always there, we just have to remember it is there to see and to recognize it when we do. The first is just Anusara’s “first principle”–opening to grace. The second is practicing and studying with increasing depth and refinement (viveka) so that we can recognize the light and know how to bring it into our lives.
There is a specific sequence to the major Anusara alignment principles even though ultimately we are doing all of the alignment principles simultaneously. “Organic energy,” the action of reaching out and making offering is the fifth of the physical principles. We do not reach out until we have softened and listened (opened to grace), intentionally drawn in with nurturing, focused embrace (muscular energy), expanded with discrimination (inner or expanding spiral), and drawn in again with discrimination and awareness to concentrate the energy (contracting or outer spiral). We do, in fact, need to be aware and open, to be nurtured, and to study and expand with refinement, to enhance our ability to make offering and to serve in the most optimal way. So we take care of ourselves and draw inward as much as we reach out to keep ourselves in balance.
Once we have taken care of ourselves, though, it has been my experience that without reaching out, there is no true strength or meaning in either a yoga pose or in life. Organic energy as a physical principle is expanding from bone to muscle to skin, expanding outward from the midline, and reaching from the core to the periphery. How I experience organic energy at its most supporting is a true reaching out, an offering of the energy created and refined by the other practices.
What is the point of a self-embrace or personal enlightenment if it is not used to serve, to offer the love and wisdom cultivated by the practice? Organic energy is what changes yoga (on and off the mat) from being enjoyable “navel gazing” and being a source of power that helps us brighten and shift not only ourselves, but our relationships and all around us.
Yesterday, in response to the question, how was I doing, I responded that though I was personally fine, I was mourning deeply those suffering from the wars and disasters around the world and anxious about the state of this country and what was to come. I feel most ok when I am making efforts to make things better and to contribute less to future harm.
I was told I was being unreasonable; real grief was only if one has just lost a relative or a close friend. This might have had something to do with the fact that this person believes in Israel’s unconscionable aggression and needed to justify their position.
I’m here to tell you that it is nonsense to say that grief is only real if so narrowly circumscribed. It was not as though I said my grief and anxiety were keeping me from helping; to the contrary, they inspire me to give more of myself.
Everyone’s grief is valid, including grief for the climate and society and our ideals. And grief does not have an expiration date.
Meditation and yoga may help you stay with the full range of human experience and better see and appreciate what joy is there is to be had. It has for me, but I already have my basic needs covered.
May you be happy and safe and healthy.
I was first taught that adhikara meant “studentship.” Although that is not a literal translation, adhikara implies a dedication and steadiness in the student that makes the student worthy of receiving the teachings (of yoga). As I was steadying myself during this momentous time and working in the garden, I was thinking about how the principle of adhikara applies to so many aspects of life, including gardening and being a citizen.
One of the literal translations for adhikara is “competence.” What is the competence one needs to have in order to participate in the study? As I harvested the last of the peppers and eggplants and pulled up the plants, making room to sow another round of greens (not too late in my sunny, protected yard in the city), and decided to leave the orchids out for another week, I thought about how I knew what to do when in my garden. By being present and observant for two decades in my yard alone, I have grown competent to know what will likely grow in my little patch of earth and for how long into the season, depending on the year’s weather. My initial competence, when I started this garden almost 20 years ago, was some basic training in other gardens, reading technical books, and enthusiasm. My consistent efforts to learn yielded results delightful to me from the beginning. As I have continued my studentship in the garden, my appreciation grows. The same is true for me also with cooking, relationships, and my participation in the community (not necessarily in that order).
The fundamental competence of a student is having the basic skills to participate at the level of the teachings. For a gardener, it is recognizing our climate, our space limitations, and our soil, and being open to learning what can be changed in a particular space and what must be accepted. For a citizen, it is knowing basic civics, what are the most relevant issues for us and society at large, and what we can change and what we must accept (I think knowing the subtle differences between what we can change and what we must accept is incredibly difficult). For yoga, it is much the same: we must know what are true limits and what are false ones and be consistently present, practice steadily, and be ever open, not only to studying, but to the fruits of study (expected or not).
I cannot change the weather, nor guarantee how other voters will vote, but I can continue to maintain the adhikara necessary to be a fully engaged student of this life on all days and not just the days it is fun or gratifying. The yoga, on a day like today, is to act fully, accepting, and perhaps even appreciating, the limits on what I can control.
