Manipura Chakra: Fire

Manipura Chakra is the seat of the ego and self-definition.  Its element is fire and it the seat of the ego.  Too much fire breeds anger, aggression, over-assertion; too little fire and we are not able to create boundaries, self-determine, or speak our minds.

A healthy third chakra is marked by empowerment.  When we are self-empowered, we do not need to dominate in order to fill the gap.  Self-empowerment leads to autonomy and personal responsibility, which are key in initiating conscious transformation.  When we honor the power within us, we can freely make decisions that honor our own personal truth.  Rather than internalizing the voices of our parents, peers, and culture, we give ourself the power to question, re-determine, and transform.

To access manipura chakra, open yourself to the fire of your own practice.  Through heat, we begin to safely shift and transform the physical body.  Through twists and navel focused asana like bakasana, we access the power of the core.  Connection to the stability of the core anchors us in our own body.  From the core, we discover the fantastic movement of radiation and contraction.  Energy moves from the center out, just as energy draws into the center.  This dynamic flow and pulsation is a reflection of the greater movements of our life: learning what to let in, learning what to let go. The constant ebb and flow keeps us alive, invigorated, open to new ideas, and anchored in what we choose to keep.

Explore the fire of your practice.  Become attuned to your relationship to your own personal power.  Can you relish responsibility without guilt or shame?  Can you risk transformation in order to connect to a deeper, more authentic  expression of your self?

Svadisthana Chakra: Water

As we move into the second chakra, life starts getting juicy.  Now that our primal survival needs have been addressed, we move into the realm of feelings, pleasure, creativity, and sexuality.

To paraphrase Anodea Judith, we are creating a container in the first chakra…and in the second chakra we fill this container with fluid and movement.  This movement of the second chakra takes us into the world of balance and grace.  When can we go too far?  When are we too stuck?

In our culture, there is frequently a dismissal of pleasure in favor of asceticism and work. In reclaiming the second chakra, we validate the needs of our pleasure body and emotional body.  When these centers are fed, they reward us with deep insight, intuition, and embodiment.  Part of being fully alive is to appreciate the magnificence of our own capacity for sensuality and pleasure.  Whether we are sipping a cup of tea or feeling the sunshine on our face (or in Vancouver, we are frequently feeling the rain), we are connecting to a primal deliciousness.  In my own experience, finding this connection allows me to honor my body’s needs: to rest when I’m tired, eat nourishing foods, and practice yoga from a place of joy rather than obligation.

In your yoga practice, see if you can connect to the yumminess of movement. Close your eyes and feel the practice from the inside out.  Rather than worrying about what the posture looks like, see if you can sense it from within.  Give yourself the freedom to relish your body.  Even in “still” poses, there is always a divine movement.  Our breath, our blood…we are in constant fluid motion.

Re-energizing the second chakra doesn’t take much and a little attention can reap enormous rewards.  Simply pause a few times a day to connect to your senses.  Feel the carpet under your toes, enjoy the taste of your food, stretch deliciously.   Tasting the little pleasures of your life will create spaciousness for presence and increase your capacity for juicy joy.

Muladhara Chakra: Earth

Can we be strong without being rigid?  Can we own our own space without being overbearing?  Is our relationship with our body healthy?

These are just a few of the issues encompassed by our first chakra. Located at the base of the spine, muladhara chakra is the “root” of the chakra system.  Like the foundation of a house, the health of this chakra affects all the others above it.    Anodea Judith describes the first chakra as reflecting our “right to be here,” which includes our “right to establish individuality” and our  right to take care of ourselves” (Eastern Body, Western Mind).

The element of the muladhara chakra is earth and the chakra resonates with the part of ourselves that solid and physical.  Judith estimates the development of this chakra during the first year of life, in which we first learn if we can trust the outer world to meet our essential needs.  This primal experience shapes our future interactions with our environment:  do we have enough to sustain us without hoarding?   On a more psychological level, can we allow ourselves to take up space  without becoming impermeable?

In our asana practice, can we be strong without becoming rigid?

As we practice, we can connect to the strength of the earth through any part of our body that is connected to the ground. As we press into the earth, the strength of the earth radiates back into our muscles and bones.  In standing poses, the feet and legs to draw up the strength of the earth into the core of our body.  In downdog, uttanasana, and chaturanga, our hands become like a second pair of feet, anchoring us into the solid girth of the planet.  Explore becoming more animal in your practice.  Get low to the earth and play with the weight and rebound of gravity.  And as you connect to the deep stability and safety of the ground, can you trust enough to let go of any hard edges?

When you feel spacey or ungrounded, explore some slow, steady standing poses like Warrior II or chair that work the hips and legs…or simply lay in savasana for a few minutes and give the floor your weight.  As you connect to earth, be reminded that you are of the earth.  Embrace your right to be here.

Your Practice Serves Your Life

I first started practicing yoga so that I didn’t get fat.

I was a fairly neurotic, athletic, 20-something, looking for a way to stay flexible, “healthy” (skinny), and (sure, why not?) centered.  Living in NYC with a healthy competitive streak and a does of obsession, I was determined to get “good” at yoga.  Handstand, shoulderstand, arm balances!  I wanted to take the hard  classes.  I craved the challenge.

Was my yoga practice serving my life?  Well, sure in a way, and rather inadvertently.  Although my ego was in the driver’s seat, the inherent benefits of the practice gradually began to seep in.  Since savasana and meditation were part of the classes, I began to calm myself and become aware of the incessant chattering of my mind.  After a few years of yoga, I eased up on the sthira (effort) and started to cultivate some sukha (sweetness).  I started to love restorative classes.   While yoga had started as another form of exercise, it slowly became a way to move deeper into myself.

After we practice for awhile, it’s time to ask the deeper questions.  How can my practice truly serve my life, and my life’s purpose (dharma)?  Can I connect my practice to my greater spiritual evolution?  How is my soul’s intention fed and nourished through my practice?

Our intentions can be simple.  Perhaps we need to open the body and breath so that we can do our daily job and stay well.  Perhaps we need to practice being present so that we can make conscious decisions.  Maybe yoga makes us kinder to other people because we’ve been able to take some time for ourselves.   Or maybe we want to take a challenging class because it makes us feel more alive.  Your reason can be simple – and it is absolutely your own.  But take a moment before you practice to consciously set an intention.

Let your Practice Serve your Life.

Moving Into Light

Ah, New Year’s Resolutions!

As we turn the corner into the New Year and the days begin to become longer (even if we don’t quite notice yet!), NOW is the fertile time to initiate profound change.  Before we dive in, though, it is important for us to take the time to distinguish between reflexive and conscious change.

Reflexive change isn’t really change at all. These are the intentions that we habitually set  – and break – every year (eat less ice cream, be nicer, get up early, lose five pounds….insert your favorite chestnut here).  Usually these are symptoms of some deeper disconnection with ourselves.  The eating ice cream or staying in bed late may be because we’re not properly taking care of ourselves or we are hiding a deeper dissatisfaction under a distraction.  Reflexive intentions feel good, but they often falter after just a few weeks.  Usually they’re ego driven, rather than heart driven.  If this sounds familiar, give yourself a pat on the back. Congratulations, you’re human!  You are in stellar company.

In conscious change, we go beneath those initial voices.  Beneath the ego and the blaming (or just as enticing, the validation) and instead ask ourselves, “what change would really serve my life’s purpose?”

Take a moment and let this sink in.

Maybe you don’t quite know what your life’s purpose (dharma) is yet.  If so, again, no worries.  As Aadil Palkhivala writes in Fire of Love, “exploring your dharma is your dharma.”  Take a few moments every day to sit and ask the question, “What is my life’s purpose?  And what change would really serve my life’s purpose?”

Wait for the answer to arise.  Not from your head, but from your heart.  Have the courage to listen to the quiet voice.  You’ll know it when you hear it.

Moving Into Darkness

To move into the unknown, we have to step out of our comfort zone.  To paraphrase Andre Gide, we must consent to lose sight of the shore if we are to venture to new lands.  As we let go of the attic junk that no longer serves us – be it a habit, relationship, attachment, or literal stuff – we are creating a blank space.  And before we rush to fill the void, we can take the opportunity to sit in this space.  To be with the unknown, the imperfection, the mess, the confusion.  As we grow familiar with this uncomfortable place, we are less likely to act reactively to fill the void. Instead, we can become friendly with the openness.  And when we do choose to fill the space, we can act consciously rather than reactively.

In yoga, we can practice moving into the unknown through our inversion practice.  Whether we are moving into headstand, handstand, or forearm stand, we are switching our worldview and moving into unfamiliar territory.   Literally, we change our perspective.  More important than the state of the pose is our state of mind.  As we approach something different, can we remain open to a sense of play rather than judgment?  Can we allow for the space to explore rather than fix?  And can we be compassionate with ourselves as we venture into unknown territory?

By practicing compassion and risk in inversions, we prepare ourselves for letting go in other areas of our life.  As we approach the winter solstice, set an intention to create space.  Let go of that which no longer serves you.  I invite you to frame the intention as follows: “With great compassion for myself, I AM letting go of ______.”

With compassion and abandon, step into the unknown.

Fanning the Inner Fire

The increasing darkness of winter is an invitation to move more deeply into our shadow selves.  We can hunker down, get internal, and examine what pieces of ourselves no longer serve.  It is time to clear out space and let go of old habits and limiting patterns, so that when the sun begins to come back, we have room to create anew.

To clear out the old, we begin with detoxification.  Manipura chakra is the center of willpower and is associated with the fire element.  The solar plexus is also the seat of digestion and the digestive fires, which can burn out the restrictions of energy at the base.  As we inhale, we fan the flames down to these blockages.  The exhalation reinforces uddiyana bandha and mula bandha, which draw these blocks up into the fire to be purified.  Thus, the power of the breath and the fire of our bodies work together to unleash our energetic potential.

While physical movements such as sun salutations and standing poses certainly heat our bodies, it is the the effort to focus and our will to concentrate that fans the flames.   Moving into twists to tone the abdomen and balancing poses to strengthen the mind, we purify the physical and energetic body simultaneously  – burning away dis-ease and attachment.

In the darkness of winter, we create our own internal sun.

Balancing Act

Perfectionism is unforgiving.  The moment we waver or fall, we are besieged with judgments of “not being good enough,” “not trying hard enough,” or really, just sucking.

When we practice balancing postures in yoga, we are immediately confronted by our unsteadiness.  We waver, we shift.  And if we’re trying something particularly new or challenging, we will almost certainly fall the first few times.  These moments of “failure” are an opportunity to re-wire our brains.  Reaching beyond our grasp involves inevitable stumbles, and how sad it would be for us to stay confined in a safe, comfortable space and never try anything new?  When we fall, stay aware of the judgmental mind.  Instead of buying into the voices of condemnation, can we find a sense of play and adventure in our practice?

As one of my teachers said, “Everyone falls.  It’s how we pick ourselves up that counts.”

The Present Moment: Gateway to Change

America has elected Barak Obama as president.

Yesterday, record numbers of voters seized the opportunity to let their voices be heard.  Today we have the first African-American president in our country’s history; a man whose voice rings out for change, sacrifice, and whose presence is a testimony to the potential of the American dream.

Most of us are not as high profile as President-Elect Obama –   man who has taken of the burden of symbolizing American transformation.  Our lives are more localized, our reach is closer to home.  However, our touch is just as – if not more – profound on those around us.  After all, it took millions of individuals exerting their right to elect Obama.

The present moment is the gateway to change.  While our minds frequently become clouded by memory or imagined futures, the clarity of presence can propel us beyond the inertia of habit and and enable us to grasp our power for transformation. We become conscience of the power of this moment.  We can move through the discomfort of the unknown and choose to change our course.

Yesterday in America we witnessed the power of conscientious change.  When millions of people made the considered effort to let their voices be heard.  Imagine carrying that consciousness into every moment of our lives.  So that every choice becomes an expression of our greater potential rather than an expression of our habits.  What other change is possible then?

Anahata: The Center of Integration

Anahata, the heart chakra, lies at the centre of the chakra system and unites the three base chakras with the three upper chakras.   It is the first chakra to take us into interaction with the rest of the world, our energy moving out and impacting our environment rather than being directed into our identity.

The heart center is also the place where our ideals and higher mind (buddhi) begin to integrate into the manifest physical plane.  In other words, it’s the place where we draw down our higher self and actually put it out there into the world. Obviously, this is not always easy to do!  When our external environment is peaceful, it is easier for us to hear our higher mind and act accordingly.  However, when our environment is threatening or challenging (and when we really need our yoga!), it is much more difficult to be authentic to our higher ideals.

We are frequently caught between a “body reaction” of fear, aggression, or pain and the intellectual thought that we’d like to find compassion and greater perspective.  The instinctive defensive reaction in our body can make our higher instincts seem like pretty thoughts rather than an accessible course of action.  And if we do impose these higher ideals into our behavior, it can feel false to ourselves.  In other words, “taking the high road” can feel like a betrayal of ourselves.  We sacrifice the integration of our whole self into a polite veneer of kindness.  We may be listening to our higher values, but the cost chips away at our self-worth and we “swallow” our sense of worthiness and self-expression.

In this difficult space of internal conflict between the body and the higher mind, the heart center holds the doorway to transformation.  Using the power of the breath (air and the lungs are the element and organs associated with the heart), we can soothe the frustration in the body and create space to integrate the higher mind.  We literally create room in our bodies to authentically respond rather than react.  We do not overcome our body’s reactions or shove them away; we integrate our bodily sensations with our higher instincts.  Embracing our whole experience, we can then allow for transformation and integration to happen.

Just as we recognize the great value of our higher mind, we must also honor the body’s somatic experience.  Both must be embraced for authentic transformation and compassion to occur.  Through the breath and spaciousness of the heart, we create room for the integration of our higher self in the physical world.

Community Matters: Lessons from John Friend

On the first night of the Estes Park Yoga Jounral Conference, John Friend read aloud from the mission statement that he wrote eleven years ago when he first articulated the intention of Anusara Yoga.  The most striking piece of the statement was its emphasis on the community.  As he introduced each Anusara teacher who would be presenting this week, they each spoke with gratitude about their practice and the community that supported them.  He then introduced his staff.  He knew each and every name.

And here is where Anusara blooms.  The first precept of Anusara yoga is shakti: seeing the good, the divine, in each and every person.  Opening to grace.  Many teachers expressed deep gratitude that they had found a community that, as Christina Sell said, “testifies for her.”  Her community has her back, she has their, and around and around it goes.

Now, this shouldn’t be such a rare occurrence, but I will venture that too many of us to not feel connected to an authentic sense of community.  To take a salient detour, my partner recently attended a Korean birthday party.  He was struck by the warmth and support that the Korean community showed for the birthday of one seven-year-old girl.  He noted that these were working class people who did not have a lot of extra money, but who seemed happy and glad to be with each other.  There was a sense they trusted and supported each other.  And within their community, each person had a place of importance.  What is most shocking about this experience isn’t that the Korean community was supportive, but that my partner – a man who makes friendship a priority –  feels the absence of such a community in his own life.

Many of us share this feeling of isolation.  Because community isn’t only about friendship.  Community mean having a civic voice and value.   The American dream determines our importance by our success.  We idolize individualism.  Proud and independent, we compete, rather than cooperate.  Despite our friendships, we feel a lack of belonging.

As John Friend has so beautifully demonstrated, yoga offers us the opportunity to reclaim a this needed community.  A community of like-minded, spiritually curious people who desire greater well-being.  Rather than go to class and remain isolated on our mat, why don’t we seize the opportunity to create community through our practice?  To recognize the people to either side of us as members of our tribe, or as John Friend says, members of the “merry band”.  We don’t need to be Anusara yogis to tap into this potential.  We can recognize our community wherever we are, and begin to weave the threads between us a little tighter.   It is no coincidence that tantra means “weave” or “loom.”  Through the practice, we create a tapestry of human connection in which to explore our deeper wisdom and brightest potential.  Testify!

Breath, Breath, Everwhere

A recent workshop with John Scott (www.stillpointyoga.com) has revolutionized my ashtanga practice.  Ashtanga is a vinyasa system, but I must admit that I have spent more time “polishing my asanas” than I have exploring how the breath supports the poses.  During the workshop, I was reminded keenly of Mark Whitwell’s viniyoga (breath-based) style (though Mark would undoubtedly decry such labels).  Inhalation is surrender; exhalation is strength.  As both teachers state, it’s a “strength-receiving practice.”  Suddenly, the two very different practices of viniyoga and ashtanga merged.  Ultimately, all practices unify.

Because the external configurations (bend your knee in Warrior II!) are sometimes all that we can control, we often spend more time making sure we look good than inhabiting and breathing through the asana.  Our culture veers to the external.  Progress is linear.  The more we work, the more we should have to show for it.  The more we practice yoga, the more advanced our asana should become.  However, what about the revolutionary idea that our asana should NOT get better, but instead become DEEPER?  What if we couldn’t prove that our asana had actually improved?  All we could point to is a deeper sense of stillness and peace?  Would we find this as valuable?

During the workshop, John rallied us to a breath-focused practice.  Rather than “polishing our asanas,” we let go of the external practice and felt the series from the inside.  We even spent one practice with our eyes closed.  Through drawing the sense inward (pratyahara), we let go of the externalization of the poses and instead focused on the breath.  Through this breath-based concentration, I found that the inhalations and exhalations supported my practice.  I wasn’t working through the primary series as much as I was being carried through it by the vinyasa.  Ironically, surrendering to the breath advanced my practice more than my effort ever had!  Injuries melted away.  Emotional cleansing flowed.  Concentration increased.

Not every day of practice will be transformative.  There are many days that feel like a slog.  But my rudder is newly fixed.  I have a new tool in my toolbox for spiritual exploration.  The workshop transformed the purpose of my practice from simply “getting further” to “getting deeper.”  Rather than propelling my practice forward through effort, I am beginning to also surrender and let it carry me.  I wonder where it will take me next.

Santosha

Sometimes it’s hard not to be Angelina Jolie.

Last week’s cover of Vanity Fair depicts one of our cultural heros in full throttled pout: a decadent and ripe movie star oozing sex appeal and inhuman beauty.  Carousing in the upper echelons of the Hollywood elite, she travels the world, is partnered with an equally godlike mate, and – oh yes – is brilliantly talented and is an ambassador for global issues.  It’s the last part that sticks in the craw; it would be easy to cattily dismiss her were it not for her ability to combine her rebel sex goddess image with a life of servitude and good works.

When I caught a glimpse of our Angelina last week, I was immediately disheartened.  And not just because I lack the fullness of such lips.  I’d had a bad morning, you see. I woke up feeling uninspired by the contribution of my own life.  I was oppressed by all the things I should be doing and should have accomplished.  The mysterious other universe in which I made more of a difference and zoomed around making things better (to the thunderous applause of vast public approval) had somehow not materialized.  My life felt small, insignificant.   Catching a glance of the mega super star of our era (and immediately turning her facedown on the counter) reminded me how far my life was away from a reality that I’d imagined for myself.  I should be better.  Should be doing more.  Should, should, should.

Then, a pause.  As I looked up from my whimpering, fetal position on the floor, I realized I was being literally oppressed by shoulds.  By ideas.  By the difference between here (where I really am) and there (my idea of where I should be).  And all this mental flailing and self-flagellation was preventing me from actually engaging – and even making that difference – in the world.   We all have moments when we are caught between where we actually are and where we want to be.  And that difference can actually drive us to a positive end, but not at the expense of the present moment.  The present moment is the only vehicle to action, and it holds within it vast potential.  Potential that we miss if we are too busy lamenting our lack of the Angelina factor.

In this moment, I was reminded of one our the Yoga Sutra’s niyamas: santosha, or contentment.  Contentment is not the rejection of effort, but rather the acceptance of the outcome of our efforts.  It is self-acceptance for where we are in our process.  It is letting go of the “right result” and instead being with what actually is.  In our yoga practice, we practice santosha when we honor our bodies’ limitations, accept what is not yet possible to change, and work with where we can grow.  In a culture that encourages the stress of keeping up with the Joneses, santosha is an antidote to unthinking consumerism and competition.  It connects to several other philosophical golden threads, such as the Dalai Lama’s edict to practice gratitude and Don Miguel Ruiz’s Agreement to Do Your Best…and Be Satisfied.

So sure, sometimes it’s hard to not be Angelina Jolie.  The real challenge – and greater potential – is in being exactly who we really are.

Finding the Base

We first connect to the earth through our feet.

Our balance, sense of self, and our “groundedness” with the big ol’ Earth is usually first transmitted through our feet’s dainty arches.  The more connected and rooted we are to the earth, the more stability and power we can access in our asana practice.  Through activating and energizing three three arches of the feet (medial, lateral, and transverse), we begin to engage up through our legs into our core, which helps us find our center.

This week in class, we are taking this work in the feet up and into the hips.  Ah, the hips.  The energetic centers of chakra one and two (muladhara and svadisthana) are governed by primal, and mostly unconscious needs.  Fear, survival, sex, creativity, emotion…..all these energies are housed in the first two chakras and dysfunction in these areas can manifest as physical resistance and blockages in the pelvis and legs.   And when we start to open into the unexplored areas, we can often meet with sensitivity, claustrophobia, resistance, and unexpected emotion.

So we use the strength of the first chakra and its connection to great ol’ mama earth to give us the stability to root into these unexplored terrain.  With sensitivity – but without hedging – we use the power of our feet and legs in our standing poses to open the hips in warrior II and parsvakonasana.  We’ll use the strength our our quads and hamstrings to work the legs and make them more receptive to stretching in parsvotanasana and king arthur’s pose.  We’ll complete our circuit by opening the hamstrings in paschimottanasana, the groin in baddha konasana, and the outer hips in double pigeon.

By using the feet to connect to the earth and draw this strength into our asana, we will create the stability that will let us open these areas safely.   And so we clean out the first floor of energetic house, while getting some really awesome physical opening through our hips.

Yoga Journal Boston

The yogis race around in slung back crocs, their new manduka mats slung across their shoulders as they race into class.  Here, in air-conditioned conference rooms with indelicately laid out tape (in crowded spaces, everyone gets their own yoga parking space), the giants of yoga meet with their adoring masses and share their wisdom.  These yogic rockstars – Shiva Rea, Dharma Mittra, Seane Corne, Ana Forrest, to name a few – become more accessible in the bland, generic conference rooms.  In Yoga Journal or on their dvd’s they are impossibly graceful, superhumanly peaceful, and (surely) enlightened.  But there’s something about a dirty Sheraton carpet that puts everything in its humble place.

For those of us outside of major yoga centers (read LA, New York City…), these conferences are a rare opportunity to meet a “teacher’s teacher.”  In the medical world, students are taught to “watch it, do it, teach it.”  In the yoga world, it’s really not so different.  The tools the experts are teaching today will be turned around and taught to our students next week.  Although the deeper message of yoga stays steady (awareness, love), the trendiness of asana is ceaselessly adapting.  Last year’s asana trend may be now shunned as dangerous or unsafe.  Conferences provide a needed source of communicating and relaying new information.

But most importantly, these conferences – as improbable as it feels in a chain hotel in a downtown city – are a source of renewal. The struggling studio owner in Florida (whose husband may not “get it”) is awash with support and affirmation.  We struggle and sweat on our mat through Shiva Rea’s 108 mandalas, and love every minute.  We bask in the glow of moaning, “I’m sooooo soooooore,” after a marathon eight-hour day of practice.  And it’s not just the teachers that are inspiring us, though their inspiration will stay with us too; it’s the unbearably joyous feeling of belonging.  Of having a community.  Of being part of the huge transformation.

So we pound our bodies through four days of asana and empty our wallets into Yoga Journal’s coffers.  We go home sore, exhausted, and delighted by our next step.