For those students who live within a few blocks, have power, and are not needed for such emergency assistance that can be provided before the trains are running and the roads reopened, what better than to come out and practice yoga as usual? (Or if the storm has made it impossible to get out, it’s a great time for your home practice).
The yoga practices are such a healthy way to channel the energy from having been cooped up by the storm and to revive and enhance one’s flexibility, adaptability, balance, and strength. It has been my experience that steady practice invites us to be ever more capable to address what confronts and engages us on our path (whether we like it or not). Sending loving energy to all who have been challenged hard by Sandy’s path or otherwise.
Thursday night, I took a dance improvisation workshop at Dance Exchange, the second in a series of three workshops. One of the exercises we did was in groups of two. The game was to do simultaneous improvisation. Without designating a particular person as a leader, each dancer was to try and stay in synchronized movement with his or her partner. When we were done with the exercise, some of the dancers talked about their goal having been to be in control of the lead or trying to push their partner past his or her edge. I had been innocently (or perhaps naively) unaware of these dynamics, as I had been seeking to find where the dance could be the leader rather than either partner.
After the workshop, when I was walking to the metro with the teacher and another participant, both of whom are performers in their 20s, I raised the issue of people trying to push others past their edge (I’d held off raising it in the group as it seemed too many were in a different space). I said that knowing that my partner was a lot less flexible than me, though lots stronger, and knowing his competitive edge, I never would have tried to push him beyond his physical limits.
The teacher said he liked being pushed past where it seemed like a good idea; it made him get to another place. I agreed that it is good to try to expand, to go beyond what we think are our limits. I have been taught, though, by my teacher John Friend, not to blow past my limits. Rather, in the practice of Anusara yoga, we seek to be intimately and exquisitely aware of our edge at every moment, and then expand it. The game with the partner using this paradigm would have been to find the edge and then see if the dance could expand it rather than to try and exert control or see if we could push our partner past his or her limits at our partner’s risk. When we operate in a paradigm of straining and striving, or we push for control or try to compete with ourselves or with others, that is where we get injured. I’ve had my share of dance injuries, I added, but to continue dancing through the decades, I cannot be blowing past my limits, though I am still growing. I was not sure that what I said felt relevant, but I could also tell that it was information that went into the thought mix for later.
The other day, when I was in NY visiting, I told my mother about the blog entry on Robert’s dendrobium. (Being physically present and discussing the blog entries is the low-tech way of getting comments). She pointed to the philodendron and some cuttings she was rooting from it and said, “that philodendron was your grandmother Rose’s; it must be 70 years old.” It might not be 70 years old, but it is at least 40 or 50, as my grandmother left her body in 1977, and I remember her having houseplants. It is possible, even, that the plant originally came from a cutting from my other grandmother, as that was how we obtained and grew most of the family houseplants.
My mother offered the plant for me to take home. I declined, but thought about taking a cutting. By the next morning, I had forgotten, but I will take a cutting one day. I did not need the cutting to enjoy thinking about bringing home a bit of life that had been living in my grandmother’s apartment and remembering both my grandmother and a space that I had loved. That was delightful enough.
(ps — one of the many reasons for the name “rose garden yoga” is in honor of my grandmothers — for my grandmother Rose’s name and for the love of gardening I learned from my grandmother Ann).
This article about manners and eating with ones hands gave me a big smile. One of my friends who went on the second India pilgrimage wrote on Facebook right after she returned home that she missed wearing a sari and eating thali meals already. How wonderful the variety of experience on these journeys. Personally, I found the sari cumbersome and binding and not worth the prettiness of the fabric and the compliments (more thoughts on sari-wearing perhaps to come). I was thrilled to get back into my regular clothes (though I was happy enough in salwar kameez). Dal , kitcheree (spiced lentils and rice porridge), and vegetarian/vegan curries have long been a staple part of my diet, so I am already getting the rice and lentils, and the south Indian thali meal is almost completely devoid of vegetables. I was happy enough to get back to my own diet, including Indian-style food of my own preparation.
I am missing, though, being able to be in company and eat with my hands (or hand singular would be more accurate as it is horribly rude in India to eat with your left hand) and getting the chance to walk barefoot outside every day. Though you might not be able to do it everywhere, I highly recommend eating some of your food with your hands and walking without your shoes for some time every day to enhance your sense of touch and your motility.
Last Monday I had the honor and delight to be invited to a multigenerational dinner of homemade dumplings at a neighbor’s house.
I was told it was customary for guests to shape a share of the dumplings; the hosts do everything else. As I have not grown up making dumplings as part of group family activity, that meant I needed first to be shown what to do with the already made dough and filling.
Skills used to make homemade noodles, tortillas, and pizza helped make dumpling shaping an accessible activity. It was tricky at first. Two people were showing me two different ways, which was somewhat confusing in an enjoyable way, and helped emphasize that for friendly dumpling making, ultimately, everyone needs to find their own method that works for them. Also, as with many hand skills, because it was the first first time I was being shown, I was simultaneously transposing it from right to left-handed.
It only took two tries to get a dumpling that wouldn’t explode in the pot and lose its filling. It took several more to make one that had nice pleats and blended in with the rest.
We had an interesting discussion about the difference between learning by eating several variations and then reading several recipes and then trying to replicate a version that resembled what I had eaten prepared by someone who learned from childhood as part of a multigenerational group process.
I have long contemplated, and continue to do so, how my comfort in learning anything from a book and then seeing if I can do it or something like it, has shaped my meditation and movement practices.
It’s pretty easy to see which dumplings I made. No difference in taste. I was also happy to contribute garlic chives from the garden.
