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    Curiouser and Curiouser…

    ByElizabeth

    Last night, I took some lovely photos in the rain when I was walking to get a massage (it is pretty awesome to get a massage on a Monday night; try it sometime and see how it changes your perspective on the work week). After I came home and had dinner, I resisted the temptation to curl up on the sofa with a book. Instead, I got on the computer to take care of email correspondence that had accumulated over the day and the weekend while I was at the workshop with John Friend. I uploaded the photos from my walk and tried to post an entry. I got a message when I was in WordPress saying that the photo upload had failed. I exited from that screen and tried to access the file uploader. I could not get in. I then exited the prompt that I had failed. It would not let me cancel. Next, I exited the admin portion of my blog. The computer was not happy about that, but eventually it seemed to close the program. After that, I could not get back either to my public page nor to the admin page. I tried several times, but to no avail. I sent an email to my website designer–could she get in?

    I woke to an email from my website designer saying no problems for her. After I did my morning practice and before heading into the office, I tried again. On my home computer, no access at all to either the public or administrative portions of the site. I reloaded Firefox. That did not do the trick. I scanned my computer, but it showed no errors. I have access to the blog from my Blackberry, my office computer, and my IPad, but not from my home computer–my central place, the place where all my files and photos and bookmarks and maximum computer capabilities are one.

    As Alice (in Wonderland) would say, “curiouser and curiouser.” I am sure with research and trying lots of alternatives, we will find a solution to this peculiar glitch.

    I think staying fully connected to the ultimate loving ground of our being can feel like this strange denial of access to my blog. We get glimpses. We have studied enough to know what it is on an intellectual basis. We feel connected when we are at a big workshop (or sometimes it looks like every one else has found the bliss and we are the only ones who are not tapping in–note to self, usually that’s not true) or are in class or practicing, but not when we get challenged by daily life.

    Two things serve to bring us back to center–the first is to keep practicing and making the effort, just as expanding knowledge and trying different strategies will get me back my full blog access; the second is grace (and being open to receive it). And when grace comes, we then need to keep practicing so that we stay connected and can live in and from grace more and more of the time and remember and reconnect more easily when we get disconnected.

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

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    Adhikara

    ByElizabeth

    I was first taught that adhikara meant “studentship.”  Although that is not a literal translation, adhikara implies a dedication and steadiness in the student that makes the student worthy of receiving the teachings (of yoga).  As I was steadying myself during this momentous time and working in the garden, I was thinking about how the principle of adhikara applies to so many aspects of life, including gardening and being a citizen.

    One of the literal translations for adhikara is “competence.”  What is the competence one needs to have in order to participate in the study?  As I harvested the last of the peppers and eggplants and pulled up the plants, making room to sow another round of greens (not too late in my sunny, protected yard in the city), and decided to leave the orchids out for another week, I thought about how I knew what to do when in my garden.  By being present and observant for two decades in my yard alone, I have grown competent to know what will likely grow in my little patch of earth and for how long into the season, depending on the year’s weather.  My initial competence, when I started this garden almost 20 years ago, was some basic training in other gardens, reading technical books, and enthusiasm.  My consistent efforts to learn yielded results delightful to me from the beginning.  As I have continued my studentship in the garden, my appreciation grows.  The same is true for me also with cooking, relationships, and my participation in the community (not necessarily in that order).

    The fundamental competence of a student is having the basic skills to participate at the level of the teachings.  For a gardener, it is recognizing our climate, our space limitations, and our soil, and being open to learning what can be changed in a particular space and what must be accepted.  For a citizen, it is knowing basic civics, what are the most relevant issues for us and society at large, and what we can change and what we must accept (I think knowing the subtle differences between what we can change and what we must accept is incredibly difficult).  For yoga, it is much the same:  we must know what are true limits and what are false ones and be consistently present, practice steadily, and be ever open, not only to studying, but to the fruits of study (expected or not).

    I cannot change the weather, nor guarantee how other voters will vote, but I can continue to maintain the adhikara necessary to be a fully engaged student of this life on all days and not just the days it is fun or gratifying.  The yoga, on a day like today, is to act fully, accepting, and perhaps even appreciating, the limits on what I can control.

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