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    “Yes We Can”

    ByElizabeth

    Yesterday’s inaugural concert spurred all sorts of memories from me.  When I was a child, we went a number of times to the Clearwater Revival Festival and other folk festivals where Pete Seeger was a headline.  He is just ten years older than my Dad, and though my parents were not among those who became famous, they were hanging around the Village and my Dad was doing activist things at the same time.  James Taylor’s “Shower the People” was a favorite when I was in junior high school.  There was a boy from camp who played the guitar who I remember saying that “a little James Taylor goes a long way [towards getting a girl’s attention].”  Bruce Springsteen, John Cougar Mellenkamp, U2, Bob Marley, Aaron Copeland, and the great oldies (played at the concert and listed as Obama’s top ten ipod songs), are part of the music of my high school, college, and law school years.

    Not needing music or advertising to help me decide to vote, I didn’t pay much attention to how music was being used in the campaign.  But here was the music, and it was mostly my music, too.  The concert was very clever, designed to appeal to black and white, young and old, and populist — they were careful to have the performers whose oevre might not appeal to an older or younger crowd stick to songs with mass appeal.

    Interestingly, it gave me an insight to those conservative guys from the middle of the country who said they liked W because he was the kind of guy they could hang with and have a beer.  The concert was a concert I might have attended when I was in high school or college or law school.  I had an insight about what it feels like to feel comfortable with the education and background of the President, but only up to a point.  I enjoyed this trip down memory lane, but it did not impact my politics or how I would view the Presidency.  There is a fine line between relating and agreeing, appreciating and accepting without question.

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    An Opening

    ByElizabeth

    Last night in group practice, we were working on the mini-arm balances.  As I demonstrated a pose, my spine shifted.  From the middle thoracic vertebra right behind the heart all the way up to C7, each vertebra popped sequentially, releasing energy not only from each vertebra, but upward.  I felt an incredible lightness moving from the heart space all the way through the crown of my head.  We talked about it a little in practice, because the fact that some kind of opening had occurred was fully evident to everyone in the group.

    As a purely physical matter, opening my thoracic spine is good.  I have degeneration in my cervical and lumbar spine.  Those parts of my spine are very mobile, almost unusually so, whereas my thoracic spine is quite tight.  This imbalance can cause pain and muscle tension, though through therapeutic practice of the Anusara principles, I progressively find a healthy balance of stability and freedom.  Go to any decent physical therapist for neck or lumbar pain, and the therapist will work to open the thoracic spine, which although it should be stiffer (being attached to the ribs and protecting the heart), likely needs to be more mobile to be in better balance with the rest of the spine.

    This morning, I woke up still feeling more open around the heart space and noticing a shift in the energy in my upper back, neck, and head, and the sensation of the opening I experienced carried itself through my morning meditation.

    We never know when we are going to get an opening in our practice.  I keep coming to the mat and the meditation cushion because I want to be more open, more grounded, more free, more full of energy, more compassionate, more at peace, more in tune with others.  It is fairly rare, though, that I experience a noticeable opening all at once (and the reason to practice should not to be to have wild moments, sensations, visions, etc).

    When one comes, though, it leaves open the question:  what will I do with it?  Will I get absorbed in talking about it and reliving it?  Will I think that I can slack in my practice because I have had a big opening?  Will I return to how things were before?  It is easy enough to do.  Just witness the collective energy and momentary hopefulness of this country when it elected President Obama.  Upon not getting instant change and relief, the country has returned to blaming, divisiveness, ineffectiveness, finger-pointing, greediness, warlikeness, and catering to the corporate war machine instead of moving towards universal health care, peace, and “green” energy consumption.  It would likewise be easy for me to have enjoyed experiencing something wild and special on my mat and then go outside to walk to work and be tense and grumbly about the ice on the sidewalks, the snow in the forecast, and the limits I experience in my daily life.  I know there will be some going backwards, but I will strive to take this experience to shift to a more optimal place in my practice on and off the mat.

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    Wonder

    ByElizabeth

    I’m pretty sure the Sanskrit word for wonder is abhuta.  I found myself contemplating my conviction that part of the practice of yoga (and my photography, which is a practice for me) is to instill everything with a sense of wonder.

    I still find plane travel–as wearily familiar as it is–completely miraculous and awe-inspiring.

    To go, in just a few short hours, from perfectly temperate to cold and gray with an impending storm (and, of course the reverse) is an outrageous feat indeed.  I’m happy to have the cat in my lap.

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    Play of Shadow and Light?

    ByElizabeth

    Does it matter whether this juxtaposition of the exhortation to love next to a game of hangman was intended by those holding the chalk?

    Even if the juxtaposition was not thought out and done for the purpose of later viewers, it raises much to ponder about how we act and live in relationship to the world.

    Just one of the questions that comes first to mind is whether it is more ok to play hangman if you it with love?

    Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

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