What’s Your Dharma?

Dear Friends ,

What could be better with the topsy turvy weather and the pace of our town these days than to spend a delicious afternoon relaxing into optimal alignment?

This month’s workshop theme will explore the second line of the Anusara invocation:  satcitananda murtaye.–roughly meaning being, consciousness, and bliss embodied.  We will spend two extraordinary hours inviting ourselves to go into each pose fully present and aware to the possibility of bringing ourselves into complete bliss by aligning through the Anusara principles.

Or you could just think it is relaxing and lovely, while listening to great music, to lie in a series of supported poses that realign the physical body to help release tension and invite a sense of ease.  The thing about restoratives is that they offer much on many levels.

If you sometimes think that restoratives are not for you because your mind has a tendency to race, please come join us, ask a question about what to do when the mind races, either privately before, or with the whole group when I ask for questions.  I have offerings from my teachers and my own experience that have proven for me to be incredibly helpful, and I love to pass them on.

Cannot come this Saturday, please mark your calendars for March 19th (Yoga for Gardeners to Benefit the Washington Youth Garden) and March 26th for the final workshop in the “Relaxing into Optimal Alignment” series.

Hope to see you soon.

Peace and light,

Elizabeth

I had lunch the other day with a friend whose life is suddenly brimming full with a variety of opportunities.  Any one of them by itself would feel like a bounty.  With multiple ones arising simultaneously, because they are not necessarily in perfect sequence with each other, making decisions seems like a conundrum rather than a blessing.  Over a rather delightful lunch, my friend gave me many details of the various things that were going on, and the places where they seemed not to synchronize in a way that would allow her to have it all with ease.  “Any words of wisdom?” she asked.  When I was younger, I might have tried to make specific suggestions.  Specific suggestions, though, are always colored by our own particular preferences, prejudices, and desires.  Instead, I said, “In the style of yoga I practice, the first principle for starting every pose, which I find works for what I do off the mat as well, is to ‘open to grace.’

“Opening to grace means to soften, to listen, to open ourselves to the universal in which the details arise, to allow what is to be in the flow,” I added.

“Without getting into the details, the essence of the next alignment principle [muscular energy] is the application of proper boundaries.  Even though we want to be soft and open, we still do not say ‘yes’ to everything.  Although open to everything, we steady ourselves and use our knowledge to discriminate and find a good container for ourselves so that we can act with more light.”

“Ah,” my friend replied, “I’ve been trying to control everything without allowing things to unfold.  What you are saying makes sense.”

My friend will find her own way, and I look forward to witnessing the great joys potentially unfolding for her.  Any time she invites me to share some of the wisdom I’ve received from my teachers, it will be my delight to pass it on.