All things human. Reflections and research on food, feelings, fads, sleep, sex, science, relationships, and everything that contributes to our well-being and human experience beyond the practice.
One of my favorite songs ever.
Sultry. Sexy.
Feel the southern heat settle across your skin as you sit on a lazy porch rocker with a cool glass of lemonade. You gaze out at the fields, where the grass barely sways to move in the warm wind. Condensation slips down the side of the glass…
“Kitchen Music:” Music recorded literally in the kitchen. No auto-tune. No fancy mixin’. Just me and my Garage Band and the sink. Thanks for listening.
Kitchen Music is a series of songs that I literally sing in the kitchen with the aid of Garage Band.
God bless Garage Band.
This one is Joni’s Mitchell’s “Case of You.” This song is very special to me. Thanks for listening.
“If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”
“The only thing that doesn’t change is change itself.”
“The right decision isn’t always easy.”
These hard nuts of reason come easily to the tongue and slowly to the spirit. I get swatted by a new life lesson and it’s as if I’m 14 and have never been on a date with self-awareness. “Really,” I think to myself, “How can I have been this blind to something this obvious for so long?”
Like the moments where I suddenly realize that – yes, it’s true – I really have been doing the same pattern in the last three relationships. Where – like a rising Atlantis (or that alien village in “The Abyss”), a leviathan surfaces from the murky depths of my subconscious to the light of day. An old, gnarled monster encrusted with barnacles and strange sea debris that shakes its ratty head at me and smiles as if to say, “Yes, girlie, I was really here all along.” And the real bummer of the story is that once he’s up – once my sea creature has surfaced and grinned and winked – he will not be going back. Nope. He’s up and he’s staying up. Pour him a mai tai, ladies, and call it an afternoon, because the gentleman is just warming up his fingers to tickle those ivories, and you’re in for some wild entertainment.
Staring the monster in the face is not exactly comfortable.
So I (and we, most likely) will choose to get back on the yacht, leave the ocean and her vagaries, and hightail if for a safer – and less interesting – port. And for awhile, we can even scrape out a manageable existence on our tiny beach of refuge. We drop anchor, huddle up on the sand, and swear never to take to the seas again. Which may work until we remember that the really good beaches lie across the ocean, and getting there requires meeting the Gentleman Sea Monster once more.
And frankly, even if we stay cozied on our beach, sooner or later some of his old sea debris starts washing up on shore. A finger here, some hairied kelp there – reminding us that he is waiting for us to resume our conversation.
So at some point, we renew our spirit to be brave. We get in the boat, row out to the open ocean, and find him there, waiting. And we sit in the small boat and play chess on the ocean with our strange leviathan. We look unflinchingly at his weathered, crab-ridden face.
And over time, we find beauty there, and loneliness, and whimsy, and hope.
The Times recently wrote an article about the 2012 yoga competition held in New York City. 
Yoga competition? As in prizes? Seriously?
Founded by Rajashree Choudary, the wife of the famous Bikram Choudary, the competition is open to all asana practitioners but is primarily attended by those who practice the Bikram style. Competitions like this are apparently more common in India, where teachers drum up publicity for their yoga schools through exhibitions. However, in the States, it’s a rather new – and somewhat startling – activity, given that yoga here still bears the traces of its hippie, counter-culture origins, which eschews all things regulated and corporate.
However, yoga has now gained enough popularity here that it’s possible to hold competitions and evaluate someone’s prowess in this (spiritual?) practice. So now what separates yoga from, say, gymnastics or cirque de soleil? Rather ironic since these physical endeavors are renowned for injuring its adherents, while one of the goals of modern yoga is to promote health and wellness.
“I’m exhausted mentally and physically,” Jared McCann [competition winner] said, grinning. “My left toe is numb and I’ve got some kind of back spasm.” He paused before adding, “There’s always something.” (Times)
All this talk of injuries, scandals, and yoga competitions has me taking a pause. Not to disparage Jared McCann or Afton Carraway for winning the 2012 competition – good on ’em, it must have been years in the making – but what is the larger message that we are getting here?
Let’s face it: the umbrella of yoga is becoming laden with competition. As the next generation of teachers starts to jockey for position, everyone is looking for their special derivative niche: acro-yoga, ballet-yoga, spin yoga, tai chi yoga, aerobics yoga, runners’ yoga – not to mention all the individual name brands that have become popular. And of course we are diversifying. It’s one way to survive in an increasingly saturated marketplace.
As this happens, ways of evaluating good “yoga” could become increasingly external. After all, it’s easier – and perhaps more impressive – to measure how far someone can get their foot behind their head than how calm their mind is or how present they are. (Although who knows, maybe we’ll have meditation competitions soon that measure practitioners’ theta waves.) Realistically, teachers who can do complex asana may be taken more seriously than teachers who are passionate about pranayama and meditation. Classes that invite asana showmanship may be more popular than classes that seem quieter or more introspective.
While there’s nothing wrong with striving to advance one’s personal practice, the growing anxiety of competition has led to increasingly insecure teachers. We fret, “are my numbers good,” rather than asking if we’re actually teaching the yoga that we want to. We can get caught in the cycle of teaching what we think the students will want, rather than teaching from our hearts.
And while it’s true that good teachers will endure and their students will find them eventually, it is naive to think that teachers needn’t be concerned about how popular their classes are. Most students cultivate a love for the deeper practices of yoga after getting their asses kicked by asana for a couple years, so the majority of the students may not want to hear a long dharma talk or sit and meditate. Being real about this may save us the depression of having three students in class – and getting concerned looks from our bosses.
One of my favorite teachers, Mark Whitwell, once said, “Give them what they want, so you can give them what you want.” Mark is pretty darn smart and experienced, so I’m thinking that we will always be dancing between delivering yoga that is popular and yoga that reaches deeper. (And lord love those precious teachers who manage to do both at the same time, you do inspire me.)
So it’s not an either/or proposition. In the midst of yoga competitions, prolific branding, and career insecurity, we can still find some room to return to our source of inspiration. As Mark might say, we can still return to the “Heart of Yoga.” While we “give them what they want,” we can also remember why we started yoga in the first place and trust that our students will be similarly inspired by something as simple as connecting to their breath.
To all those teachers out there who have struggled with the insecurity of popularity (including myself), I’d like to offer the following hopeful reminders:
So while we dance this dance – while we navigate marketing, yoga competitions, and class numbers – we can also try the occasional experiment. Once in awhile, let’s see what happens if we teach the kind of yoga that we do in the living room when no one else is watching. The kind of yoga that may not win any awards or look impressive on our websites, but simply leaves us more connected to who we are.
Yesterday, I sent my Grandma an article from Harvard Medical School about some new research touting 
the merits of a protein from a plant-based diet. As someone who has run the spectrum between carnivore and vegan, I was rather cheekily lamenting my recent departure from the ranks of vegetarian.
Here’s her reply, which just goes to show why you should respect your elders:
“Dear Granddaughter,
Just read your article from Harvard and wish I could participate in one of these studies! As you know, I will be 92 next month and was raised on the delicious food My Mother prepared. This was usually mush or eggs or bread with cream and sugar poured over it (for breakfast). I always drank a lot of milk (before they pasteurized it). We cooked with butter and cream, had fried chicken and I can still taste the little dumplings my Mother made and put in gravy made from the chicken drippings. The burnt sugar cake she made (from scratch) was out of this world. Fried ham and gravy made from the drippings was delicious. I remember the first time I made gravy, I was about 10 years old. We were down at my Aunt Birdie Dawson’s making apple butter. We spent a day each year doing this in a huge copper kettle over an outdoor fire. We had a big apple butter stirrer and it took all day to make. Anyway, I digress, My aunt asked me to go up to the house and fix lunch and I had to fry ham and make gravy. First time. As I recall it turned out O. K.
I am not disputing their studies- I try to eat healthy and try to eat fish a couple of times a week. I have always been a coffee drinker and always loved chocolate. Now after years of saying it was not good for you they tell you to drink coffee and eat chocolate. I always wonder how they figure out how many calories are in things? I really think there is too much time and money spent on telling people what they should and shouldn’t eat and the money could be put to better use drilling water wells in Africa for people there who have to walk miles for a little water.
I really do appreciate your sending me the info and always glad to hear from you. I have read a lot on Yoga lately and think it is a good thing!
I Love you, Grandma XOXO”
Today, or this morning rather, I was eating piece toast with cashew butter (homemade, even, dee-lightful). And I decided to make a little agreement with myself.
To self: I will eat this toast with homemade cashew butter, and endeavor to do just that, and only that. No checking email, no reading the paper. Just simply stand, and eat. And taste.
I didn’t get very far before my hands reached for the tv remote (put it DOWN, now! My head belatedly hollered). Then I found my hand reaching for my Iphone (the phonecall to Mom can WAIT!, I suddenly thought, and mentally slapped my hand away.) Then I found myself wandering across the room to go check on the cat (the damn cat is FINE, I caught myself, now just stand still!)
Apparently, I cannot even get through one piece of toast without my mind – and body – running off in six different directions.
This is a sobering thought, as it illuminates something frightening: What is happening for the vast majority of the time when I’m not actually trying to stand and just eat a piece of toast? How much compulsion is daily pouring through my body and mind that I simply go along with (reach for remote, Iphone, cat, etc?). When actions are done before I even realize that they’ve happened? If I have to do some serious focusing just to stay in one place, then what’s going on when I’m not paying so much attention?
Freaky.
I do not have any glorious, pithy wisdom to offer up here. I obviously spend a great deal of time in the throes of my subconscious urgings and only occasionally make it above water to look around at the scenery. But the experience did remind me of a suggestion in the Yoga Sutras, which I’ve been cruising through lately. The Sutras, a series of terse aphorisms compiled back in 200 CE or so, basically throw down the meditative wisdom of the time. Most yogis are familiar with the second Sutra which declares that “Yoga is the restraint of the fluctuations of the mind.” Here’s another that is particularly piquant (translation by Carlos Pomeda):
Sutra 1.13: tatra sthitau yatno’bhyasa
“Practice is the effort to remain there.”
Basically, Patanjali is saying that we need to just sit down already and eat our cashew butter covered toast. Do one thing at a time. Stay “there.” In that space. Can we sit in our stuff? Literally and metaphorically? And not go wandering after the damn cat?
Doing our yoga doesn’t always have to involve incense, candles, and a meditation cushion. We can do it right now, simply by trying to anchor ourselves in doing one thing at a time.
Eat Toast. Then call Mom. Then pet cat. Rather than eat/talk/pet.
A revolution of non-multi-tasking.
So here’s to sitting our asses down, already.
And just taking a moment.
The New York Times recently ran an article, “How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body,”that has a rather sensational and silly title and a fairly simple point: doing yoga can cause injuries. The article, citing the musings of yoga teacher Glenn Black, references the medley of yoga injuries that have been developing through the West over the last ten years. The article whispers to us in horror: ‘Black has come to believe that “the vast majority of people” should give up yoga altogether. It’s simply too likely to cause harm.’
The response to this: Well, duh.
Of course it can cause injuries.
Hatha Yoga (which includes power, flow, Anusara, “hatha”, and every other physical form of yoga) is a physical, bio-mechanical practice. Ask any yoga teacher and – if they’re over 30 and being honest – you’re likely to find some sort of medical history. To share my personal trophies, I’ve torn my hamstring in Prasarita Padottanasana, damaged the meniscus in my knee from too many lotus attempts, and dislocated a rib facet falling out of handstand. And these days, with the emphasis on “getting” handstand in the middle of the room to be a “real yogi” or pushing through thirty chaturangas in a class to “test your edge”, it’s no wonder that we are limping to the physio and crying to our RMT’s. But before you gasp in shock and tremble because yoga is supposed to be a cure all, listen up. Injury and stress is the nature of any repetitive physical endeavor done passionately over time. I’ve also tweaked my hamstring playing touch football on the beach, damaged my wrist skiing, and hurt my back in Cross Fit. Golf causes injuries. Martial Arts causes injuries. I may be going out on a limb, but I bet you can develop repetitive stress injuries in swimming too.
Anyone who expects yoga to be a panacea for all ills isn’t paying attention. The author of the article, William Broad, describes his experience: “While doing the extended-side-angle pose, a posture hailed as a cure for many diseases, my back gave way. With it went my belief, naïve in retrospect, that yoga was a source only of healing and never harm.” William, thank you for the wake up call. We should all set our naivete aside. Living on this plane of existence with muscles, bones, tendons, and blood, we are subject to the forces of time and aging. We move in a world of form and limitation. Expecting yoga to transcend the nature of this Universe is like expecting dinner to cook itself or time to move backwards.
Does this mean you shouldn’t do yoga?
Absolutely not.
Yoga is revelatory for self-connection. Yoga wakes you up and asks you to breathe. Yoga cultivates strength, suppleness, and fluidity. Yoga asks you to commit to your deepest and most passionate self and cultivate a deep inquiry into your life and your place in this world. Yoga is a tool for helping you to become more fully yourself. And – when done mindfully and with kick ass alignment – yoga heals. So yes, do your freakin’ yoga.
But here are some tips:
Yoga is one of the best things that has happened in my life. If you’re reading this, my bet is that it’s transformed you, too. But let’s remember what our yoga is really about: self-revelation, compassion, and a deep connection with the world. Yoga is a tool for co-creating with the Universe; for nourishing our bodies, minds, and hearts and exploring the wonder of our own expression while we live on this marvelous world.
Do your yoga.
Just do your yoga smart.
A thought provoking happiness article from The Economist. A lovely, and spirit-lifting, read!
Dec 16th 2010 | from the print edition
ASK people how they feel about getting older, and they will probably reply in the same vein as Maurice Chevalier: “Old age isn’t so bad when you consider the alternative.” Stiffening joints, weakening muscles, fading eyesight and the clouding of memory, coupled with the modern world’s careless contempt for the old, seem a fearful prospect—better than death, perhaps, but not much. Yet mankind is wrong to dread ageing. Life is not a long slow decline from sunlit uplands towards the valley of death. It is, rather, a U-bend.
When people start out on adult life, they are, on average, pretty cheerful. Things go downhill from youth to middle age until they reach a nadir commonly known as the mid-life crisis. So far, so familiar. The surprising part happens after that. Although as people move towards old age they lose things they treasure—vitality, mental sharpness and looks—they also gain what people spend their lives pursuing: happiness.
This curious finding has emerged from a new branch of economics that seeks a more satisfactory measure than money of human well-being. Conventional economics uses money as a proxy for utility—the dismal way in which the discipline talks about happiness. But some economists, unconvinced that there is a direct relationship between money and well-being, have decided to go to the nub of the matter and measure happiness itself.
These ideas have penetrated the policy arena, starting in Bhutan, where the concept of Gross National Happiness shapes the planning process. All new policies have to have a GNH assessment, similar to the environmental-impact assessment common in other countries. In 2008 France’s president, Nicolas Sarkozy, asked two Nobel-prize-winning economists, Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz, to come up with a broader measure of national contentedness than GDP. Then last month, in a touchy-feely gesture not typical of Britain, David Cameron announced that the British government would start collecting figures on well-being.
There are already a lot of data on the subject collected by, for instance, America’s General Social Survey, Eurobarometer and Gallup. Surveys ask two main sorts of question. One concerns people’s assessment of their lives, and the other how they feel at any particular time. The first goes along the lines of: thinking about your life as a whole, how do you feel? The second is something like: yesterday, did you feel happy/contented/angry/anxious? The first sort of question is said to measure global well-being, and the second hedonic or emotional well-being. They do not always elicit the same response: having children, for instance, tends to make people feel better about their life as a whole, but also increases the chance that they felt angry or anxious yesterday.
Statisticians trawl through the vast quantities of data these surveys produce rather as miners panning for gold. They are trying to find the answer to the perennial question: what makes people happy?
Four main factors, it seems: gender, personality, external circumstances and age. Women, by and large, are slightly happier than men. But they are also more susceptible to depression: a fifth to a quarter of women experience depression at some point in their lives, compared with around a tenth of men. Which suggests either that women are more likely to experience more extreme emotions, or that a few women are more miserable than men, while most are more cheerful.
Two personality traits shine through the complexity of economists’ regression analyses: neuroticism and extroversion. Neurotic people—those who are prone to guilt, anger and anxiety—tend to be unhappy. This is more than a tautological observation about people’s mood when asked about their feelings by pollsters or economists. Studies following people over many years have shown that neuroticism is a stable personality trait and a good predictor of levels of happiness. Neurotic people are not just prone to negative feelings: they also tend to have low emotional intelligence, which makes them bad at forming or managing relationships, and that in turn makes them unhappy.
Whereas neuroticism tends to make for gloomy types, extroversion does the opposite. Those who like working in teams and who relish parties tend to be happier than those who shut their office doors in the daytime and hole up at home in the evenings. This personality trait may help explain some cross-cultural differences: a study comparing similar groups of British, Chinese and Japanese people found that the British were, on average, both more extrovert and happier than the Chinese and Japanese.
Then there is the role of circumstance. All sorts of things in people’s lives, such as relationships, education, income and health, shape the way they feel. Being married gives people a considerable uplift, but not as big as the gloom that springs from being unemployed. In America, being black used to be associated with lower levels of happiness—though the most recent figures suggest that being black or Hispanic is nowadays associated with greater happiness. People with children in the house are less happy than those without. More educated people are happier, but that effect disappears once income is controlled for. Education, in other words, seems to make people happy because it makes them richer. And richer people are happier than poor ones—though just how much is a source of argument (see article).
Lastly, there is age. Ask a bunch of 30-year-olds and another of 70-year-olds (as Peter Ubel, of the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University, did with two colleagues, Heather Lacey and Dylan Smith, in 2006) which group they think is likely to be happier, and both lots point to the 30-year-olds. Ask them to rate their own well-being, and the 70-year-olds are the happier bunch. The academics quoted lyrics written by Pete Townshend of The Who when he was 20: “Things they do look awful cold / Hope I die before I get old”. They pointed out that Mr Townshend, having passed his 60th birthday, was writing a blog that glowed with good humour.
Mr Townshend may have thought of himself as a youthful radical, but this view is ancient and conventional. The “seven ages of man”—the dominant image of the life-course in the 16th and 17th centuries—was almost invariably conceived as a rise in stature and contentedness to middle age, followed by a sharp decline towards the grave. Inverting the rise and fall is a recent idea. “A few of us noticed the U-bend in the early 1990s,” says Andrew Oswald, professor of economics at Warwick Business School. “We ran a conference about it, but nobody came.”
Since then, interest in the U-bend has been growing. Its effect on happiness is significant—about half as much, from the nadir of middle age to the elderly peak, as that of unemployment. It appears all over the world. David Blanchflower, professor of economics at Dartmouth College, and Mr Oswald looked at the figures for 72 countries. The nadir varies among countries—Ukrainians, at the top of the range, are at their most miserable at 62, and Swiss, at the bottom, at 35—but in the great majority of countries people are at their unhappiest in their 40s and early 50s. The global average is 46.
The U-bend shows up in studies not just of global well-being but also of hedonic or emotional well-being. One paper, published this year by Arthur Stone, Joseph Schwartz and Joan Broderick of Stony Brook University, and Angus Deaton of Princeton, breaks well-being down into positive and negative feelings and looks at how the experience of those emotions varies through life. Enjoyment and happiness dip in middle age, then pick up; stress rises during the early 20s, then falls sharply; worry peaks in middle age, and falls sharply thereafter; anger declines throughout life; sadness rises slightly in middle age, and falls thereafter.
Turn the question upside down, and the pattern still appears. When the British Labour Force Survey asks people whether they are depressed, the U-bend becomes an arc, peaking at 46.
There is always a possibility that variations are the result not of changes during the life-course, but of differences between cohorts. A 70-year-old European may feel different to a 30-year-old not because he is older, but because he grew up during the second world war and was thus formed by different experiences. But the accumulation of data undermines the idea of a cohort effect. Americans and Zimbabweans have not been formed by similar experiences, yet the U-bend appears in both their countries. And if a cohort effect were responsible, the U-bend would not show up consistently in 40 years’ worth of data.
Another possible explanation is that unhappy people die early. It is hard to establish whether that is true or not; but, given that death in middle age is fairly rare, it would explain only a little of the phenomenon. Perhaps the U-bend is merely an expression of the effect of external circumstances. After all, common factors affect people at different stages of the life-cycle. People in their 40s, for instance, often have teenage children. Could the misery of the middle-aged be the consequence of sharing space with angry adolescents? And older people tend to be richer. Could their relative contentment be the result of their piles of cash?
The answer, it turns out, is no: control for cash, employment status and children, and the U-bend is still there. So the growing happiness that follows middle-aged misery must be the result not of external circumstances but of internal changes.
People, studies show, behave differently at different ages. Older people have fewer rows and come up with better solutions to conflict. They are better at controlling their emotions, better at accepting misfortune and less prone to anger. In one study, for instance, subjects were asked to listen to recordings of people supposedly saying disparaging things about them. Older and younger people were similarly saddened, but older people less angry and less inclined to pass judgment, taking the view, as one put it, that “you can’t please all the people all the time.”
There are various theories as to why this might be so. Laura Carstensen, professor of psychology at Stanford University, talks of “the uniquely human ability to recognise our own mortality and monitor our own time horizons”. Because the old know they are closer to death, she argues, they grow better at living for the present. They come to focus on things that matter now—such as feelings—and less on long-term goals. “When young people look at older people, they think how terrifying it must be to be nearing the end of your life. But older people know what matters most.” For instance, she says, “young people will go to cocktail parties because they might meet somebody who will be useful to them in the future, even though nobody I know actually likes going to cocktail parties.”
Death of ambition, birth of acceptance
There are other possible explanations. Maybe the sight of contemporaries keeling over infuses survivors with a determination to make the most of their remaining years. Maybe people come to accept their strengths and weaknesses, give up hoping to become chief executive or have a picture shown in the Royal Academy, and learn to be satisfied as assistant branch manager, with their watercolour on display at the church fete. “Being an old maid”, says one of the characters in a story by Edna Ferber, an (unmarried) American novelist, was “like death by drowning—a really delightful sensation when you ceased struggling.” Perhaps acceptance of ageing itself is a source of relief. “How pleasant is the day”, observed William James, an American philosopher, “when we give up striving to be young—or slender.”
Whatever the causes of the U-bend, it has consequences beyond the emotional. Happiness doesn’t just make people happy—it also makes them healthier. John Weinman, professor of psychiatry at King’s College London, monitored the stress levels of a group of volunteers and then inflicted small wounds on them. The wounds of the least stressed healed twice as fast as those of the most stressed. At Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Sheldon Cohen infected people with cold and flu viruses. He found that happier types were less likely to catch the virus, and showed fewer symptoms of illness when they did. So although old people tend to be less healthy than younger ones, their cheerfulness may help counteract their crumbliness.
Happier people are more productive, too. Mr Oswald and two colleagues, Eugenio Proto and Daniel Sgroi, cheered up a bunch of volunteers by showing them a funny film, then set them mental tests and compared their performance to groups that had seen a neutral film, or no film at all. The ones who had seen the funny film performed 12% better. This leads to two conclusions. First, if you are going to volunteer for a study, choose the economists’ experiment rather than the psychologists’ or psychiatrists’. Second, the cheerfulness of the old should help counteract their loss of productivity through declining cognitive skills—a point worth remembering as the world works out how to deal with an ageing workforce.
The ageing of the rich world is normally seen as a burden on the economy and a problem to be solved. The U-bend argues for a more positive view of the matter. The greyer the world gets, the brighter it becomes—a prospect which should be especially encouraging to Economist readers (average age 47).
You catch sight of it out of the corner of your eye. There’s a perky little splash of red on one of the YYoga Events Boards. You look closer. It’s the announcement for an information session for the upcoming 200-hour teacher training.
Something inside of you starts buzzing. Teacher training, hmmmm… It sounds kind of intriguing. Imagine spending 200-hours really exploring your yoga practice, finding out more about yoga and figuring out how to really do those darn poses. And you know, it would be great to learn how people get that floaty thing happening when they jump forward….
But no, you squelch the feeling. Teacher training is not for you! What were you thinking? You scoff. Teacher training is for people who absolutely want to be teachers. Teacher training is for students who can put their foot behind their head or do a one-handed handstand. Or at very least, surely teacher training is for people who don’t have tight hamstrings. Right?
Wrong.
Teacher training is just about the only place where you can take a solid chunk of time and completely invest in your own personal yoga practice. Ever wondered how to take your Warrior II to the next stage? The answers are in Teacher Training. Are you curious about how exactly it is that people get up into handstand anyway? Take a teacher training. Want to know more about pranayama? Teacher training. Have you ever wondered just how the heck yoga came about? You got it: Teacher Training.
There is simply no other forum for taking such a deep dive into yoga. Asana, philosophy, anatomy, history, subtle body…all this and more is covered in teacher training while teachers go over your personal practice with a fine-toothed comb (and perhaps kick your butt a little). And while you’re at it, how about some personal transformation to boot? Not bad for just 200 hours.
Top Ten Reasons to Take a Teacher Training:
1. Get a supercharged yoga practice. You think your alignment is good now? Wait until we get our hands on you.
2. Learn the “why” behind the “what” in asana by learning anatomy. Why do yoga teachers say the things they say? How can you make your own practice safer, more effective, and more functional? The answers lie in applying anatomy to yoga. What you learn in your anatomy sessions will serve you in all physical areas of your life.
3. Make friends. The YYoga community is an amazingly welcoming place as it is, but just imagine being in an intensive with a crew of cool, like-minded travelers. Deepen your connection with YYoga, the students, and our teachers.
4. You want to learn more about the “juicy” stuff. Take the time to explore pranayama, meditation, and the subtle body in a way that’s not possible in a regular class.
5. Ask your questions. Have an itch to know something? Wondering how we do that thing? Trying to figure out that pose? Here’s your opportunity to get your questions answered.
6. Explore philosophy. Where does yoga really come from and why did it start? How can I be happier? If you like mulling on the deeper questions of life, you’ll love taking forays into yoga philosophy. You’ll be surprised by how little we’ve changed in 2000 years.
7. Speak in Public. We know you may hate it. Here’s your chance to get over it.
8. Take time for you. Take a breather from daily life. Give yourself the time to get reacquainted with who you really are, while investing in your health and growth.
9. You love yoga. Has yoga made you happier? Healthier? Learn more about your passion.
10. Learn to teach. Sure, we’ve even got stuff in here on how to teach yoga to students, should you choose that path. Learn to share your passion effectively, safely, and dynamically with your students.
When I took my first 200-hour training, I actually had no intention of becoming a teacher; I was simply hungry to know more about something I loved. So what are you waiting for? Dive in. Invest in yourself.
But be warned: yoga insight can become addictive.
As appears in YYoga’s Blog: Off the Mat
It’s that time of year again, the time that we emerge bleary eyed from a winter of gray rain and step blinking into the growing Vancouver sunlight. The warming weather reminds of last year when, was it possible? We actually went outside!
It’s time to slough off the winter funk and come out of hibernation. But before we race off to Lynn Valley or sprint up the Grouse Grind, we can take advantage of the change in seasons to do a some much-needed housecleaning. Spring is the perfect time to clean up, clear up, and streamline – both inside and out.
Getting Your Internal House Clean: Yoga Style
Shake off your hibernation body! Winter is the right time to stay inside and eat cozy foods, but sometimes we can go a little too far with our comforts. If anyone is still feeling the remnants of the holiday indulgence or general winter torpor, your yoga practice will help kick start your body into a fresh start.
Here’s a simple twisting practice to bring some movement back to your digestive system and give your internal organs some love. Moving the inner body helps to squeeze and soak our vitals, generating fresh blood and nutrient flow and getting rid of any stagnancy. Movement can help break up fascial adhesions in our body, keeping us mobile and fluid. When we move, we create synovial fluid in our joints, helping them to function well. Imagine your car with oil, then your car without oil, and you get the idea! Twisting is also great for our spine, and helps keeps our intervertebral discs happy by squeezing and soaking them.
We’ll start off with a simple breathing technique that will get your juices flowing and your abdominals fired up.
1. Easy Seat (Sukhasana) with Kapalabhati breathing
2. Easy Seat (Sukhasana) with a twist
3. Cat/ Cow
4. Downward Facing Dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana)
5. Chair and Twisting Chair (Parivtta Utkatasana)
6. Crescent
7. Twisting Lunge (Parivrtta Parsvakonasana)
8. Bridge
9. Savasana
For detailed instructions on doing these asana for the juiciest effects, click the above links.
Consider a Cleanse
If you’ve had a winter of wine and sugar, a simple cleanse can help you restore order and balance to your system and give your body a chance to rid itself of accumulated toxins.
There’s no need to be too dramatic; even just taking a week off of alcohol and refined sugar will help your body reset and give your liver a much-needed breather. For those interested in going a little deeper, consider abstaining from all things white: white pasta, white rice, white sugar, white bread. Replace these foods with fresh veggies and fruits for a nutritional whallop.
If you’re a caffeine-phile, consider cutting your intake or even (gasp!) taking it out altogether. While the first few days may be a little rough, your body’s energy levels will even out and become more self-sustaining. (I finally managed to cut out the coffee when my energy swings were so extreme that I needed to conk out every afternoon. Not a lot of fun in that! ) If you have radical energy peaks and valleys, caffeine could be your culprit. Giving your system a caffeine-breather will allow your batteries to recharge the old-fashioned way.
For a personalized regime that is perfect for you, consider checking in with one of YYoga’s Wellness practitioners. If you’re considering a more radical cleanse, check in with an expert before you embark to make sure it’s the best thing for you.
Clean Out the Closet
Nothing keeps us tethered to the past like a closetful of old clothes. Put your clothes into three piles: Absolutely keep, absolutely give away, and absolutely maybe. To sift through your “maybe” pile, ask yourself:
1. Have I worn this in the last year?
2. Does this make me feel fabulously me?
If the answer to both is no, then toss it! Make room for the new by clearing out the old. Give your old stuff to friends or donate it to charity to spread the love.
Clean Out the Fridge
If you’ve got some mystery food in your fridge, now is the time to clean it out! Get rid of all things expired and all things that don’t reflect how you want to nourish yourself going forward.
Clean Out Your Medicine Closet
Have duplicates of your favorite antibacterial spread or four toe clippers? Toss out your expired meds and give your duplicate tweezers to friends who are without.
Do a Deep Clean of the House
Get our your scrubbies and dive in! Now is the time to clean all those places that you’ve always said that you will “get to” eventually. Move the furniture, get out the ladder, and take a day to clean out the nooks and crannies. White or ascetic vinegar with water is a natural (and cheap!) anti-bacterial cleaning agent that can help freshen up your home without a lot of toxic cleaners.
Now Get Outside!
Once you’ve done a good ol’ clean out, get thyself outdoors! On the next glorious day, take yourself for a walk in English Bay or Stanley Park and bask in the sunshine. We deserve it! And be reminded why Vancouver is called one of the most livable cities on earth. Happy Cleaning!
9 Yoga Moves for a Great Spring Cleaning
1. Easy Seat (Sukhasana) with Kapalabhati breathing
Start off in a comfortable, cross-legged seat. Prop yourself up on a blanket or a block (a book can do!) to give your spine the maximum lift.
Take a few minutes to close your eyes and breathe. Connect to the internal space of your body. Exhale fully a few times and feel the inhalation naturally and effortlessly expand more fully through your abdominals and ribs.
Kapalabhati breathing consists of short, sharp exhales through the nose, pumped by your lower abdominals drawing in and up. The force of the exhalation will allow the inhalation to naturally drop back in of its own accord. Start off with a slower rhythm, then eventually increase your speed.
To start, sit up tall and exhale fully. Then inhale partway, and begin with short, methodical, vigorous exhales through the nose. Keep your throat, face, and tongue soft, and concentrate on keeping the body quiet as the abdominals do their work to help expel your breath. Repeat this exhale 12-15 times, then release the Kapalabhati breath and sit. Allow your breathing to return to normal, and feel the effects in your body. Not only does Kapalabhati rev up your core and give your inner organs a massage, it increases your oxygen intake and revitalizes your cardiovascular system. Repeat once more.
2. Easy Seat (Sukhasana) with a twist
Sitting in sukhasana, bring your fingertips to your shoulders. Root through both sitting bones, sit up tall and twist to the right, using the strength of your obliques to turn you rather than your arms. Keep your chin over the center of your chest and imagine a line pulling from your left shoulder to your right hip. Hold 3-5 breaths, feeling the deep internal workings of your core. Inhale to release, and do the second side. We twist to the right first to stimulate the natural action of your digestive track. By systematically twisting to the right first, we imitate the natural peristaltic movement of your large intestine.
3. Cat/ Cow
Come onto your hands and knees. Your hands are parallel and outer shoulder distance apart, your knees are under your hips. As you inhale, draw your chest forward through your arms and reach your sitting bones back. On your exhale, round your spine to the ceiling and root your sitting bones to the floor. Close your eyes enjoy the sensation of moving from the inside of your breath. This simple movement helps to open the front and the back line of your body. Repeat 5-7 times, then exhale and send your hips back and up to Downward Facing Dog. Walk your feet a couple inches back to find the correct stance.
4. Downward Facing Dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana)
Press your fingertips and the base of your fingers forward and down as you bend your knees and STRETCH your spine longer. Then press the tops of your thighs up and back as you reach your heels back and down towards the floor. Downward Facing Dog can’t be beat as the asana to create a beautiful spinal stretch. Focus on feeling the length of both sides of your waist evenly stretching. This mild inversion will also give your brain a refreshing oxygen bath.
5. Chair and Twisting Chair (Parivtta Utkatasana)
Step forward to the front of your mat, and bring your feet and knees together so that your feet are parallel. Bend your knees, lower your hips, and reach your arms straightforward for a slightly modified chair pose. Bend deeply at your hips and send your inner thighs back and down as your sitting bones root to the floor. Enjoy the heat and intensity (tapas) that you can create simply by being here! The heat helps increase the blood flow to the periphery of your body and can even get a detoxifying sweat going.
From chair, again bring your fingertips to your shoulders. Lengthen fully through your spine, anchor your hips together, then twist strongly to the right. Look down and keep the tip of your nose in line with your knees so that your body is working evenly. Since you aren’t using your hands, your core will be doing most of the work here, which is both strengthening and a great way to massage your internal organs. Keep drawing your right shoulder back to increase the twist and get your back muscles involved. Hold 3-5 deep breaths. Inhale to release, then do the other side.
6. Crescent
Step your left leg back and parallel, then bring your hands to your hips and lift up for crescent pose with your front thigh parallel to the floor. Start by gathering your inner thighs to your midline to increase your core connection and stability. (You can also leave your back knee down if you feel shaky.) Press the tops of your inner thighs back as you root your sitting bones down to the floor in order to most efficiently stretch your hip flexors. On an inhale, lift through your back ribs, then stretch your arms up and overhead. Press down through both feet as you begin to lengthen through the sides of your waist and take your upper inner arms back in line with your ears. Breathe and stretch from your pelvis out though your fingertips. This full body expression will help open up the hip flexors that have become tight through chair sitting over the winter, as well as create the space you need for twisting. Link this pose to the next pose…
7. Twisting Lunge (Parivrtta Parsvakonasana)
Exhale and come halfway forward (like you’re on a 45 degree angle with your upper body). Bring your fingertips again to your shoulders and widen your elbows away from each other. This variation will call for core deep stability, so again, you can leave your back knee down if needed. Hug in through your inner thighs, lengthen through the sides of your waist, and twist to the right. Keep your chin in line with the center of your chest and your nose to the inside of your right knee. With each inhale, lengthen the sides of the waist, and on your exhale, twist using the deep strength of your core. Inhale to release, step back to Downward Facing Dog, then do Crescent and Twisting Lunge on the second side.
8. Bridge (Setu Bandha)
Lower to your knees and come onto your back. Bend your knees, place your feet under your knees, hip distance apart and parallel. Make robot arms by placing your elbows on the floor by your waist and pointing your fingers straight up to the ceiling. Press the tops of your arms down and feel your collarbones widen. Root through your feet (particularly the inner edges) to keep your thighs parallel, and lift your hips and chest off the floor evenly. Keep your arms here, or interlace your hands underneath you for more leverage to lift your chest. Lift your sternum to your chin, and press the back of your head down slightly to keep the natural curve in your neck. This heart-opener will open up your core after all its work, as well as provide a stretch for the muscles that are chronically tightened by the shrunken posture of wintertime. Take 3-5 breaths, then lower your chest and hips to the floor. Repeat 2-3 times. If needed, draw your knees into your chest after your final Bridge.
9. Savasana
Absorb all the work you’ve done by resting in Savasana. Extend your legs long and stretch your arms by your side. Enjoy the openness and warmth that you’ve created and savor the knowledge that you’ve just given your body a delicious internal shower!
Watch this and be INSPIRED!!!!
My friend and YYoga co-worker Steph Tait runs 11,000 miles in one year with her running partner Matt Hill to generate environmental awareness. An astonishing journey!!!!
Message from Steph:
In celebration of Earth Day 2011, commit to one new action for Earth. Small steps add up.
1. Eat local & organic
2. Turn off your car
3. Eliminate plastic bags – bring your own bag
4. Use green cleaners
5. Turn off the lights
6. Turn off the taps
7. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
8. Compost
9. Bring your own bottle
10. Teach your children well
Believe in the power of your dreams.
Love
Steph
A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of taking a therapeutics training with Susi Hately Aldous. On the basis of that training, I want to propose a crazy idea.
Work less.
Rather than working our way into poses that “look right,” how about we invite your bodies into pure movement…and leave it at that? For example, in Warrior 2, we tend to set our hips up, line up our knee over our front ankle, then take a twist in order to face our body to the side. Essentially, we’re compensating in upper body because our hips (for 95% of us) won’t square safely to the side and allow us to also protect the knee. While this is fine, it illuminates our automatic tendency to make the pose look like something we see on the cover of Yoga Journal rather than actually considering the movement. This tendency must give us pause.
Our intentions are coming from the right place. We see that the pose is supposed to look a certain way, we hear cue that indicate it should be done that way, and so we mimic the form of the pose rather than having the opportunity to really feel what our body can do. If we leap to the look, rather than the feel, then we’re missing part of the process.
I’d like to invite you to a process of feeling. As you explore your asana, rather than jump to the end, explore how your body actually moves into the pose. Notice if a lot of static is happening (wiggles, maneuvers, compensations…) or if you’re able to move smoothly from the largest joints (the Major girdles – the hips and shoulders).
When we start to move from a place of feeling rather than doing, our ability to explore the inner landscape of our body increases. As our sensitivity to ourselves to ourselves increases, we may be surprised by the textures and feelings that arise. We may uncover tension and pain we did not formerly recognize, or we may find unexpected strength arising from a deeper place.
Be kind. Feel more. Do less.
And see what happens.
Last weekend I went skiing in Whistler.
Now, I am not what you’d call a great skiier. Last time I was on the mountain was three years ago, before that, it had been a decade. So let’s just say that I was shocked to find out that good skis aren’t straight and that it’s now considered cool to wear helmets.
My idea of making it down the mountain in one piece is to traverse it as slowly as possible. I ski horizontally across to one side, do a little jiggle hop, then cruise on back across the mountain. Now, if you know something about skiing, you’ll know that covering the mountain like you were crawling down switchbacks is not precisely the point.
To ease my way back from what was essentially at 13-year hiatus, I took a lesson.
Yoyo, my very kind Japanese instructor, first made me ski without poles and keep my body facing down the mountain. Down the mountain? Yes, down the mountain. In a move that seems bizarrely counter-intuitive, I am supposed to turn my body down towards the sloping belly of beast, regardless of what my hips and knees are doing beneath me – or the natural tendency to lean back. Despite my misgivings, keeping my torso facing down the hill actually seems to help me stay in control and Yoyo seems pleased with me.
“Much better. Much more stable.” He nods approvingly when we stop.
I’m pleased, and a little flushed. “It’s a lot to think about,” I say. “Keep the head still, torso down, arms forward, shoulder forward, core in…”
He frowns, “No, no. Don’t think too much.”
I frown back. Easy for the ski instructor to say.
We continue to work on my upper body (“Keep body facing down!”), but towards the end of the day, Yoyo deems me ready to work on my edging. He instructs me that instead of lifting my skis to turn, I should roll my weight across them to use the edges. Edge on one side, then roll to center, turn, and edge on the other side. I give it a whirl and notice with a bit if panic that when my weight becomes even on the skis, I seem to suddenly move much faster.
“Good, good!” says Yoyo. “See your lines, better edging.”
I glance behind me and -sure enough- my skis have cut twin grooves in the fluffy snow.
Life is grand. I swoosh down the mountain by following in Yoyo’s tracks.
And then we hit the ice.
I wipe out. In a beautiful blitz of snow.
Yoyo swishes up to me.
“I need,” I say, trying to haul my butt up, “to slow down, huh. Make slower turns.”
Yoyo shakes his head. “No, turn faster.”
“Faster?”
“Point your skiis down, and turn more. Turn, turn, turn.”
I have managed to get up. I look at him. Rather doubtfully.
“Okay.”
Despite the screaming resistance in my brain. I turn my skiis down the hills. And Turn. And Turn. And Turn.
And strangely, despite the fact that I am going faster – I’m cruising right along, really – I feel more connected to my feet. I feel more in control. The skiing is actually going better.
And it’s the same with yoga.
And with life, since, let’s cut to it, people, yoga is really just a big ol’ reflection of life.
Sometimes the next step on the path is not to know more. You can’t study up harder. There’s no more homework to be done. Learning more details and having better skills won’t always take you across that final chasm. Instead – we have to trust. Isvara Pranidhana, as the sutras say. Surrender to god. What takes us into handstand is that moment where we go, well, screw it, and let the chips fall where they may. We practice, we prepare the ground….and then we have to let go to something bigger. And when we turn our skiis down the hill, when we give up our scrappy attempts at control and dive into the jetstream – that’s when, strangely, everything starts moving with grace.
In the fall of 2010, I initiated a project where the community of YYoga joined together to create a cd called “listen to understand, vol.1”. This remarkable endeavor features the original music of our teachers, guest experience team, base camp team, and wellness practitioners. And every last cent is donated to Vancouver’s Children’s Hospital. To date, the cd sales have generated over $4,000 for Children’s.
Take a listen to the excerpts and stop by a YYoga center to buy your own copy. Online version available via Itunes and CDBaby.
Taking Me Higher
Om Shanti
Anusara® Invocation
Twameva
Asatoma Sadgamaya
Sri Krishna Govinda
Let Go
Hopeful
Tibetan Singing Bowls
Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu
Taking Me Higher-Remix
Eternal Om
“Vi” = in a special way
“nyasa” = to place
“krama” = step by step
Change is challenging.
When confronted with change, it’s easy to get swept up in anxiety, discomfort, depression, or panic. We distract ourselves, or seethe as we create a million contingency plans. We cling to our “creature comforts” – those small habits we’ve created that anchor us in an easy ride of familiarity, that soothe us when we get ragged around the edges.
So how can we cope?
While she was going through a particular challenging time, my Mum said to me, “It’s not one day at at time, honey. It’s one hour at a time, one minute.” We can cope with change by getting out of our head – which is wired to try to analyze and “fix” our problem – and move into the spaciousness of the present moment. In the present moment, we are generally “okay.” However, we are so used to living in the past and the future (in analyzing past actions, in projecting future results), that we have forgotten how to arrive in our own skin.
Our yoga practice can help.
In the “vinyasa krama” practice, which literally means “to place step-by-step in a special way,” we cultivate our capacity to return to each unfolding moment. When we bring our attention to how we place our feet, our hands, or move in and out of our asani – we are continually brought back to each arising moment.
The first yoga sutra is “Now the exposition of yoga is being made.” The very first word in the sutras is “atha” or NOW. This is a clarion call to return to the Now, the only moment that truly exists, the only moment in which we can actually accommodate change.
As you practice your vinyasa krama, open to step by step progression of your asana. Use this practice as a reminder that our deepest creature comfort is our fundamental and eternal connection to ourselves.
Pema Chodron writes, “Only to the extent that we expose ourselves again and again to annihilation, can that which is indestructible in use be found.” As we ride the currents of change, the dauntless center within us becomes polished and revealed.
Why is it so hard to let go?
Of habits, relationships (healthy or toxic), of expectations, of dreams? Even when we know we’re hurting ourselves by hanging on, what drives the compulsion to keep gripping?
What do we do when old behavioral patterns no longer serve our life?
In the transition stage between awareness and change lies a really sucky phase of awareness without change. It’s torturous. “Why do I do this?” “Why can’t I change this?” We lament. We tear out our hair. And we still don’t change. But now we’ve spiced up our situation by hating ourselves. Stop adding fuel to the fire. Rest assured, you created your habits for excellent reasons. To cope, to deal with stress, to survive. They have served you well. But now the time has come to change. So let go of the blaming and put that fabulous energy into changing your situation.
You can either be uncomfortable in your old habits, or uncomfortable in your new habits, so why not choose with awareness? Once you start, it becomes easier every time. Remind yourself that following your old habits may bring short-term relief, but longer term suffering. Find ways to take care of yourself during this time, whether it’s yoga, massage, tea, time with friends, or a trip somewhere that grounds you. Cultivate your capacity to take pleasure in the little things, moment to moment.
You are not alone. You are wired like a human being, and we’re all programmed to create habits in order to become more efficient. As your awareness increases, you may realize that some of your autopilot tendencies aren’t ideal for you. Reach out to others who may be experiencing similar growing pains. There is comfort in community.
In the spirit of radical change and letting go, I’m including some inspiration below from different sources, even Dr. Phil 🙂 The first is about the Hindu goddess Kali. Put this girl in back pocket when you need to up your potency for radical transformation!
Here’s a blurb from Anita Revel’s Goddess Site:
| Kali Kali’s esoteric attributes are PASSION and physical and sexual energy. Be alert to those who undermine your self-confidence – Kali is here to hurl your life onto a new path that will ultimately prove to be more fulfilling than your current path. |
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| SUGGESTED MANTRA: AWAKENING
SUGGESTED AFFIRMATIONS:
ESSENCE: Goddessence KALI 100% pure essential oil blend GEMSTONES: Ruby, garnet, bloodstone, tourmaline, smoky quartz (red stones) |
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Kali 100% pure essential oil blend for the If you are feeling “stuck in a rut”, use this Base Chakra blend to energise your intention. The blend of five 100% pure essential oils represents strength, unwavering willpower and insight. It helps you purge elements of destruction in your life and reclaim your independent spirit by directing your life onto a new path – your true path. Walk with confidence and know your place in the world.
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MORE ABOUT KALI According to ancient Hindu tradition, Kali is the mother of us all. Kali is often depicted as a bloodthirsty harbinger of destruction, but this is so that through death we can experience the wonder of rebirth. Hence, when our lives seem as though they are out of control, this is Kali telling us that we have not chosen the right path. Through Kali’s strength, we are forced out of complacency and fear to find the right path for ourselves. HER MODERN ENERGY Kali has unwavering judgement, strong willpower and penetrative insight. She also characterises how we feel about our attachments to people and possessions, and how we react when we are threatened with losing them. Don’t be afraid to shed – Kali offers you the strength to rid your life of excess baggage, to confront the forces that threaten you, to destroy the elements of destruction in your life. Once this is done, you can celebrate new life! DO THIS Kali is related to our root chakra, home of the kundalini energy. When our root chakra is in balance, we feel secure, alert, stable – our lives are full of active and positive energy. If you are not feeling like this, it is no wonder Kali is speaking to you today. Sit on the floor, close your eyes, and while nurturing a related gemstone, feel your spine grow and take root in the earth. Feel the strength of the earth energise your spine and your body. You are indestructable! You are strong! You can shake the weight from your shoulders and conquer the demon shadowing your life. Go Warrior Woman!!
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If we contemplate desires and listen to them, we are actually no longer attaching to them; we are just allowing them to be the way they are. Then we come to the realisation that the origin of suffering, desire, can be laid aside and let go of.
How do you let go of things? This means you leave them as they are; it does not mean you annihilate them or throw them away. It is more like setting down and letting them be. Through the practice of letting go we realise that there is the origin of suffering, which is the attachment to desire, and we realise that we should let go of these three kinds of desire. Then we realise that we have let go of these desires; there is no longer any attachment to them.
When you find yourself attached, remember that ‘letting go’ is not ‘getting rid of’ or ‘throwing away’. If I’m holding onto this clock and you say, ‘Let go of it!’, that doesn’t mean ‘throw it out’. I might think that I have to throw it away because I’m attached to it, but that would just be the desire to get rid of it. We tend to think that getting rid of the object is a way of getting rid of attachment. But if I can contemplate attachment, this grasping of the clock, I realise that there is no point in getting rid of it – it’s a good clock; it keeps good time and is not heavy to carry around. The clock is not the problem. The problem is grasping the clock. So what do I do? Let it go, lay it aside – put it down gently without any kind of aversion. Then I can pick it up again, see what time it is and lay it aside when necessary.
You can apply this insight into ‘letting go’ to the desire for sense pleasures. Maybe you want to have a lot of fun. How would you lay aside that desire without any aversion? Simply recognise the desire without judging it. You can contemplate wanting to get rid of it – because you feel guilty about having such a foolish desire – but just lay it aside. Then, when you see it as it is, recognising that it’s just desire, you are no longer attached to it.
So the way is always working with the moments of daily life. When you are feeling depressed and negative, just the moment that you refuse to indulge in that feeling is an enlightenment experience. When you see that, you need not sink into the sea of depression and despair and wallow in it. You can actually stop by learning not to give things a second thought.
You have to find this out through practice so that you will know for yourself how to let go of the origin of suffering. Can you let go of desire by wanting to let go of it? What is it that is really letting go in a given moment? You have to contemplate the experience of letting go and really examine and investigate until the insight comes. Keep with it until that insight comes: ‘Ah, letting go, yes, now I understand. Desire is being let go of.’ This does not mean that you are going to let go of desire forever but, at that one moment, you actually have let go and you have done it in full conscious awareness. There is an insight then. This is what we call insight knowledge. In Pali, we call it nanadassana or profound understanding.
I had my first insight into letting go in my first year of meditation. I figured out intellectually that you had to let go of everything and then I thought: ‘How do you let go?’ It seemed impossible to let go of anything. I kept on contemplating: ‘How do you let go?’ Then I would say, ‘You let go by letting go.’ ‘Well then, let go!’ Then I would say:
‘But have I let go yet?’ and, ‘How do you let go?’ ‘Well just let go!’ I went on like that, getting more frustrated. But eventually it became obvious what was happening. If you try to analyse letting go in detail, you get caught up in making it very complicated. It was not something that you could figure out in words any more, but something you actually did. So I just let go for a moment, just like that.
Now with personal problems and obsessions, to let go of them is just that much. It is not a matter of analysing and endlessly making more of a problem about them, but of practising that state of leaving things alone, letting go of them. At first, you let go but then you pick them up again because the habit of grasping is so strong. But at least you have the idea. Even when I had that insight into letting go, I let go for a moment but then I started grasping by thinking: ‘I can’t do it, I have so many bad habits!’ But don’t trust that kind of nagging, disparaging thing in yourself. It is totally untrustworthy. It is just a matter of practising letting go. The more you begin to see how to do it, then the more you are able to sustain the state of non-attachment.
Have you been dumped, betrayed or left so heartbroken that you didn’t ever want to love again? Are you still stuck on an ex and don’t know how to move on? And how do you know when it’s time to let go and look for love somewhere else?
When I went traveling to India this last month with my mom, I packed everything in a small backpack, determined to be a minimalist. It was an experiment to see if I could really get away with traveling light. “Aren’t you impressed,” I asked my boyfriend. “I got everything into here!” I brandished my backpack proudly. He looked at my bag skeptically, “I’ll be impressed,” he said, “if you still think that was a good idea when you get back.”
Well, two weeks later and I’m happy to report that traveling light was an excellent idea. (Although my bag did come back a bit more stuffed than when I left.) I was a bit dirty, I’ll admit, but it was incredibly satisfying to let go the usual defensive materials I like to shore up. No extra books for reading, no “clothes for every occasion,” no mascara, no “just in case” items, and few distractions.
In celebration of traveling light, I’m sharing this article I found by Michelle Cook. It’s that time of year: clean out the closets, dump off the waste, and let in the fresh air!
Spring is upon us–at least in theory. Every year I get spring fever. I can’t wait to get outside, open all my windows to let some fresh air in, and get down to cleaning my house of all the clutter that tends to build up over the winter. I think spring is the best season of the year. It’s a season of birth and new growth. Flowers, trees, grass and shrubs all start budding with life. This spring, help breathe new life into your body by incorporating some simple detox suggestions to your day. Reducing the toxic burden on your body can spell: improved digestion, increased energy, clearer sinuses, normalized blood pressure, fewer allergy symptoms and hormonal imbalances, strengthened immunity to viruses, sharper mental abilities, better sleep quality, fewer mood swings, healthier skin, and much more. Here are 9 ways to spring cleanse your body without the harsh regimes or deprivation of most detox plans:
1. Throw out the trash…from your diet, that is. I probably don’t have to tell you what constitutes “trash”–fried foods, sugary foods, and the 3 Ps: processed, prepared, and packaged food since they tend to be full of trans fats, sugar, and food additives.
2. If you can’t read eat, don’t eat it. Read labels on the healthy food selections you choose. As a general rule: most of the harmful chemicals you should be avoiding have long and complex names. If you can’t read the words on the package, don’t buy it, and don’t eat it. Better yet, choose fresh foods that come directly in Nature’s packaging.
3. Drink at least 8 to 10 cups of pure water daily to help flush out toxins. For a really great detoxifying drink, add the fresh juice of one lemon to a large glass of water first thing in the morning. Lemons help alkalize your body chemistry, contain more than 20 anti-cancer compounds, and help cleanse your liver, kidneys, and colon.
4. Cut back or eliminate meat and dairy products at least for a while to give your body a break. Meat is highly acid-forming in your body, can be a strain on the kidneys and intestines (low water, no fiber, and requiring plenty of energy to digest) and dairy is mucus-forming.
5. Eat lots of vegetables. Make at least 70 percent of every meal vegetables. That’s easier to do than you think: enjoy a fresh vegetable juice, a large green salad, or a plate of steamed, roasted, or stir-fried veggies, for example.
6. Keep your meals small and simple but eat more frequently throughout the day. That will help stabilize your blood sugar and free up some of the massive amount of energy required for digestion.
7. Add 1/2 cup of cooked legumes (beans) to your diet daily to boost your fiber and nutrient intake and balance your blood sugar levels-one of the keys to balanced energy and weight.
8. Choose healthy snacks throughout the day. Here are some quick and simple ideas: a handful of raw, unsalted almonds, almond butter on celery sticks, nori rolls with avocado (vegetarian sushi), a veggie and sprout wrap, a berry smoothie with rice or almond milk.
9. Go for a brisk walk outside. Exercise improves circulation, which brings fresh, oxygenated blood to your organs and tissues, thereby revitalizing them…and you.
Simple daily changes to your diet and lifestyle can add up to major health improvements, more energy, balanced moods, and an overall feeling of wellbeing. Plus the changes will be manageable and you won’t feel deprived.
Copyright Michelle Schoffro Cook
I got disconnected three times.
Three times.
In a row.
“Just hold one moment while we transfer you to confirm,” they’d say sweetly, just before I heard a strange sound. The sound of silence. The vacuum of a disconnected phone line. The sound of my impotent, mediocre frustration growing to a boiling point of irrational, helpless rage.
Nothing can be quite so delightful as customer service, eh?
Or how about when the woman in customer service would ask me for all my details, “I’ll just need that information before transferring you,” and the guy in cancellations would say, “I’ll just need all that information again, you’re in a new department.” Then, moments later, the guy says, “You seem irritated at me already!” I say through gritted teeth, “I’m not irritated at you, it’s not personal, I’m irritated because I’ve been disconnected twice already and -” CLICK. I think he’d decided he didn’t want to deal with one more stress case on the phone.
Ah, the rage of powerlessness. A tiny fist shaking at an faceless, stonewalling bureaucracy.
And finally, when I do finally get to someone who can help me, wouldn’t you know that I then had to sigh, “I have to go. I’ve run out of time. Just make a note on my file,” knowing that I’d just have to call back and start everything All. Over. Again.
During this little adventure, I was not at my yoga best. As I left the phone and the house behind me to bike downtown for class, I was still fuming with the tape of “angry and wronged customer” running through my head. How dare they have such lousy service! How dare they be so inconsiderate of my time and my needs! How dare they WRONG ME SO!
But what could I do, I realized. It was done. Over. The moment was past. Now, I couldn’t change a thing. If I wanted to enjoy my commute and my class, I was going to have to find a way to let it go. To leave my anger behind me.
It’s a challenge to leave anger behind, especially when it feels sooooo righteous. My brain would much rather stew in a morass of “why I’m right and they’re wrong” than think about how nice the weather is or even (*gasp*) contemplate how difficult it must be to have to talk to angry customers all day.
But what good does being “right” do me? Sure, I get to shore up my ego, but at the same time I get this strange hardening sensation happening somewhere in my chest. The brick laying of an impenetrable walls of certitude. It certainly doesn’t get me any closer to actually getting a resolution on my phone issue. Customer service is completely unaware that I am sending psychological daggers at them during my bike ride. Absolutely no one was benefiting – least of all me – from rehashing the situation. All I was doing was wasting time that I could have spent enjoying the ride, feeling the wind, breathing.
As I rode, I had to laugh to myself. Or really, at myself. I don’t want to live a life hashing out imaginary conversations in my head just to prove that I can come out of a situation looking better. Looking “right.” I tried to let go. Which is really hard to do, because it’s really a matter of undoing something. But the intention was there. And my anger started to fade. I started to enjoy the ride. And sure, I caught myself circling back into my defensive brain loops more than once. But I’d just laugh at myself, tell myself it was okay, and try to focus on riding my bike again.
There is a Zen koan. Something to the effect that there is a monk hanging out on the side of a cliff by his fingernails. He will soon fall off. He can’t pull himself up, and below him there is a Tiger circling, ready to pounce. Just then, he spies some strawberries and is able to take a bite of one. How sweet the juice is!
Last Thursday evening, I attended a talk by Reginald Ray, founder of Dharma Ocean and tantric buddhist practitioner.
He spoke about the intimacy and the power (and terror) of really Seeing another person.
What is Seeing? It’s when we strip away the filters through which we most often see the world and take the time and space to witness what is actually before us. Usually we half-ass our seeing. I look at my partner, but what I’m really seeing is what I expect to. I impose upon him everything that I think a partner is, or should be, or what my own expectations are. I will frequently assume that I understand a situation or person without actually taking the time to see and hear them. How many times have I been caught up short in an argument, saying, “I didn’t know you felt/thought that way!”
Seeing – and then allowing ourselves to be seen – is actually terrifying. As an acting instructor, one of my favorite exercises is to have people simply enter the room and stand in front of the group. And wait. And stand. And wait. And do nothing. Because – as an audience – we are actually Seeing them, they are feeling the intensity of being Seen. And because they’ve been asked to simply be there and do nothing, there is no distraction available but to simply endure it. It’s a terrifying and liberating experience. Terrifying because we feel vulnerable, but also liberating because we can realize in that moment how powerful Seeing actually is.
When we really take the time to See and Be Seen, it is amazing to notice how quickly our defenses can rise. Even with our closest friends and partners, how much do we hide? How much do we resist intimacy?
After Reggie’s talk, I had tea with my friend Vicki in the library’s atrium. As we chatted, a homeless man came up and started to talk to us. His name was Norman. And as he spoke to us, I tried to SEE him. Rather than scuttle away or assume that he wanted something from me, I just took some time to see him for who he was and what he was doing. I found out that Norman wasn’t scary, although he was pretty pretty drunk. This previously invisible man became visible.
This week, I’ve been practicing Seeing People. Seeing my waitresses, the woman behind the counter at the visa office, the grocery attendant. My friends, my lover. People BLOSSOM with being Seen. They light up like plants in sunlight. Creating the space to see another person reveals our underlying human connection. Time slows down. We relax. Common ground rather than difference is discovered.
When we practice yoga, or when we meditate, we can practice Seeing ourselves. Can you give ourselves the space to be – without judgment, just with presence and compassion?
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