Even though not documented much recently, the garden has moved into summer effulgence. It is a place of curiosity, wonder, and delight. What brings you joy and nourishment in these troubled times that are calling for ever more engagement?
I started out tonight’s group yoga practice saying that I’d been listening again to the recorded conference calls in Claudia Welch and Cate Stillman’s “Healthier Hormones” course, which while presenting very simple aspects of much more complex systems of thought and practice, I think gives valuable perspective on living with awareness and self care. In the first call, Dr. Claudia tells a story of teacher who told her that she should meditate lovingly. Dr. Claudia suggested that practicing just out of a sense of obligation wouldn’t have the same benefits as if you went to it and did it lovingly; and, as a physical matter, you wouldn’t get the same positive hormonal benefits.
During my intense workday trying to meet a major deadline, I thought both of the intention to make everything one does a meditation and this exhortation to meditate lovingly and decided to have combining the two be my practice for the day. I’d draft an email or get on the phone or edit documents and say to myself, “lovingly, lovingly.” I thought, as I contemplated what needed to be said and done, “lovingly” doesn’t mean never tough love. Doesn’t mean passive acceptance or false praise. Doesn’t mean anything crossing appropriate work place boundaries. But the action always done lovingly. With spacious awareness. Illuminated consciousness. However you might describe that lovingly place. Saying the word periodically during the day as if it were japa or mantra made this day better. More loving for me; probably better for all the people with whom I had to engage on a fairly unpleasant and monstrously complicated task.
I sent the big email to my boss at 6:30 and got off the phone with him at 6:58, when the yogis arrived. As I ended the call with my boss, I said I’d be done with yoga at 8:30 and would leave my computer on, and I would be available then. Practice was sweet–standing poses and hip openers to get ready for more snow. We’d were shifting into our first restorative and the phone rang.
8:04pm. The answering machine picked up and my boss began leaving a message. I’m leading yoga practice. Boss calling while leading yoga practice not good.
Lovingly.
I decided that it would be better overall not to wait until practice was over to return the call. I asked one of my fellow yogis to lead the others in the next pose (the delicious and simple restorative of lying with a rolled up blanket cross-wise under the back right under the shoulder blades to give the heart a lift and to provide a counter balance to the shape of sitting at a computer).
I reminded myself what we’d been talking about as the focus of practice; “lovingly,” I said to myself, the lovingly being about how to complete the task at hand, not specific to the individual. I called back my boss. He just couldn’t wait to call until 8:30; he was anxious about the impending snow storm and its impact on our being able to get things done and he wanted to be done and home, too. I’d left my glasses in the studio and couldn’t see the computer well enough to work, so I went looking for them. When I went in, expressing my chagrin, the yogis said they were enjoying listening to the conversation (while they were happily in their poses). I decided to believe them. When my boss apologized, I replied, “it’s ok; my students assured me that they enjoyed listening.” I am grateful and delighted to practice with such gracious friends, that I could say it truly.
Then we wound up the practice with supported half shoulder stand, followed by a twist and savasana.
Lovingly.
Hard work that lovingly thing sometimes, but I think it might be an efficacious conscious practice for a while for me.
Feel free to remind me if it seems like I’m forgetting. But lovingly.
In recent months, I have listened to the stories of a number of close friends and co-workers as they navigate the difficult process of saying their good-byes to the tangible, physical embodiment of a loved one and participating in the loved one’s own good-bye.
I find myself filled with memories of those I still love though the loved one is no longer embodied in the physical form in which I met them. For me and for those with whom I share my memories, they live on as such and. in greater and lesser amounts, in how I think, respond, and act to this day and beyond.
On my way back to the office after lunch with a friend. The beets weren’t yet on display–farmers were just starting to set up for the afternoon market in Penn Quarter–but there were some beautiful onions, tomatoes, and peaches.
Last night at around 2:30, I found myself very aware and wide awake for no apparent reason. I got myself readjusted for going back to bed and then sat in my bed in the dark, wrapped in my favorite shawl for meditation. I got myself sweetly settled into a practice intended to invite in the sweet support of the satguru (see my previous post on variations of what that might mean for you), which serves well to help a return to sleep on a wakeful night.
After I had been practicing for about five minutes, a slew of emergency vehicles wailed down the street. The emergency was not on my block, but based on the timing of the sirens, it sounded like it was not far away.
I marveled that I was already awake and meditating in a delicious place when the sirens sounded rather than having been jolted awake out of some dreaming. There were enough vehicles that I am sure many if not most people other than the soundest of sleepers for blocks around were woken by them.
In thinking about the auspiciousness of my state, a memory came to mind. Friends Meeting of Washington. Where I often attend Quaker unprogrammed worship, is just west of Connecticut and Florida Aves., NW. Being on such a busy street, even on Sunday morning there can be a lot of traffic noise and having an emergency vehicle drive past with its siren blasting during meeting for worship happens from time to time.
It is, of course, somewhat jarring to be deep in meditation and silence and have a siren start wailing and not pleasant to be woken from deep sleep. One time several years ago when a series of siren-sounding vehicles sped down the street outside the meeting house, a friend stood in meeting after the sirens were gone and said that for him, whenever a siren interrupted his worship, he used it as a reminder to hold those in need in the light. In sharing this reminder, he took us all back from however we reacted to having been loudly interrupted to a grace-full place. I remember having moved back into the depths of silence, offering its healing light-filled energy to whomever had needed the emergency vehicle, those driving the vehicle and attending it, devoting their lives to serving those in need, and to others in my life who were struggling or in pain.
In recalling that beautiful teaching last night, as I also wondered whether at some level I had woken and started practicing to be ready for the event, I thought that what had been so special about the message was that the reminder was not a criticism of whatever reaction might have spontaneously arisen to such a disturbance, but rather an invitation to respond in the best light. The speaker clearly had been reminding himself of his own teaching and sharing with the rest of us how much it helped him.
