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Energetic Presence

ByElizabeth

I go out when I can to be present, to let those, like the Congresspeople trying to get into the Treasury Department to ask oversight questions, who are putting their safety on the line and dedicating more energy and talent than I am capable of to saving all of us, know that they have support, are appreciated, and are not alone. And I give them money and try to amplify their voices.

Every day, I invite myself to do one more thing.

Every day presents a new challenge and opportunity to be in and for community.

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    Pre-Season Gardening (and diksha)

    ByElizabeth

    In yoga practice the concept of diksha — initiation or threshold — carries with it a sense of right timing and conscious understanding of readiness for the next level.  For example, knowing I was not yet strong enough, this past weekend I chose not to try to jump from adho mukha svanasana (downward facing dog) to svanasana (headstand), but instead concentrated on doing the poses one at a time, even though I was surrounded by people who could do the transition with ease and my ego was challenged.  Until I am stronger and better able to hold the alignment in poses at that level, I would be too much at risk of hurting my neck and shoulders.

    In the garden, it is easy to be fooled by a beautiful weekend to move right to activities that are still 3-4 weeks premature.  Even though it will hit 70F this weekend, it is not time to plant (other than perhaps an experimental row or pot of kale, chard, or beets, which like the cold).  The best gardening you can do in the beginning of March when the weather is swinging wildly from below freezing to unseasonably warm is to read and plan and start seedlings indoors, just like it is best to warm up and work on strength, alignment, and flexibility before going for harder asana in your yoga practice.  It will be tempting to get out this weekend, but do the prep stuff and the clean up.

    Here are some favorite books of mine to get ready for planning.  It is mostly more practical stuff (rather than the super glossy, beautiful garden as splendid art and architecture picture book reading) with some food and yoga overlap and a bias for small urban gardens.

    The Yoga of Herbs — An Ayurvedic Guide to Herbal Medicine, D. Frawley and V. Lad (Lotus Press, 2d Ed. 1988)

    Gardener Cook, C. Lloyd (Willow Creek Press 1997) (OK — this one is kind of cooking, gardening porn)

    The Edible Container Garden — Growing Fresh Food in Small Spaces, M. Guerra (Fireside, 2000)

    The Bountiful Container, McGee and Stuckey (Workman Publishing Co., 2002)

    Small-Space Gardening — How to Successfully Grow Flowers and Fruits in Containers and Pots, P. Loewer (The Lyons Press, 2003)

    Kitchen Herbs — The Art and Enjoyment of Growing Herbs and Cooking with Them, S. Gilbertie (Bantam, 1988)

    The New Kitchen Garden, A. Pavord (Dorling Kindersly Ltd., 1996) (Also pretty and glossy, but still practical)

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    Meditate Lovingly

    ByElizabeth

    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.

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    The Importance of Doubt (and Shrada)

    ByElizabeth

    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.

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    Thoughts on Democracy (and “Actionless Action”)

    ByElizabeth

    My friend Dan posted some interesting thoughts about democracy on his blog.  He is writing in the context of the Unitarian Universalist community, but the thoughts are equally applicable to our lives as citizens.  The thoughts on democracy also for me highlighted what is really meant in the Bhagavad Gita about “actionless action.”  To embody our spiritual practice in the way we live our lives, we serve to our best ability out of love, out of delight in acting, out of a sincere joy in serving, but we do not get attached to a particular outcome.