The Beauty of the Universe

Universe (via jurvetson)

Imagine your body as a universe - a vast cosmic landscape in which every planet and every star is a point of energy signifying one of your particular qualities, talents, or aspects of your identity. Imagine each of these coalesced points of energy as a marker of some aspect of your life. Now imagine recognizing that that vastness, that sense of limitless possibility, that ever-expanding tapestry of seen and unseen, darkness punctuated with flashes of illumination…is your very essence.

Just as a star pulses, expanding and contracting energetically, so do we. When you feel depleted mentally, physically, or spiritually, when you have a hesitation of the heart - anxiety, self-doubt, or feelings of unworthiness, hug in to your inner universe - to the constellation of your own complexities. By moving inward, we become expansive. This is not a contradiction. It is an essential fact of the natural world. A dense and compact seed contains the promise of a tree. At the core of our bodies, we find infinite potential. In Anusara yoga we call this pulsation muscular and organic energy. We hug in toward the center of our bodies to tap into the expansiveness that resides there. This enables us to unfold and open, to extend and become spacious.

While it is still warm at night, go outside. If you need to, find an open space – a park or a rooftop. And just look. Receive the lessons of the inky and infinite sky. Welcome the night air into your body. Soften until there is less separation between you and the sky. Commit to recognizing your own vastness - to not getting stuck in one small corner of your personal universe. Commit to seeking out options. Step into your own enormity. And recognize that the endless night sky is a reflection of you.

The Beauty of Alignment

John Friend as SuperOM

“The future is about responding in alignment” - John Friend 9-11-10

Daily life is an ever-shifting process of aligning and realigning. You wake up and realize it’s raining or that you forgot to buy food for breakfast. Maybe you check your email and see a message that adds a layer of complication to your day or one that makes you excited about how your day will unfold. Perhaps you make the most perfect breakfast and the coffee has never tasted so delicious, or instead you forgot to pick up milk and feel vaguely disappointed. You imagined this, but now you have to readjust to that. Every moment of your day instigates a series of tiny shifts and adjustments. Each adjustment is a point of departure from which your actions and choices ripple outward, affecting your life and the lives of the people around you. So the essential question becomes: how do you align with those incremental shifts and changes - with what was, with what is and with what might be?

As my teacher John Friend reminded us this past weekend in Boston, everything is microcosm-macrocosm. The shifts of our bodies and minds mirror the processes of the world around us. If we deny those processes, we become misaligned. If our knee suddenly feels tweaked and we decide to run 5 miles or sit in lotus position for an hour, that’s a misaligned decision that will result in injury. If we decide to address that unexpected shift with rest or a theraputic physical practice, we have responded intelligently, realigning with what is, and setting a positive path for what might be.

The more aligned we are as individuals, the more skillfully we align with those around us. We become proficient at navigating the vicissitudes of life, which enables us to more positively affect our world. We are less likely to lash out in anger when provoked, less likely to be devastated by sadness. If we can align with the small shifts, we can better address the life-changing ones.

So try this:

First, notice some small unexpected shift in your plans or expectations.

Then observe: How is this change affecting my thinking & mood?

Then ask yourself: How, at this moment, can I best align with what I’ve been given so that I can move forward in a positive way?

The Beauty of Beginnings

Yellow Leaf (via My aim is true)

It’s officially September. No ocean weekends, roof deck urban sunbathing, or persistent flip-flop wearing can deny it. For many of us, this signifies the bittersweet trailing off of summertime heat – a regretful goodbye to the radiant openness of our bodies that offers us a similarly open state of mind. For others, the transition into September is filled with the excitement of the new – the cooler weather activating our motivation, our work ethic – a shift into focusing and goal setting. So I remind myself at the onset of Fall that this season can be about possibility and freshness, an opportunity to create a new way of thinking, to set new habits, to shift emphasis from something that didn’t serve us to something that holds potential. An opportunity to make our someday into our now.

I begin my Fall by committing to some particular practice for 5 minutes each day. Seriously - 5 minutes. A few years ago, I committed to a 5 minute a day Pranayama practice. I knew that committing to 5 minutes would make it impossible for me to fail. Even when I had a head cold and was in a state of exhaustion I did it. In the process, I fell so in love with my practice that I often continued for a half hour or an hour. But achieving 5 minutes was so reasonable that I was easily able to honor my commitment to myself. It provided a calm and expansive backdrop to my days.

My teacher Dr. Douglas Brooks says, “If you make a mistake, don’t do it again. And then, if you do it again, then don’t do it again.” This is such a generous way of looking at human nature, offering the reminder that every time we begin something again, we are actually beginning it anew. Every recommencement is a new beginning, regardless of associations or familiarity.

So what will you commit yourself to this September? 5 minutes of running, writing, asana, meditation, drawing, stretching, dancing, apartment cleaning, singing? Remember to be kind to yourself. Offer yourself the present of a practice. And don’t beat yourself up for occasionally forgetting about it entirely. But if you do forget, then don’t forget again. And then if you do forget about it again…then don’t do it again…and so on.

The Beauty of Knowledge and Wisdom

Pablo Picasso-Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (detail) 1907

Knowledge is different from wisdom. Knowledge is acquired information, facts, or technique, like how to speak another language or do a handstand or bake a cake. There is external proof of your knowledge in the form of visible accomplishment. Knowledge enables you to make an educated decision, to get things done, and is the foundation for wisdom. Wisdom, however, is what you do with knowledge, how you apply acquired information to the rest of your life. Wisdom is far more subtle and elusive than knowledge, and is not measurable. It is a refinement or an expansion of knowledge. Wisdom is how poetically you speak that language, the radiance of your handstand, the transcendent, “oh!” of the cake.

In Sanskrit the word jnana means knowledge and the word vidya means wisdom. Vidya is the intelligence, creativity, and artistry of how you apply what you know to what you do. One is not more important than the other – both are necessary to live a rich fulfilling life. You can live less brightly without vidya. But you can’t even make your breakfast without jnana. Jnana is the foundation that allows for vidya to flourish, as long as you cultivate it. But vidya is what offers insight, makes beauty and art, and makes life worth living.

Before Picasso turned toward increasing degrees of abstraction in his work, he painted in a highly realistic manner. His contemporaries could also render in a visually accurate technical style. They all had the jnana. But they did not all have the vidya. How Picasso applied his knowledge was his wisdom – his genius – his vidya. He pushed the boundaries of jnana so much that he changed the rules.

So how does this relate to you?

In what areas of your life do you need to acquire more knowledge, more jnana?

In what areas of your life do you need to cultivate wisdom, vidya?

How can you build your knowledge as a point of departure for the wild creative leap of your wisdom?

The Beauty of the Fire

Ian Britton/Freephoto.com

We must destroy to create. My intention in saying this is not an endorsement of aggression or violence, but an observation of a fundamental fact of nature. When we truly desire change in our lives, when we crave the transformation of our bodies and minds, we need to burn down our old patterns and habits to make room for the new. We must dramatically and emphatically rid ourselves of that which no longer serves us. Sometimes things need to fall apart before they can come back together in a more positive and substantial way. When you burn something, you transform it – it is a form of alchemy.

Now, what you need to throw into the fire could be a bad habit, an addictive behavior, a toxic friendship, or a negative thought pattern - anything that holds you back from being your greatest self. I remember Olympic swimming champion Michael Phelps saying that whenever someone insulted or harassed him, he used it as fuel to feed his practice. Whatever came at him he was able to alchemize. These transformed experiences nourished the soil of his practice.

There are fire rituals in virtually every spiritual tradition. Fire symbolizes memory, alchemy, disintegration, and transformation. In Anusara Yoga we begin every class with the mantra Om Namah Shivaya, which can sometimes be interpreted as: I honor Shiva, the great Destroyer. The Shiva we refer to is our own inner light, our own inner fire. This light is luminous and powerful, beautiful and frightening. When, through our practice, we tend to the inner flame, burning away that negative habit – that destructive tendency - that nagging doubt, we clear our inner landscape, creating a fertile ground for personal growth.

So what is holding you back from being your greatest self?

What in your life isn’t serving you?

Envision throwing that thing into the fire. Visualize it burning until there is nothing left but ash. Feed the flame. Transform your self.

The Beauty of Practice III

Imagine yourself as an ocean. Now imagine yourself as a rock tumbling through the waves of that ocean, grating upon sand, other rocks, shells, and seaweed, and being smoothed by the incessant movement of the waves. This is you and your practice.

Stepping into your practice is like diving into the ocean of you – all of your complexities churn and shift as you are buffeted by excitement, curiosity, doubt, frustration, exhaustion, and bliss. These are the thoughts and sensations that arise within the context of your practice. Some of these sensations might be residual from your day or your week, others might be hidden on the ocean floor of your psyche, just waiting for the churning of your body and mind to jiggle them loose. But it is all you – you are the rock, cleansed by the practice, debris shaken loose, rough edges smoothed. And you are the ocean, your own world, deep and enveloping, in which anything can happen. In your practice you plunge into the depths. You move. You see what arises.

Your practice, like the ocean, is always right there waiting for you to step into it. But in a sense you are never not practicing. Everything you do feeds your practice in some way. So the relevant question becomes:

How deeply are you willing to dive into the ocean of your practice?

Or, to paraphrase:

How deeply are you willing to dive into the ocean of you?

The Beauty of Practice II

Sianna Sherman at Dig Yoga

“Practice, practice, practice and all will come…” -Shri K. Pattabhi Jois

I woke up Saturday to the birdlike sound of a flute playing a raga, listening as the sound wandered, swooping down, climbing up, and meandering through the morning quiet. Sleeping downstairs from me for the weekend was master bamboo flautist Steve Gorn. who was engaged in his morning practice. In the bedroom next to mine, Sianna Sherman was on her asana mat and across the hall, our host, Sue Elkind, was deep in meditation. As I moved through my own morning rituals of meditation and asana, the sound of the flute connected us, telling the story of our love for our own practices.

The reason why I share this moment is to make a point about practice. All of these people are brilliant practitioners who had converged for a weekend Intensive at Dig Yoga in Lambertville, NJ, along with the brilliant Tantric scholar Paul Muller-Ortega. These individuals have more skill in their fields than most people dream of acquiring in a lifetime. But what do they do first thing in the morning? They practice. Clearly, they all have a natural gift, but without practice, the gift might never have emerged or fulfilled its potential. Their brilliance, like everyone’s, is in a state of continual evolution. Without practice, it can’t grow, develop, or flourish. The gift shrivels, like a neglected plant.

Accepting that moments of frustration and dissatisfaction are part of a whole that also contains contentment, curiosity, and sometimes ecstasy, is part of being a mature practitioner of any art. Yoga-running-writing-painting-cooking-singing-whatever. My teacher, John Friend, reminds us of how many times he had to fall in a pose to get to where he is now. And it never ends. That’s the beauty of having a practice. As Paul Muller-Ortega said to us on the last day of the Intensive, “You cultivate this path with love, commitment, dedication, vigilance…Life is the process of refinement.” And to refine, you have to practice.