Blossoms Around Town
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The Triangle Player
Yesterday, while watching the Capitol City Symphony and Capitol Hill Chorale’s joint performance of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony at the Atlas Theater, I noticed with some amusement the cymbol player reading a novel in the wings through the first three movements. (The triangle player appeared just in time for the fourth movement).
This reminded me of an anecdote John Friend told at the Anusara Certified Teachers’ Gathering in Denver the other week to illustrate the importance of every person and element to the whole. He spoke of the triangle player. What do you say to him after the show, John asked, “great job man; I love the way you came in right when you were supposed to?” Even if showing up and playing one beat at the right time is the triangle player’s only job, the triangle player still is an integral part of the composition, though perhaps not as evidently crucial as the first violinist.
We may not know how we are essential or how we will shift things, but we should always revere and recognize each and every being, including ourselves, as part of the web of existence.
- Art and Culture | Asana, Pranayama, and Yoga Practice | Community and Family | Food for the Mind (Yoga Philosophy, etc) | Meditation | Quaker
The Importance of Doubt (and Shrada)
I was just led by a friend’s Facebook posting to the website for an upcoming movie about the Siddha yoga ashram (Siddha yoga was part of the teaching and practice lineage of John Friend and Paul Muller-Ortega, and both have told stories about how useful the fierce ashram discipline was for them, but who adopted too much of the ashram style in their yoga organizations for me ever to have tried to be in the inner circle). In watching the trailer and reading the background materials for the movie, it struck me that the most important point for me is that the followers who were most injured were those who doubted least and who were the most hungry for an authority and love figure.
As a born and bred doubter (how could I not be one who consistently doubts as part of my spiritual practice, given that I am a culturally jewish, New York intellectual who was raised on the Quaker system of queries and advices, who studied western philosophy and law, and who works inside the Beltway?), I believe that you will always be able to get the good out of teachings without losing your own control, sense of self, and discriminating (viveka) ability to evaluate your commitment to a teacher or organization and the teachings offered, if your faith is in your own intuition and education and not in any one human or organization or specific teaching.
Faith (in Sanskrit shrada), in order to serve us well, needs doubt; it needs questioning; it needs testing at every point of the way or it is superficial faith. Don’t let anyone–particularly someone with whom you study or engage in religious or spiritual practice ever tell you otherwise. Sometimes doubting with faith means getting involved or staying fully committed to an organization or teacher despite misgivings or despite troubling behavior (assuming you are not sticking with being abused yourself or standing idly by when witnessing the abuse of others). After all, no humans, organizations, or relationships are without their shadow sides. Sometimes doubting, even with faith, means a radical and complete separation–quietly or loudly. Sometimes what is best for you is something in between. Learning to be in community is part of the practice, after all, keeping in mind that you are the company you keep.
All I can say is this: Please doubt. Please doubt with sincerity. Please doubt with love. Please doubt with respect. Please educate yourself, and with appropriate doubt, have faith that there is good in connecting and in the teachings, no matter how challenging is getting and sharing the teachings and the practices with and through the filter of others.
