Asana, Pranayama, and Yoga Practice | Food for the Mind (Yoga Philosophy, etc) | Meditation | Photos
Found Exhortation
Similar Posts
An Excellent Sufficiency, Homegrown Tomatoes (and the Isha Upanishad)
The Isha Upanishad starts, “That is fullness (purna). This is fullness. Fullness comes from fullness. Take fullness from fullness, and the remainder is fullness.”
My maternal grandfather died when I was just a toddler, so I never got to know him. My mother used to tell us that when he had eaten enough at a bounteous meal, he would say “that was an excellent sufficiency and any more would be a superabundency.”
On Sunday I went over to Lovejoy Gardens to my little plot (approximately 3′ X 7′ raised bed on concrete, half shaded by a fence) and harvested tomatoes. There were about 15 ripe tomatoes. The first thought was that it was too many tomatoes. Then I thought of all the neighbors I had who didn’t have their own tomato plants. I knocked on one neighbor’s door. He gave me tea while I played with the cat. I gave him tomatoes. I went for a massage in the afternoon. I brought tomatoes. I was sent home with freshly made spanakopita. I invited another neighbor over for dinner. We at pesto with basil from the garden and cucumber and tomato salad (cucumber, tomato, and shallots all from the garden drizzled with a little of the best balsamic vinegar and seasoned with just ground sea salt and pepper). We had a lovely visit, and I sent him home with tomatoes. In the next day or two, I will make a batch of tomato sauce and put it in the freezer and have someone over for dinner another night.
There is only “too much of a good thing” or a “superabundency” if we hoard it or try to ingest it all ourselves out of fear, greed, or desire for power or control. When we have enough ourselves and then share the abundance, we simply create more abundance. Once again, I am given again from my garden another sweet insight into the yoga teachings. I am also reminded by this small example that I could share even more broadly from my blessed lot of fullness in global society.
- Art and Culture | Community and Family | Food for the Mind (Yoga Philosophy, etc) | Meditation | Photos | Poetry
Lines
Creating and seeing
Both division and unity
Is awfully human.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
- Art and Culture | Asana, Pranayama, and Yoga Practice | Community and Family | Food for the Body | Food for the Mind (Yoga Philosophy, etc) | Gardening
Living Mindfully in a Heat Wave, Ahimsa, and “Opening to Grace”
Ahimsa, which is the first of the yamas in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, and thus is the first practice or principle of the eight-limbed path, is usually translated as non-violence or non-harming. Over my years of practice and study, I have read and heard many versions–some general, some personal beliefs–as to what it means to practice nonviolence as part of a path of yoga. As I watch the way people around me are behaving and reacting to the heat and drought, I thought about how, for me, the practice ahimsa is as much about seeking to be in alignment with the movements and shifts around us that we cannot change as about refraining from specific acts of violence (though that is obviously a basic element).
In terms of aligning with the world arounds us and the cycles of our own body-mind, when we are sensitive to what will best serve our own self while having the least impact on the environment, we are practicing ahimsa, in other words, “opening to grace.” How does practicing ahimsa by behaving mindfully incorporate many aspects of the Anusara first principle of opening to grace? Opening to grace, as a practice principle, invites us to be open, sensitive, spacious, and radically affirm what is so that we can expand, shift, and serve ourselves and others in the best way possible under the circumstance. To be open in this way, try not to rage at the heat–or whatever is your weather. Soften, listen, and mindfully discover how you can live at your fullest, kindest, and most generous with what you cannot change.
When the temperature soars above 95F for days in a row, it is an act of violence to rage against it or to consume outrageous amounts of fossil fuels to cool our businesses and homes enough to wear warm clothes, sleep under blankets, cook and eat hot foods, or do an athletic asana practice or workout (lest we feel that we are not fulfilling some externally motivated personal notion of fitness–having external notions of how we should look, act govern us without accepting the actual situation is its own form of violence against ourselves) that we would not do if we could not artificially cool our environment.
Perhaps I have no call to speak on this: my central air conditioning is on, though I’ve been keeping it between 78-82F and I have been moving, dressing, and eating in a way that honors the fact that those temperatures are as cool as it is going to be until the heat wave breaks. Some might argue that using any air conditioning or even an electric fan or a refrigerator is doing excessive harm to the environment. That may in fact be true, but asking for more than we can do just makes things seem impossible, and then we are less likely to make any shift at all.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
- Asana, Pranayama, and Yoga Practice | Community and Family | Food for the Mind (Yoga Philosophy, etc) | Meditation | Miscellaneous (blog matters, etc)
Holiday Schedule and Greetings (Web Version of E-Newsletter)
Dear Friends,
Best wishes to all whatever your holidays are bringing and however you might be celebrating. I write this in the midst of days full with preparing for my much anticipated travel to India with Professor Douglas Brooks, where I will experience among other amazing things, the temple at Chidambaram, where the idea of Shiva as the Cosmic Dancer first arose, seeing friends and family before I leave, and taking care of all manner of things at work and home so that things will be in as much order as possible both while I am gone and when I return.
I typically make the holidays a quiet time. I enjoy going to a few choice parties and visiting with friends and spending a few days in New York visiting family and exploring museum exhibits and delicious meals, but mostly I use it as time for introspection and refreshment. I process what has happened over the year and get myself and my house and papers ready for a new year of working and teaching and creating. I practice and rest. I take exquisitely long and contemplative walks and write and photograph. When I have spent the holiday season in this way, come the first of January, I feel ready for whatever might come. I know that my general health and emotional well-being are definitely enhanced by consistent daily yoga and meditation practice, regular sleep and wellness activities, such as massage, keeping a beautiful and clean home, and eating healthy meals that come in part from my garden, and the holiday season is enhanced for me by honoring my regular practices and health needs.
By choosing to go on an adventure, with the amount of energy I will need to expend to be open to the outragious influx of sensory input and information and to weather the challenges of travel (including a nine-hour time difference) and to get back to work immediately on my arrival in the middle of of a week in which I already have a known deadline, I can be fairly certain that the comforting, well-rested feeling to which I have become accustomed from the holiday break will not be how I start 2012. In this sense, going on this trip is willfully ignoring and disrupting all that I know keeps me on an even keel. Sometimes, though, we just have to intentionally shake ourselves up to see what ways we can expand and how much. Such shake-ups not only open us up to new possibilities and ways of thinking, but they also help us get ready for the invevitable upheavals in life whose exact timing and nature we cannot control. My holiday blessing is that the shake-up is one I have chosen, that comes when I am healthy and secure, and that will no doubt provide much fuel for growth and creativity. I definitely am looking forward to bringing home new insights and energies to share with you in the new year, perhaps even the seeds for the first art exhibit in many years.
I wish you all peace, health, and joy through the holidays and the new year. To those of you who are currently dealing with extra challenges of embodiment, please know that I am holding you in the light and will be sending beams of healing energy from abroad.
For everyone, here are the yoga offerings for the holidays and the beginning of 2012:
No coincidence, my trip is at exactly the same time as Willow Street is closed for Winter Break, and I won’t be missing any of my Saturday noon gentle/therapeutic classes. The class is continuing in the Winter Session (registration is now open) and I hope to see friends both returning and new signed up for the session. For Willow Street free class week, I will be leading a gentle/therapeutics class on Saturday, January 7th to welcome those new to yoga, the class, or to Willow Street to all the healing potential of Anusara yoga. Free class week is a great way to get to class for the first time that curious friend or family member with whom you have been wanting to share the wonders of yoga.
I know lots of you will be wanting the yoga during the holiday period, so I’ve invited two guest teachers for the Tuesday night William Penn House class. Meridian Ganz-Ratzat will be leading the class on Tuesday, December 20th, and Anna Karkovska McGlew will be leading on Tuesday, January 3rd. They are awesome teachers, so come check out the classes, even if you haven’t been to the William Penn House class before.
There will be no rose garden yoga classes between Christmas and New Year, but check out the great array of holiday offerings that week at Willow Street Yoga to celebrate the transition from 2011 to 2012. I’ll be back to neighborhood classes, starting with the house class on Wednesday, January 4th, and hope to see you at William Penn House in the new year.
Thinking ahead for ways to sweeten your 2012 schedule or looking for a great holiday gift to give that enhances health and a celebration of life, but doesn’t result in more stuff being manufactured? Give the gift of the ultimate nurturing yoga to yourself, friends, and family, with a registration for “Finding the Warmth Inside: Relax Into Optimal Alignment with Anusara Restoratives,” Saturday, February 25, 2012, 2:30 PM – 5:00 PM, Willow Street, Takoma Park studio, $35.00, click to Register Online. Suitable for all levels.
I look forward to seeing many of you at my regular neighborhood and Willow Street classes and at workshops in the new year. Much love and many blessings.
Peace and light,Elizabeth
