Food for the Mind (Yoga Philosophy, etc)

Contemplations on readings and yoga philosophy.

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    How Big Is the Light?

    ByElizabeth

    Just as the sun can appear to be caught in a tree though we know it is exponentially larger than any tree, so too, the great unifying principles can appear to be smaller and caught in the challenges of the day to day. Yoga helps remind us of the greater perspective, which enables us to live more lightly and compassionately.

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

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    Morning Fog

    ByElizabeth

    I was greeted this morning by a gentle fog. It is the softness of fog that I love. Sometimes perfect acuity glares, just as technicolor was louder than reality and disturbed perception. A good fog lets one slip into an appreciation of the essence of form without having to get absorbed in the details. If clarity is required, consciously moving closer to the goal will dissipate the clouding by the fog, and the details will emerge.

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

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    Fine Weather for Walking

    ByElizabeth

    The past several days in DC have been perfect for walking.  The mornings, for me, require a winter coat and gloves and a hat or scarf.  At the warmest part of the day, the air is refreshingly cool, and I can shed some layers.  In spring and fall, there is little I want to do more than take long walks.  And so I take to the sidewalks even more than the usual walk to work, to the Farmers’ market, to the metro, to visit with friends, to teach, to go to the nursery or the grocery store, to go to the bank and post office, to go get a massage.  I make no effort to be efficient and consolidate errands; every errand is an excuse to take a walk.  I add a block or seven onto an errand walk.  I walk and think and then my attention is seized by the beauty of the color and the light.  I have to pause and drink it in.

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    John Friend Speaks About the Recent Departures (in case you haven’t gotten this from other sources)

    ByElizabeth

    My own reflections will come at some point.  Here is a thoughtful interview with John Friend on the decisions by Darren Rhodes, Christina Sell, and Elena Bower no longer to hold themselves out as certified Anusara instructors.

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    Web Version of Fall Newsletter (Free Yoga, Annual Thanksgiving Fundraiser for Oxfam, New Props at Wm Penn House)

    ByElizabeth

    Dear Friends,

    Happy Samhain, All Hallow’s Eve, Halloween.  We are slipping into the time of year that is good for dreaming and introspection, while things get wild and windy outside.  I can always tell when it is drawing to the midpoint between the Winter Solstice and the Autumn Equinox because the Christmas cactuses (which always bloom at Thanksgiving) start to bud.  When I went to bring in the tropical plants because of the pre-Samhain winter storm, I saw that a few of the orchids were spiking.  It is almost as much fun to watch the buds emerging and growing and taking on color as it is to see the flowers, which only last so long before the flowers must die so that energy can go back into making the whole plant healthy and ready to flower again.  Inside and out, my garden invites me to a deeper appreciation of the dance of dissolution, creation, and maintenance.

    It takes only modest intention, commitment, and nurture to have plants blooming through winter.  Just as we can cultivate gardens indoors in winter, yoga and meditation help us cultivate inner beauty so that we are at ease with our being regardless of what storms rage and how we are impacted in space and time and material body by the storms.  My solution:  practice of all kinds, and this November is going to be a wonderful month for yoga..

    Just as maintaining a garden in winter calls for props–containers, heat, indoor water source, etc., cultivating the fullness in our bodies, particularly if we are working with a challenge of embodiement, can benefit from the assistance of various props.  I am pleased to announce that we now have lots of blocks and straps for everyone (and some tennis balls, though we could use a few more for when the class is big) at the Tuesday night all levels yoga class at William Penn House, making it an even more supportive environment for those new to yoga or with challenges of embodiment.  As always, a portion of the fee from every student supports the work of William Penn House.

    I will be leading the Friday night free community yoga class at Willow Street Yoga’s Silver Spring studio, which I will be teaching this coming Friday, November 4th.  It is an all levels class that will include discussion of therapeutic applications of yoga alignment, and it’s a great way to bring a friend along with you to get introduced to yoga or to Willow Street.

    If you are in town for Thanksgiving, please join me to support a great cause.  From 10:00am-11:30am, Thanksgiving morning, I will be leading my ninth annual fundraising class to benefit Oxfam at Willow Street Yoga’s Takoma Park studio. 100% of the profits go to Oxfam.  I look forward to seeing many of you, both those coming back and those joining us for the first time.  Friends and family welcome, including children 12 and over.

    Veteran’s Day weekend brings Todd Norian to Willow Street Yoga.  On Sunday, November 13th, the focus of the workshop will be therapeutics.  Todd is an incredibly loving and knowledgeable teacher, and I am planning to be there to assist.  You can sign up on-line or in person at Willow Street.

    I am looking forward to the weekend workshops with John Friend in College Park, MD on November 19 & 20.  Both Mixed Level and Intermediate/Advanced workshops are offered.  This is the first time John Friend has taught in the DC area since 2007. Apply today to join your fellow yogis.  There are several of us going from the Capitol Hill neighborhood.  Feel free to contact me if you are looking to carpool, and if you can either offer driving or are looking for a ride.

    I always enjoy hearing from you by email or comments on the blog.  If you haven’t already, click here to be taken to the subscription page.  For short thoughts about yoga and meditation in your Facebook news, please “like” my public page for Rose Garden Yoga.

    Looking forward to sharing more of the yoga with you.

    Peace and light,

    Elizabeth

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    As I Read This Poem

    ByElizabeth

    This morning, as I read this poem by Janet Hoffman, which is collected in Plain Living–A Quaker Path to Simplicity by Catherine Whitmire, I thought of friends and family and students and colleagues who are living with loss and illness and other struggles.

    I wish sometimes that I could heal or make happy everyone I know. Knowing that is not possible or even right, I wish for myself and those in need to know strength and courage and joy even when faced with causes for deep suffering.

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

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    The Danger in Taking Instructions Out of Context (and Satcitananda)

    ByElizabeth

    Those of you who are regular readers may sometimes wonder why this blog, which purports to be about yoga, only on the rarest of occasions goes into any detail about the physical alignment principles for asana.  I just received a comment on a post that I wrote several months ago that reminded me of my conviction that the optimal place to discuss and practice physical alignment principles is in class.  This conviction is not because there isn’t value in reading about the alignment principles–I look at the Anusara Teacher Training Manual on a regular basis–but because it is critical to understand the bigger picture, to have a loving eye on the alignment, and the opportunity to ask questions right away, which we can only get when we practice with a teacher.   In this instance, the commenter said in response to a post in which I had indicated that “thighs out” was shorthand for part of inner spiral that she had heard that “thighs out” in the common Anusara alignment instruction “shins in, thighs out” was just hitting the thighs apart and was something separate from inner spiral.  Would I mind clarifying.

    I found the comment timely as I was recently at a workshop where the teacher had noted the injuries that can flow from overdoing an isolated action that is intended to describe one part of an element of the basic principles of alignment (in that case “taking the armpit back.”)  I agreed with the teacher that just jamming the armpits back can stress the shoulder and limit freedom if it is done in isolation and as the first action in a movement involving the shoulder girdle.  It can be an incredibly helpful alignment instruction, though, if the students recognize (as reminded by the teacher) that we don’t take the armbone back without first opening to grace, including softening and expanding and making the “inner body bright” and also practicing the movement in a way that recognizes the point of the instruction is to encourage students to integrate the head of the armbone into the shoulder socket by means of muscular energy.

    Like taking the armbone or armpit back, I do not believe that taking the thighs apart should ever be treated as an isolated point of alignment.  It should only be done in proper sequence and in proportionate action to the amount the yogi is able to work the other principles.  “Shins in” should not be done without first opening to grace, including softening, expanding, listening to the body, and establishing a good foundation.  It is also only one of the three aspects of muscular energy.  “Shins in” is just one way a teacher might tell students to apply the principle of hugging to the midline, but the student should not neglect hugging the muscles to the bone or drawing energy from the periphery to the focal point of the pose just because the teacher only cued “shins in, thighs out.”  After all, there are only so many words that can be said in a single class and only so much on which we can focus at a time, but that does not mean we should be neglecting the basics as we seek to become more refined in our practice.  Just as “shins in” is only part of muscular energy, the companion shorthand instruction “thighs out,” emphasizes just one aspect of inner spiral — that which serves to broaden the broaden the pelvic floor by means of the movement of the thigh bones.  That does not mean that it is independent of the other aspects of inner spiral–spiraling inward and expansively from the feet upwards and taking the thighs back, both of which sequentially come before the “apart.”

    Wow.  For those of you who read this for the gardening or cooking or to enjoy the photographs, this level of detail might seem mind-numbing.   Part of the danger of getting into the weeds in writing about alignment is just that.  Not only is it distancing, but it gets educated readers into a space of debating the finer points and wondering whether things have been said just right.  It becomes far to easy to lose sight of the point of yoga in the first place, which is to bring us joy on and off the mat.  Remembering the intention to cultivate joy (ananda) when we are practicing actually physically protects us from getting in trouble by over-efforting with regard to one small aspect of alignment.  When we are (sat)  consciously (cit) in the moment with an intention to cultivate bliss, then we are much less likely to do any physical action so hard or so precisely that we forget the big picture and how the principle or the pose fits in with the overall flow and alignment principles and do more harm than good.

     

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    Receiving v. Taking Revisited

    ByElizabeth

    Last Tuesday night class, I noticed that one of my students who had started out with very tight hamstrings fairly easily touched his toes at the beginning of class. He is an athletic guy who started yoga in his late 60’s. He first came only with his wife, who has been a regular student for a number of years. After a few months, he started coming even when she was out of town. He said that although it was hard and he does not always feel like coming, he always feels better afterwards, which inspires him to keep showing up.

    When I saw his easeful uttanasana–standing forward fold–I asked whether six months ago he would have thought this possible. He replied that he knew it would just take time. If he had pushed it, he would have just busted a hamstring.

    This was a great illustration of the class theme of receiving v. taking. If he had pushed or grasped at the poses that require hamstring flexibility, he would have just injured himself. By coming to class consistently and practicing with right effort, though, the openness came to him when it was time.

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

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    Prasad (and Opening to Grace)

    ByElizabeth

    During one of the sessions at the workshop last weekend in New Jersey, John Friend made a passing reference to the difference between receiving and taking.  He did not go into any detail because it was not central to the theme of the class, but it led me to contemplate on my own about the difference between taking and giving in the context of yoga practice.  In so doing, I thought about the concept of prasad — which is food that has been blessed and is offered to those who have participated in worship (puja).

    When offered prasad, one does not take it.  Instead, the cupped palm is turned up to receive the prasad.  The recipient does not get to pick through the basket and choose which sweet looks the biggest or the tastiest, but simply receives with gratitude the sweet or fruit that is infused with the intention of spirit.  The active part is the showing up with openness and receptivity to the offering, the blessing, the nourishment being offered.

    Coming to yoga class or doing our own practice (asana or meditation) should be, I think, like preparing to receive prasad.  What is primary in the practice of Anusara yoga is being open to grace, but we can no more force openings or enlightenment (grace and insight always elude grasping),  than forcing any particular physical posture or goal really yoga practice.  The point of effort in yoga to improve and expand alignment and knowledge is to enable the practitioner to receive more fully all the potential gifts and grace of practice, and then in turn make fuller and more complete offerings to others.

    Below:  offerings at the Chelsea Farmers’ Market