipika (Bihar School of Yoga translation has the best commentary). Or read a book by Georg Feuerstein to get a sense of earlier hatha yoga techniques and the influence of tantra on yoga and Buddhism.
In the wake of the Yoga Journal controversy about their ads, it's good to remember the fuller picture of yoga practices. It is, after all, a practice that focuses on the bodily practices so that the student can realize nonduality; that is, really GET the way that the body is not separate from the mind, nor from other bodies, nor from other material things.
I am all for a discussion of why YJ needs to reconsider their editorial (both text and image) emphasis on asana and why the relationship between editorial and advertising sales is increasingly twisted in most magazines, including YJ.
But to say that Kathryn Budig's photographs in Toesox ads are just more "naked women" and say they are not "about the celebration of the beauty of the human body or the beauty of the poses" seems misguided to me. The photos show a woman in motion who is strong and focused, not waifish or pouting or staring blankly or any of the typical "I am a sexual object" indicators.
And if we consider the many techniques of hatha yoga, we find many that are far more salacious and eyebrow-raising than naked asana practice. For instance, there's going into a river to draw the water up into one's anus, hold it there, and then expel it. There's having ritualized sex. There's meditating on corpses in a burial ground.
There are lots of practices, especially the ones from the "left-handed" tantric schools, that encourage the practitioner to shake herself out of ordinary consciousness by doing something forbidden, exotic, unusual. It can help to wake us up.
AND there are many others that encourage the student to shake herself out of ordinary consciousness by doing the mundane and ordinary. That is, by practicing the same thing OVER and OVER again. And finding the freshness in it even though it is, on the face of it, very familiar.
You may remember this argument from the movie My Dinner with Andre.
I think the two approaches work beautifully together. A yoga practice of asana (moving and holding postures) and pranayama (breathing consciously) and pratyahara (turning senses inward) and dhyana (concentrating) can do BOTH.
Sometimes I take a class and it blows my mind. The teacher gets me to do things I'd never think I could do. I move and breathe steadily until I let go of everything but just this breath, just this moment. I am alert and calm and totally focused. They usually have to exhaust me and get me right to the edge for this to happen. They have to remind me of my true Self, which is bigger than the little one I usually identify with, and threatens to dissolve little-self.
Other times my practice is so familiar I can feel myself starting to get bored and I have to work to make what is so familiar fresh. I have to make an effort to notice what is different about this easy inhale from the last one, this Warrior B from yesterday's. This is another way to wake up.
So in today's practice, your intention might be to make way for either of these to occur...either the huge unusual event that shifts your perspective suddenly, or the gradual changes that take place when we apply ourselves to a regular, ordinary practice and notice what happens over time.
Top down or bottom up? I'll meet you in that middle path.
In the wake of the Yoga Journal controversy about their ads, it's good to remember the fuller picture of yoga practices. It is, after all, a practice that focuses on the bodily practices so that the student can realize nonduality; that is, really GET the way that the body is not separate from the mind, nor from other bodies, nor from other material things.
I am all for a discussion of why YJ needs to reconsider their editorial (both text and image) emphasis on asana and why the relationship between editorial and advertising sales is increasingly twisted in most magazines, including YJ.
But to say that Kathryn Budig's photographs in Toesox ads are just more "naked women" and say they are not "about the celebration of the beauty of the human body or the beauty of the poses" seems misguided to me. The photos show a woman in motion who is strong and focused, not waifish or pouting or staring blankly or any of the typical "I am a sexual object" indicators.
And if we consider the many techniques of hatha yoga, we find many that are far more salacious and eyebrow-raising than naked asana practice. For instance, there's going into a river to draw the water up into one's anus, hold it there, and then expel it. There's having ritualized sex. There's meditating on corpses in a burial ground.
There are lots of practices, especially the ones from the "left-handed" tantric schools, that encourage the practitioner to shake herself out of ordinary consciousness by doing something forbidden, exotic, unusual. It can help to wake us up.
AND there are many others that encourage the student to shake herself out of ordinary consciousness by doing the mundane and ordinary. That is, by practicing the same thing OVER and OVER again. And finding the freshness in it even though it is, on the face of it, very familiar.
You may remember this argument from the movie My Dinner with Andre.
I think the two approaches work beautifully together. A yoga practice of asana (moving and holding postures) and pranayama (breathing consciously) and pratyahara (turning senses inward) and dhyana (concentrating) can do BOTH.
Sometimes I take a class and it blows my mind. The teacher gets me to do things I'd never think I could do. I move and breathe steadily until I let go of everything but just this breath, just this moment. I am alert and calm and totally focused. They usually have to exhaust me and get me right to the edge for this to happen. They have to remind me of my true Self, which is bigger than the little one I usually identify with, and threatens to dissolve little-self.
Other times my practice is so familiar I can feel myself starting to get bored and I have to work to make what is so familiar fresh. I have to make an effort to notice what is different about this easy inhale from the last one, this Warrior B from yesterday's. This is another way to wake up.
So in today's practice, your intention might be to make way for either of these to occur...either the huge unusual event that shifts your perspective suddenly, or the gradual changes that take place when we apply ourselves to a regular, ordinary practice and notice what happens over time.
Top down or bottom up? I'll meet you in that middle path.
03 August 2010
Liberté, équanimité, fraternité!
Tonight in class I'll be teaching a lot of twisting, sidebending, and inverting postures. So I've been thinking about what we need to do to get into each of those positions.
It's pretty basic: to enter any yoga posture safely, we need to find a neutral posture and even breath first.
But NEUTRAL is not the same thing as HABITUAL. Our habitual posture and breathing is often far from neutral.
This is where ujjayi samavrtti pranayama and bandhas come in. They help us create a steady breath with equal-length inhalations and exhalations, plus find neutral pelvis and a long, tall spine, as we begin each movement.
Then we can twist safely. We can sidebend without crunching. We can invert without compression.
It's tempting to think that we can wring ourselves into position with muscle and force, and once we get there start to breathe fully again and maybe "fix" the areas we've tensed up...but it will always feel better when we remember to work the equanimity in our breath and the neutral spine with space between the vertebrae FIRST.
In our everyday lives, we can find equanimity before putting ourselves in positions that could cause strain. We find "neutral" so that we can enter a difficult situation and still breathe...so that we can emerge from a place of constriction even stronger, even more spacious than before. As the systems of the body--respiratory, skeletal, muscular, circulatory, etc.--find a calm, steady state, so can the mind.
So, as many teachers have pointed out: Find the Tadasana (Mountain) in every posture. Even breathing, neutral pelvis, tall spine. In today's practice, focus on that FIRST, before any movement to twist, side bend, invert, back bend, or forward bend. So what if you don't grab your toe or wrist or get into some extreme new variation of a posture? Explore equanimity--it might be the most extreme thing you do today!
It's pretty basic: to enter any yoga posture safely, we need to find a neutral posture and even breath first.
But NEUTRAL is not the same thing as HABITUAL. Our habitual posture and breathing is often far from neutral.
This is where ujjayi samavrtti pranayama and bandhas come in. They help us create a steady breath with equal-length inhalations and exhalations, plus find neutral pelvis and a long, tall spine, as we begin each movement.
Then we can twist safely. We can sidebend without crunching. We can invert without compression.
It's tempting to think that we can wring ourselves into position with muscle and force, and once we get there start to breathe fully again and maybe "fix" the areas we've tensed up...but it will always feel better when we remember to work the equanimity in our breath and the neutral spine with space between the vertebrae FIRST.
In our everyday lives, we can find equanimity before putting ourselves in positions that could cause strain. We find "neutral" so that we can enter a difficult situation and still breathe...so that we can emerge from a place of constriction even stronger, even more spacious than before. As the systems of the body--respiratory, skeletal, muscular, circulatory, etc.--find a calm, steady state, so can the mind.
So, as many teachers have pointed out: Find the Tadasana (Mountain) in every posture. Even breathing, neutral pelvis, tall spine. In today's practice, focus on that FIRST, before any movement to twist, side bend, invert, back bend, or forward bend. So what if you don't grab your toe or wrist or get into some extreme new variation of a posture? Explore equanimity--it might be the most extreme thing you do today!
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