Professor Douglas Brooks on language and the India pilgrimage. I have just finished leading the group house practice and need to meditate before going to bed, so I do not have time to write more, but I wanted to draw your attention to this blog for your own contemplations about language and practice. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to join in part of the conversation and look forward to going ever deeper.
Around the base of this statue, it says this as one walks clockwise from the front right. And when done circumnavigating, and facing the same direction in the direction the statue of Mary McLeod Bethune, one can see down East Capitol Street to the Capitol Dome:
“I leave you love. I leave you hope. I leave you the challenge of developing confidence in one another. I leave you a thirst for education. I leave you a respect for the use of power. I leave you faith. I leave you racial dignity. I also leave you a desire to live harmoniously with your fellow man. I leave you finally a responsibility to our young people.”
Of my friends on facebook, several reveled in staying inside because of the rain yesterday. Others complained about being unable to do things that would have been better on a dry day. Reporters and anchor persons seemed to think it newsworthy whether the rain will impact football or baseball games. How about telling us whether the rain we are getting is optimal for the native flora and fauna and how it is impacting the farmers? We seem as a society to have forgotten the relationship of the weather to food.
Last week Orie suggested that as I have a “Yoga for Gardeners” workshop, I should also do a “Yoga of Housekeeping” workshop. A blog post isn’t a workshop, but here are a few preliminary thoughts on yoga and housekeeping.
From an alignment perspective, I have found that the Anusara principles of alignment make safe everything I do off the mat, as well as on. Overwhelmed by all that needs to be done? Doing heavy lifting? Bending and stooping? Reaching for something way up high?
First, soften (open to grace). Appreciate that you have a home and things to clean. Honor each item in the house. Things have energy, too., and they like to be touched and cleaned. If you have anything that you do not appreciate or does not fit in the house, give it a new life in a new home (freecycledc is a great way to pass things forward).
Use muscular energy, drawing the muscles to the bone, hugging into the mid-line, and drawing energy into the focal point (for most housecleaning activities, this will be the pelvis). Using muscle energy will definitely help to keep you from tweaking a muscle or straining the low back or shoulders. When you are reaching, keep the arm bones integrated by hugging the shoulder blades onto the back and then reach from the waist, though each rib to extend the length of your torso (organic energy).
Especially for bending and lifting, after you bend your knees, hug your shins in (muscular energy), take your inner thighs back and apart (inner spiral) and then tuck your tailbone (outer spiral). If you just bend from the knees but hunch your back, your low back will still be vulnerable.
Switch sides for activities like sweeping, vaccuuming, and scrubbing. Yes, it can be difficult and awkward, but it’s worth it to shift sides. Imagine doing all of your yoga practice only on one side. How much imbalance would you be encouraging?
The first niyama of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras is sauca, which means cleanliness or purity. It is easier to think and live and be hospitable in a clean home.
The first yama is ahimsa, or non-harming. Do your best to use safe, biodegradable cleaning products. Your skin and respiratory system will be grateful. So will the earth. Try to make cleaning your own space and act of honoring your self, your home, and the greater home of the earth.
Fully absorb yourself in the task of cleaning. Make it a meditation. Integrate fully the act of cleaning, the item being cleaned, and you as the cleaner.
Finally, be playful.
preparing a capable vessel
to remember, to recognize,
to dance with, to love
the shimmer, the
vibration, the very
pulse of being.
Could you find your innards gorgeous–the blood, sinovial fluid, organs of digestion and elimination? What about your inner thoughts and memories, the ones you do not want to share?
That, of course, is not the point, here. What does it mean to be gorgeous inside? As a found exhortation it is to invite us to find (and seek) the wondrous and exquisite place where external (including your internal critic) judgment and values become irrelevant (even while recognizing that we are still working on things).
To find that gorgeous and glorious inner space and rest in it is one of the reasons to meditate–especially those of us who have a tendency to hear at times all too loudly the inner and outer voices of criticism.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
