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    Working with Chaos

    ByElizabeth

    I’ve had more than one yoga/meditation teacher who has suggested that in order to make true spiritual shifts, it is necessary to pick one path (theirs) and stick to it.  I agree with that up to a point.  If we just stay on the surface of lots of different things, it will be hard to go deep.

    Nonetheless, living in a multicultural nation of immigrants and working in a field where being open to diversity is in my mind a job requirement and having grown up with the multifarious influences of New York and both Jewish culture and Quaker practice, it would be hard to think that sticking to a single-sourced spiritual path could be possible for me.  Better then, perhaps, to go deep by also looking broadly and openly.

    In that regard, though I do not consider myself a Buddhist, I often find Buddhist teachings instructive.   This article by Pema Chodron on working with chaos seems particularly useful for me today.

  • How Injuries Can Help Us Open to Grace

    ByElizabeth

    Earlier this week one of my long-time students emailed me before class to say that even though she had strained a muscle in her mid-back, she still intended to come to practice because she hoped it would make her feel better.  “It even hurts when I laugh,” she added.  I emailed her back saying that I would offer alignment instructions to help with her back, but I could not promise that we would not laugh (which, of course, she reported made her laugh).  In fact, it was a class filled with much laughter, but applying the principles of alignment served to alleviate the pain the student had been experiencing.

    Towards the end of the class, as we were getting ready to move into a seated forward bend, I asked my student what alignment principles she should apply to take care of her back in the pose.  Demonstrating as she spoke, she said that she should spread her toes to activate “shins in;” take her inner thighs in, back, and apart to inner spiral her legs in order to widen her pelvic floor and enable curve in the lumbar spine, releasing some of the strain on her back; and then work outer spiral to engage and protect her back.   “Perfect,” I said, “but what should you do before those actions?”

    Another student jumped in, “open to grace.”  Quite right, but how, I asked, would you apply “opening to grace” as a physical principle in this instance?  That seemed a little like a trick question, so I explained how I use the action of “opening to grace” when I am working with an injury (obviously this applies all the time, but it especially applies both when working with an injury and when moving towards a more advanced pose than you have previously practiced.)

    Opening to grace here means being patiently and exquisitely sensitive, moving slowly and mindfully enough to be able to tell from the beginning and throughout the entire cycle of entering into, reaching pinnacle (whatever that may be under the circumstances), and getting out of the pose whether the movements are serving to heal and expand before causing more pain and injury.  Does any movement into the pose at all aggravate the injury?  Does applying the principles gently make it better?  Does applying them with fierce intensity help more?  If we start with the strongest, we will have already gone past the place where we discover that resting or just a gentle attempt would have been healing or expanding, but any more would be aggravating.  When we start with the gentle and sensitive and then move in deeper and stronger without losing the perfect sensitivity that is when true change can occur.

    It never feels good to be injured, but because of the immediate motivation to get out of pain, injuries can be great teachers of just how much practicing with true sensitivity and awareness can enable us to expand heart and mind instead of just moving towards wilder poses for the sake of some idea that we are better yogis if we can do more poses.

     

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    Pickles

    ByElizabeth

    Soon after this article on making your own pickles was published in the New York Times, a friend and mentor sent it to me.  Though she is a mentor for reiki and energetic practices, and I see her regularly for massages, I’m quite sure she wasn’t trying to encourage me to eat more raw food or get into the fermentation fad (but you can read lots about how some raw foodists fetishize fermented food by using your favorite search engine).  I think she just thought I’d like making pickles, and she was right.

    I’m now on my fifth or sixth batch.  The first batch I did exactly according to the directions in the article.  The second, I did exactly according to Mark Bittman’s recipe in How to Cook Everything, which I found used a few years ago at my favorite used bookstore in DC–The Lantern-A Bryn Mawr Bookshop.  After that, I experimented with a little less salt, a change of spices, and different ways of slicing the cucumbers.  The cucumbers for this most recent batch were a little older and seedier so I added carrots and ginger to improve the flavor of the cucumbers.   I also added garlic, a few chili peppers, and some coriander seeds from the garden. A grape leaf or two helps make the vegetables stay crisper; they aren’t needed, but if one has a grape vine in the garden, as I do, why not?

    For my birthday, though you don’t really need one, I just bought myself a nice fermentation crock.  First up:  sauerkraut and then when I’ve had an opportunity to go shopping in Chinatown for supplies, a big batch of kimchee.

    This latest kitchen venture, is mostly because I’ve always loved the taste of pickled food, and because it is amazingly easy to make them.  Pickles and other fermented foods are now added to my list of  love to make foods that with a little attention and some planning and patience yield big results (like sprouting and slow cooker beans and stews).  That my yogi friends who are crazy into raw food would also be excited about what eating fermented foods might be doing for my health is just a bonus.

    pickles

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    State of the Garden

    ByElizabeth

    The grapes are starting to bunch, and for the first time, the kiwi is covered with buds.  Two of the tomato plants have their first flowers.  Snow peas are climbing up the trellises.  Carrots, spring onions, radishes, and beans are sprouting.  There are plenty of cool weather greens and herbs for eating already.  The red roses are blooming.  I pray for sufficient rain.

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