The Mind just doesn't "get" Yoga.

Yoga is in a realm beyond words.

For as crazy in love with yoga as I've been, there is a part of me that remains skeptical. Just this morning, I'm embarrassed to say, I had a moment of fear when I wondered, "How am I going to stand in front of those people and teach them yoga." I was in a moment of feeling lost and disconnected, and I was about a block away from the building where I teach my first class of the day. And thankfully, moments later the looks of warm greeting and expectation from the class caused the doubting me to vanish. I was a passionate teacher, and totally into it once I got started.

There is an aspect of yoga (probably the heart of it) that is beyond words. All we really have to offer one another to pass yoga on is technique. Our minds can grasp technique. But what happens when we practice is ultimately beyond ordinary communication. Poetry tries, but only when we see through the spaces that the ideas open up do we get a fantastic glimpse. So, it's not the words of the poetry or the angles of the arms and legs in a yoga pose, but it is where we go from those launch pads of language and form that is so fortifying and affirming.

So I really believe that yoga is beyond the grasp of the thinking mind. And I find it wonderful that I want to talk about it so much. Isn't it strange to want to speak the ineffable?

The transmission of techniques is important. In a recent posts I've talked about my inner conflict with the traditional teachings, and how I've embraced the marketplace of yoga (because that's what I know...). This is another angle: the importance of studying, using, preserving, living and teaching yoga technique. There is something very real and powerful in these techniques for practicing yoga.

It's important to honor the teachings we have because the mind doesn't get it. And when we think that we've "got it" you can be sure that we're in an inflated state, or stuck because yoga is a window into the unknown. If we think that we know the unknown I'm sure that we are really oversimplifying. Labels and definitions help put things into human hands, but there is something about yoga that is beyond what any one person can hold by himself or herself.

I've been extremely fortunate to have studied extensively with the best Ashtanga Yoga and Iyengar Yoga teachers in town. And the situations where I have been so humbly blessed with beautiful experiences have happened when teachers were honoring these techniques for practice that came from India.

The mind can shape the container that yoga goes into, but that's all. The imperfect process of our humanity becomes blessed with yoga, and escapes the container of ordinary mind.

Linda-Sama recently commented on a post, "there is a saying in India: dharma teachings are like a bowl of rice; you pick out the dirt and leave the rest to nourish you."

There are flaws in the teachings, but even so, we might also be nourished by their wisdom.

*simul-posted at Elephant Journal*

The Blissful Framework of Pranayama

When I walked into the Art Institute of Chicago it felt like a switch was turned on inside me. I went from a mode that was coasting into an activated state. My eyes became keen as I was primed and excited about what I was about to see. I enjoy and am stimulated by art. And I made a connection: I realized that when I get up from my pranayama (breathing) practice I feel the same way. The difference is that it sets up my frame of seeing without the pleasant expectations of seeing something great. As we know, not all activities are equally exciting. It’s easy to be “on” for things we know we like. Learning about the breath can help us to be “on” for more of life.

Pranayama, or breath control, is the fourth limb of Ashtanga yoga. It can be seen as a bridge towards meditation. The first limb, Yama has to do with relating to the external world ethically. While the second limb, Niyama is for personal observances. And the third limb, Asana is posture. So Pranayama begins to take us into more subtle realms of breath, preparing us for the next four limbs to work with our consciousness on many levels. It goes beyond how we understand ourselves in everyday interactions with others.

Breath connects visible processes with invisible processes. When you take a breath there is a perceivable movement in your body. Your belly moves, and/or your ribcage swells. This is something you can observe on yourself or others. It’s nice to watch pets do this (I like watching my bunnies breathe.). Inside the body oxygen is absorbed from the air, and it cycles through the body—invisibly maintaining our cells.

And air is invisible, so breath can also be seen as mediating the invisible. We take in the invisible air where it goes through invisible processes. So our bodies are in direct contact (inside and out) with the unknown (invisible) all the time. Metaphorically it can also be seen as processing an invisible past towards an invisible future, and the only place we can actually taste it is in the present moment. So when we are working with the breath it is important to be aware of the sensations of what is occurring in any given moment.

Different kinds of yoga handle the practice of breathing in different ways. In Iyengar yoga it’s important to be well established in your asana practice before learning pranayama. But, in Kripalu yoga they teach breath control right away. And, in Ashtanga yoga (of Sri K. Pattabhi Jois) you are doing Ujjayi Pranayama during your asana practice.

I feel a greater sense of wellbeing after my pranayama practice (I have been doing it separately from asana in line with Iyengar yoga). I do it every day before leaving the house. Just five minutes of breath awareness can make a real difference. A good way to start practicing is to lie down and watch your natural breath. Learn to observe your inhalations and exhalations as they appear without any help from you. Then lengthen the in and out breaths so that they are long, soft, smooth, deep, even breaths. Breathe evenly into the right and left lungs. Make sure that the inhalations and exhalations are equally extended for a balancing breath. End the practice by relaxing the breath control, and observe the natural flow of breath.

Body Shadow

Not too long ago I did something to my back. I had been mindlessly galloping around, high on coffee. Apparently I jumped one time too many and hurt myself. I was hurting across my hip and deep buttock on one side, my low back on the other, and within the next week on the other side my neck and shoulder were practically frozen. Yikes! A little mindlessness can have big repercussions.

My yoga practice helped me to feel better. But, still, if I felt like that all the time I’d have to find a new way to earn money. It was exhausting to teach yoga with back pain! It made me feel physically ill.

For most of last week I felt so much better! And then last weekend I went to a yoga workshop with Lois Steinberg. She pointed out that I was holding my head crooked, and that I was working my low back and shoulders asymmetrically in symmetrical poses (among other things that were off). And I was so grateful to have these things pointed out to me. My body’s shape had adjusted itself so I wasn’t feeling the residual tightness, but my injuries had deformed me. So when I was adjusted into symmetrical alignment I felt the tightness that was still there.

My injuries had gone underground. I had lost awareness. The truth of my condition had slipped into shadow—invisible to me.

I was so fortunate to see a teacher of Iyengar Yoga at this time! In this system of yoga teachers are trained to look and see asymmetries in the body. These people can help you get your body into alignment so it can function in an optimally healthy way.

Life can really mess up your body without your permission or knowledge!

Earlier I mentioned that the truth of my body had slipped into “shadow.” I intentionally used the word—as in shadow psychology. I had a physical manifestation that reflects the psychological usage. The shadow in psychology refers to aspects of self that are subconscious and can warp a person’s perceptions behind the scenes, often affecting behavior.

In psychology, a way to become more balanced is to do work to bring aspects of the shadow into consciousness. This allows a person to live a more intentional life. And it makes a person less likely to ignorantly harm others. An example of this might be any global judgment about people. Like if someone grew up with a father who never showed feelings, and this person grew up to speak to men as if they had no feelings. This behavior would obviously hurt some people along the way, but it might not be coming from a conscious place. This person is unknowingly hurting others.

The same can be true in our relationship to our bodies. We can be unknowingly hurting ourselves through unbalanced use of the body, as I described above.

I also think that the shadow in psychology can show up in the body.

Just prior to my galloping injury I had seen someone I hadn’t seen for a long time. This encounter was friendly, and just the nature of it forced me to look at my life. I didn’t really want to see what I saw. So I drank coffee, ate sugar, jumped around and hurt myself. My pain called my attention to what had happened. I had seen through this old friend an alternative future for myself that deeply disturbed me. This person was living in a different version of my life, living with decisions that I never made. It was an intense meeting that showed up without my choosing it.

Some people don’t want to be bothered with alignment details in their yoga practice. Yoga for them is possibly about disappearing into a high of the breath and body. I have enjoyed this many times. But, there is a missed opportunity for growth if a student always practices without a teacher with eyes trained for alignment. If I had gone from my “feeling better” state directly into a strengthening yoga practice I may have just strengthened my asymmetries!

Ode to Yoga Feet

“Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.”
- Kahlil Gibran

Whatever part of your body is touching the earth: open to it perceptually. Tune into the sensations. Open the pathway into greater awareness. Very often, especially when you are walking somewhere, the parts touching the earth are your feet. Feel the feelings in your feet. If you are usually stuck in the head (as many of us are) it might seem like you are tuning into the perceptions from little Mars Exploration Rovers far away, meet your feet!

Footprints of the Buddha symbolize the embodiment of enlightened consciousness, reminding us that the ideal can be had, here on the earth. We can be kind here. We don’t have to be slaves to roiling bad karma. We can be a peaceful people.

In Iyengar Yoga, the first thing you learn to do is to stand. You learn to stand in different postures, called Standing Poses. And in order to build these poses well, you need to have a firm and well-articulated foundation. So you learn to use your feet, and to be self-aware in the feet. I had a student once comment that before learning yoga she just thought of her legs and feet as little stubs that she walked on, and was so grateful to have expanded her understanding. And this work of learning to use your feet helps as you learn all the poses in yoga. It helps the whole structure of your body to learn to cultivate healthy feet. (Which means that we have to get them out of shoes from time to time.)

Love your feet! (There, I said it.)

Your feet are your physical connection to this earth and this life. Without them we can certainly learn other ways of getting around, but be grateful while you have them! And use them well. Go to wonderful places and do good and helpful things. Love others.

Several months before my grandmother (Nana) died, my Mother was in the hospital recovering from surgery. From her hospital bed she shared with me that Nana was “not going to live too much longer.” It seemed really strange coming from her. She, herself, had just almost died. So I asked her how she knew that. And she said with a voice that was much stronger than the one she had been using, “Look at her feet!” And then with a lighter tone, “They don’t ever really touch the ground when she walks.” And she was right. After that I noticed how my Nana’s feet seemed light as air as they, almost playfully, moved her along, hardly acknowledging the firmness of earth.