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Yoga of Housekeeping

ByElizabeth

Last week Orie suggested that as I have a “Yoga for Gardeners” workshop, I should also do a “Yoga of Housekeeping” workshop.  A blog post isn’t a workshop, but here are a few preliminary thoughts on yoga and housekeeping.

From an alignment perspective, I have found that the Anusara principles of alignment make safe everything I do off the mat, as well as on.  Overwhelmed by all that needs to be done? Doing heavy lifting?  Bending and stooping?  Reaching for something way up high?

First, soften (open to grace).  Appreciate that you have a home and things to clean.  Honor each item in the house.  Things have energy, too., and they like to be touched and cleaned.  If you have anything that you do not appreciate or does not fit in the house, give it a new life in a new home (freecycledc is a great way to pass things forward).

Use muscular energy, drawing the muscles to the bone, hugging into the mid-line, and drawing energy into the focal point (for most housecleaning activities, this will be the pelvis).  Using muscle energy will definitely help to keep you from tweaking a muscle or straining the low back or shoulders. When you are reaching, keep the arm bones integrated by hugging the shoulder blades onto the back and then reach from the waist, though each rib to extend the length of your torso (organic energy).

Especially for bending and lifting, after you bend your knees, hug your shins in (muscular energy), take your inner thighs back and apart (inner spiral) and then tuck your tailbone (outer spiral).  If you just bend from the knees but hunch your back, your low back will still be vulnerable.

Switch sides for activities like sweeping, vaccuuming, and scrubbing.  Yes, it can be difficult and awkward, but it’s worth it to shift sides.  Imagine doing all of your yoga practice only on one side.  How much imbalance would you be encouraging?

The first niyama of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras is sauca, which means cleanliness or purity.  It is easier to think and live and be hospitable in a clean home.

The first yama is ahimsa, or non-harming.  Do your best to use safe, biodegradable cleaning products.  Your skin and respiratory system will be grateful.  So will the earth.  Try to make cleaning your own space and act of honoring your self, your home, and the greater home of the earth.

Fully absorb yourself in the task of cleaning.  Make it a meditation.  Integrate fully the act of cleaning, the item being cleaned, and you as the cleaner.

Finally, be playful.

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    Hard Freeze Forecast (Heyam Dukham Anagatam)

    ByElizabeth

    My favorite sutra in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra’s is, II.16, “heyam dukham anagatam.”  This translates roughly as “the pain that is yet to come can be avoided.”  What does this have to do with a forecast of a hard freeze?

    My chard, beets, and turnip greens are still flourishing.  They can manage with a night or two in a row in the high 20sF, and that is all we have had so far.  The forecast for later in the week, though, is for the first true cold snap since 1994 (you may remember that as the year when lots of people’s pipes froze).  My winter garden (which does not have a cold frame due to lack of space — maybe I’ll get more creative next year, and I’ll try an experiement with plastic bags on Thursday night) cannot survive lows in the low teens highs in the twenties.

    I could suffer today by bemoaning the coming cold, worrying about the garden, and remembering that I don’t like cold.  That would be present suffering in anticipation of potential future suffering.  I certainly can avoid that.  I can also do what I did yesterday, which was harvest lots of the chard and most of the beets, put the beets into cold storage (vegetable bin in the refrigerator) and make pasta with sauteed garlic and chard.  Between now and Wednesday night, I’ll harvest most of the remaining greens.  I’ll make a big vegetable soup with the beets and the chard, maybe make chard pie or calzones (truly delicious), and eat the rest over the following days.  I’ll feel grateful that in the bitter cold, I can be eating fresh garden greens.  I’ll be even more grateful that I can just shop at the grocery store or the farmers’ market and don’t need to rely on my garden feeding me year round.  I’ll also be happy for the hard frost.  Part of the reason the aphids and the mosquitoes have been so bad is the absence of a hard frost in winter.

    Some bitter cold in winter in a temperate zone is inevitable, as are sickness and death.  We can avoid suffering by not just getting anxious and unhappy and suffering in the present, but not taking action to alleviate potential suffering.  With preparation and practice, we can avoid some suffering.  Just has preparing for winter in the garden can allow it to be productive for greater parts of the year, so too, with a steady practice of asana, pranayama, and meditation we can avoid some physical and emotional pain and suffering.  Most important, with steady preparation (preparing for the potential for difficulties in the future is not the same as being anxious about it), when the inevitable comes, we will likely suffer less, at least in our hearts, if not in our bodies.

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    Sthira-Cara (of the stationary and moving living beings)

    ByElizabeth

    A number of years ago, I attended a week-long workshop with Rod Stryker.  He invited us to meditate on absolute stillness — cara sthira — meditation.  Sitting comfortably, still the skin, the muscles, the bones.  Draw the attention to stillness.  The breath and heart will still move, but the concentration is on stillness rather than on any movement.  Rod Stryker discussed the next day the challenges of this meditation, especially for those who are intellectual, who enjoy being active in the mind.  I found it difficult at the time and even dreamed about the issues the meditation brought up for me.  Meditating on stillness can be very challenging in a way that meditating on a mantra or the breath would not necessarily be.

    I believe the origin of the meditation comes from the principle of sthira being  the absolute unmovable, the essence of being (not dissimilar to Kant’s unmoved mover).  We invoke pure stillness, pure potential out of which movement comes because that is part of our essence and a place where we can rest our spirit.  See, for example, the Srimadbhagavatam.

    I discovered absolute joy in this meditation a couple of years after I learned it.  I was suffering from a severe sinus infection and bronchitis simultaneously; I joked that I was fine as long as I didn’t breath through either my mouth or my nose.  In the midst of my suffering, I remembered the teaching.  For a few days I stayed in the meditation for hours at a time.  I found the place where I did not really need the breath.  Enough came to survive, but I forgot about wondering how to breath or finding a place for it or my struggles with it.  In the stillness, there was space and peace and supreme bliss.  Ever since then, I have chosen this form of meditation when I have a cold, a sinus infection, or other challenges with breathing.  Meditating on the breath, obviously, will not be soothing when breathing is a struggle.  But when even breathing is a struggle, peace can be found in complete stillness.

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    Statues Around Town (and a Quote, Too)

    ByElizabeth

    Around the base of this statue, it says this as one walks clockwise from the front right. And when done circumnavigating, and facing the same direction in the direction the statue of Mary McLeod Bethune, one can see down East Capitol Street to the Capitol Dome:

    “I leave you love. I leave you hope. I leave you the challenge of developing confidence in one another. I leave you a thirst for education. I leave you a respect for the use of power. I leave you faith. I leave you racial dignity. I also leave you a desire to live harmoniously with your fellow man. I leave you finally a responsibility to our young people.”

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  1. Pingback: Yoga of Housekeeping : Rose Garden Yoga | www.housekeepers.com

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