Truthful Fire

In my last entry I talked about creating space for emotions in yoga. While this is an important aspect, if all we did was create space, we might end up like a pancake without blueberries! Emptiness is good, but we need the ripe fruits of our lives to give us direction.

In yoga I want to open up and refuel. This is where the fire aspect of yoga comes in.

A large open gas tank is nothing without the fuel inside. In this case the fuel is truth, including truth that might seem difficult to bear.

Is there easy truth? It can be hard to see in this world where there is violence, ecological destruction, corrupt politics, and sometimes difficult personal truth that everybody faces.

From the Hindu tradition, Nataraja, the fire dancer represents standing in the fire of truth, both personal and shared truth.

In LifeForce yoga, the archetype that Nataraja represents (staying present with one's truth) is coupled with that of Kuan Yin (compassionate understanding, or heart-listening) from the Buddist tradition. Together, an understanding of the human attributes represented by Nataraja and Kuan Yin can help make the situation workable.

If we only stood in the fire of truth we might burn, but if we also include arms of compassion to hold truth, we can protect ourselves from the hot flames.

With this model of practice, we allow the truth to be with us on the yoga mat. The truth could be tightness, fatigue, anxiety, sadness, anger, warmth, ecstasy, and so on... I'm not suggesting that we take yoga into the mental realm, only that we feel whatever is there. And if the story around the sensations starts coming up, observe that and allow the heart to hear. Rather than trying to fix it with intellect, bring attention to the body and to the practice.

For example, I have had various things come up in backbends. One time I was getting a delicious-feeling adjustment from a beautiful male yoga teacher, when my body let out a loud, cracking fart. I felt myself shrinking inside after that. I was so embarrassed! After I came out of the pose, I courageously looked at my teacher. His eyes told me that it was okay. In this case my truth was embarrassment about a body-noise, and the compassionate understanding came from the eyes of my teacher.

In another backbending incident with another male teacher I moaned, but it didn’t seem like me. When I came out of the pose this time (this teacher had brought me up to standing), there was the teacher, who’s first look was accepting, and a female assistant who mocked me with her eyes. Then she looked at the teacher and they shared a look that seemed to judge my behavior. So I explained what happened: I was in the backbend (Urdhva Dhanurasana) and it felt amazing. It had the effect on me as if I existed as pure bliss. The body didn’t seem to be there. The moan came from somewhere far away. I observed it mostly from the outside, and was only dimly aware that the sound came from the body that was “me”. Only after I came out of the pose (feeling expansive) did I realize that it was me, and the strange looks from the teacher and assistant also clued me in. So in this case the truth was ecstasy, and the compassionate understanding also came from inside myself. The experience had seemed to be beyond ordinary experience so I didn’t judge myself, even though I saw others judging me. I just accepted that wildly wonderful backbend experience.

At least that is what I have told myself, but I am suspicious now because I never went to that class again. It was another body-noise embarrassment. In fact I remember myself as a child, cringing at the sound of my voice on a tape recorder. Somehow I haven’t been very accepting of the sounds I make.

What I learn from this is that the compassionate space represented by Kuan Yin has been hard for me to experience. I was so quick to judge.

Both of these backbend experiences happened years ago. The farting backbend happened years before the moaning one, and the moaning one was about five years ago. So perhaps now that I am writing this on a public blog, it might indicate that I am in a place of greater compassion and understanding than I was then. Don’t we all fart and moan? Aren’t these sounds truth?

So as I accept the truth of these experiences with compassionate awareness, I say, “What’s next?” and go back to my yoga mat.

Room for Emotions

A few years ago I traveled with certified Iyengar yoga teacher, spiritual mentor, and beloved friend Gabriel Halpern for a yoga retreat at Kripalu. When we arrived in Albany it was gray and rainy, and I was disappointed by the weather so I complained about it. Gabriel replied with the observation, “Rain is a sign of fertility.” And said that it could be seen as a blessing for a rich learning experience on retreat.

Perhaps emotional rains can also be seen as a blessing. These showers nourish the ground of consciousness and water the seeds of creativity.

A strategy for working with the emotions in yoga comes from the LifeForce yoga training that I did earlier this year. This approach uses archetypes of human experience to set the tone for practice. One of the archetypes used is the bodhisattva of compassion from the Buddhist tradition, Kuan Yin; the name means, “she who hears the cries of the world.”
In the representation that I have, Kuan Yin is seated on a human hand. The hand represents action, and I’m inspired to think that something I can do can actually create enough space to adequately hold my sadness. At certain points in my life this seemed impossible. But the practice of yoga and meditation does create more space in the experience of consciousness so a person can hold much more than once seemed possible. And I now find myself in a place where I can hear other people’s sadness, too.

I’m also inspired to think that this representation might also suggest that humanity has the ability to hold it’s sorrows in this troubled world.

It’s not from the intellect that one can do the kind of listening I’m talking about here, it is from the heart. In the heart I’m convinced that there is adequate space to hear all cries. To me, Kuan Yin represents the listening heart. This kind of listening is not trying to fix anything. Heart listening is acceptance.

The yoga mat can also represent this, an open and accepting space where feeling-states can safely come up. Metaphorically speaking, the yoga space can have the ears and heart of Kuan Yin, who hears an individual’s sorrow, as well as all of humanity’s sorrow. Suffering is bigger than any individual. This reminds me that I am not alone, and that my emotions are a natural part of the path.

In yoga, there is a call for me to expand beyond my woe-is-me story line. Yoga gives me tools for enlarging my consciousness, and with that the sense of who I am.

I have a story, but who I am is bigger than that. And how I express who I am is a creative project.