Similar Posts

  • The Importance of Paying Attention and Acting as Needed in Response

    ByElizabeth

    We’re all fine, and the problem is definitely outside of the house, but this is the gas company’s immediate response to the phone call saying, “I smell gas.”

    With your body and home, do you know what needs prompt intervention, what might go away on its own, and what can wait?

  • Shins In/Thighs Out (and Rabbi Hillel)

    ByElizabeth

    Rabbi Hillel is famous for having said, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me; if I am not for others, what am I? If not now, when?”  Taken in its best light (and not as the recruiting technique for going to war this quote has served), this means we must, as they say on the airplane, “put on our own oxygen mask first before helping others.”

    I often think of this principle, when I am emphasizing the fundamental physical alignment principle of shins in/thighs out.  If you have taken even just a few Anusara classes, you have probably heard the teacher say “shins in, thighs out.”  It is really short hand for the action of muscular energy that hugs the legs to the mid-line, followed by the spiraling upward and backward expansion of inner spiral.

    When applied with enthusiasm and in the right sequence, “shins in/thighs out” protects our knees and opens the groins, hips, and pelvic floor in a way that gives us greater access to finding the strength of our pelvic floor, low back and abdominal muscles.  It is a perfect example of an appropriate personal boundary:  it leaves us open and available to receive and observe all that is good, while creating a protective and appropriate boundary from which we can grow safely better to serve.

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    Dakshinamurti

    ByElizabeth

    Sometimes we call out the names; sometimes they call out to us.  I’ve been too tired and stressed to yearn for more adventures in the near term, but this week, I have found myself wanting to be in India, to be surrounded by the colors and the sights and the outrageous display of creative imagery.

    The photo is of a roadside temple, with Siva in the aspect of Dakshinamurti–guru of all knowledges (jnana).  I have been told that is good to chant to Dakshinamurti when one is looking for support and guidance in teaching.

    In my work as a civil servant, I spend much time informally teaching colleagues and the regulated community the details of the complex area that is my specialty.  I set my intention to be able not only to be clear, but to convey a bigger purpose even in that which does not readily come to mind as being something of spirit.

    Dakshinamurti

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    Seva

    ByElizabeth

    Today, instead of going with the group to visit a Hanuman temple a couple of valleys away (which entailed at least two hours each way of hairpin turns and going through a construction zone so dusty tying a t-shirt or scarf around my head would be necessary and having almost no opportunity to take care of biological needs), I chose to stay back. I honored the spirit of Hanuman with seva in the form of a morning helping tend the grounds.

    In the afternoon I will walk into the village with two others who are in residence here. One a Canadian Indian who is a Kabir scholar, the other a Dutch woman who has been spending a month or two every year for the past decade.

    There is a Siva festival going on. It is loud even up here on the hill. I will have my earplugs.

    I am appreciating getting to connect to the space and the people who live and serve here in a way that I could not when surrounded by the rest of the group. It was very grounding for me, too, to spend a few hours gardening.

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