This video will take you through trikonasana (triangle pose), parsvokonasana (side angle pose) and ardha chandrasana (half moon). A challenging sequence with binding is demonstrated. Enjoy!
4/17/09
Aiming for Paradise
“By aiming for paradise, we lose sight of the earth.” (Onfray) Aim for the earth and you will find paradise. (Wells)
Michel Onfray in his critic of monotheism argues that the fixation with a paradisiacal afterlife obstructs us from living fully in this life. He points to all the deliciousness that we miss in the moment by pursuing rewards in the hereafter. The focus on cultivating a place in heaven has been concomitant with neglect and abuse of our home on earth.
If we turn it around and we embrace the earth, we find paradise right here: in the scent of the air, in the relationships at hand, in the flowers blooming in our gardens, in the touch of a lover’s hand or the sound of a child’s voice. Each delicious drop of life on earth is paradise. Savor it.
At our Monday Women’s Authentic Movement group we spent time ‘exploring’ a place that we know. We closed our eyes and conjured that place in our minds. Then we moved in that place, exploring textures and smells and it’s presence. Sally told us about her journey. She explored her driveway and found richness she had forgotten existed: from the plants to the ground to the structure. When we stop and take in the details of a small known place, we can find richness greater than the most romantic getaway.
I invite you step into the place where you are right now. Appreciate the details of your life in this instant. Notice the miracles you have come to take for granted. This is paradise.
This moment is the only one that is guaranteed. You’ve got it now. Embrace it. Stop living for another paradise. Stop living for the time when …. Live now. That is also yoga, the moment of living in the moment. Ram Das said it clearly: Be Here Now.
Michel Onfray in his critic of monotheism argues that the fixation with a paradisiacal afterlife obstructs us from living fully in this life. He points to all the deliciousness that we miss in the moment by pursuing rewards in the hereafter. The focus on cultivating a place in heaven has been concomitant with neglect and abuse of our home on earth.
If we turn it around and we embrace the earth, we find paradise right here: in the scent of the air, in the relationships at hand, in the flowers blooming in our gardens, in the touch of a lover’s hand or the sound of a child’s voice. Each delicious drop of life on earth is paradise. Savor it.
At our Monday Women’s Authentic Movement group we spent time ‘exploring’ a place that we know. We closed our eyes and conjured that place in our minds. Then we moved in that place, exploring textures and smells and it’s presence. Sally told us about her journey. She explored her driveway and found richness she had forgotten existed: from the plants to the ground to the structure. When we stop and take in the details of a small known place, we can find richness greater than the most romantic getaway.
I invite you step into the place where you are right now. Appreciate the details of your life in this instant. Notice the miracles you have come to take for granted. This is paradise.
This moment is the only one that is guaranteed. You’ve got it now. Embrace it. Stop living for another paradise. Stop living for the time when …. Live now. That is also yoga, the moment of living in the moment. Ram Das said it clearly: Be Here Now.
4/10/09
Dancing Wild Oregon: Road 6021
This video is part of an ongoing project dancing in wild spaces of Oregon. This particular cut scene was done just off Road 6021 in the McDonald Forest outside of Corvallis. The sound overlay in the second half is a bit of Japanese Fireworks posted by Capuchin on freesound.org.
4/8/09
Why you need to stretch.
My friend Kirstin Schumacher (structural integrationist extraordinaire) sent me this video. It is a lovely short clip explaining why we all need to stretch every single day. The video includes a bit of dissection, so if your squeamish be forewarned.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FtSP-tkS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FtSP-tkSug
4/4/09
3/28/09
Final Vacation Lesson: Thoughts about God
Last night I was dancing. I love dancing. I love dropping into the truth of the body in movement. It is a celebration of the physical-ness of being: moving limbs, heart beating, internal rhythms and the simple joy of having a body. In its grossest sense, the joy of living in a body is the best face of God that I know.
Then the DJ spun a slow song. The song was an appeal to God to end war, violence and torture. I found my body slowing down and deepening into a dance of despair. The lyrics were a desperate appeal for sanity in an insane world. The artist begs God to change things. I have made the same plea, many times in my life. Beginning when I was very young. God has never answered this plea. I have come to believe that there is no one there to answer the plea.
My personal story: I grew up in an alcoholic home with a father whose behavior was a form of ‘gentle sadism.’ Yes, its and oxymoron, but it’s best descriptor I can manage. He liked to pinch, poke, tickle, and tease to the point that he injured us both mentally and physically. He never tied me up, but he did pin me down and he did drop me from a balcony. It was all done in the name of ‘fun.’ Not our fun but his. Thus I call it sadism.
My family was Catholic and so I was sent to Saturday Catechism classes. We only lived a block from the San Gabriel Mission. Each Saturday morning I’d walk there for a lesson on the Bible, Catholicism and general religious indoctrination. The first few years of Catechism were a preparation for First Communion (at age 7 or 8) and that was followed by preparation for Confirmation in middle school. The teachers were most often Nuns, occasionally a Priest would come to give a guest lecture and occasionally a lay volunteer would teach.
They taught us to pray. Much of praying consisted of repeating memorized prayers, most commonly ‘Our Father’ and “Hail Mary.’ We were also taught to pray to be relieved of our sins. We were taught to ask God to solve our problems. I prayed for my Dad to stop drinking and stop hurting us. I prayed for a long time, long in the mind of a 7 year old, and nothing changed. I prayed over and over again asking God to stop my father from hurting my Mother and me.
Needless to say, Dad didn’t stop. His abuse continued for the rest of his life. Even when he sobered up and stopped drinking, he was abusive in that ‘gentle sadist’ fashion of his. And then he died, at age 54, and left this odd shaped hole in all of our lives.
So at the tender young age of 6 or 7 I stopped believing in God, or at least the God they were teaching us about in Catechism. I considered the evidence and determined that there either wasn’t a God or that if there was a God he had little to do with me. I was also taught that one had to go through the steps, regardless of what one believed. You had to pretend to believe whether you actually believed or not. So, I continued with Catechism.
In preparation for First Communion we were instructed in how to take our first Confession. Along the north wall of the Mission there were small rooms with two doors. The Priest would enter through one door and sit behind a screen. We would wait our turn in line and then enter through the other door and take a sit. Then you would repeat the following a script: “Bless me father for I have sinned, it has been x weeks since I have been to confession….” you listed your sins in a particular order. We were taught just what behaviors were sins and we were told what to confess. I remember that in my first confession I couldn’t think of any sins, so I made them up. I suppose that was a sin itself: sin forgery to please the powers that be. But remember, we were taught to pretend to believe. The entire affair was an act that had to be played out to keep the adults happy.
The Priest would assign us prayers as penance, for example: “say 10 Hail Mary’s and 4 Our Fathers.” We’d go back to the pew and ti kneel to say the prayers. If you were really contrite you might kneel right in front of the altar and weep as you prayed. They said that the Priest talked directly to God. We’d confess, the Priest would relay the message to God, God would tell the Priest what we needed to do to make God happy again, then the Priest would tell us, if we said our prayers with the appropriate attitude and we’d be ‘Good to Go” straight to Heaven. Just in case we got run over by a car on the way home from communion, we knew we were all set.
We must have been taught not to sin, but I don’t remember that part. Sin happened. The church helped you out by making everything all right with God again, through confession and communion. If you hadn’t confessed and went to church with ‘sins on your soul’ then you had to sit in the pew through communion. Everyone would know you had sinned. Priests were the necessary middle man between us and God. As mere lay people we didn’t have direct access to God. And like any good middle man, the church collected tolls along the way.
The results of all this effort, prayer, confession, communion, made no change in the reality of my life. My parents didn’t change. My Dad continued to drink and hurt us. My Mom didn’t protect us. The pain didn’t stop. I stopped believing in the church. Occasionally a friend and I would go to Sunday Mass, but it was an action fueled by a desire for entertainment rather than an action of faith or belief. In fact, the more time I spent around the church the more cynical I became and the less I believed. For whenever I put the teachings to the test, they failed the test. After I was confirmed I stopped to going to church all together. I classified myself as agnostic. I didn’t believe, but I wasn’t strong enough to call myself an atheist either.
Now I’m in mid-life. I’ve continued to try and test a variety of churches and spiritual teachings. But I have yet to find a God in a church that I can believe in. I do not believe there is an omnipotent being who is causal in the world. I don’t believe in an outside actor who has a stake in the outcome of the human experiment. I don’t believe any religion has the answer to the question of ‘why are we here.’ I don’t believe in being saved. I don’t believe in Heaven or Hell or a divine reward or punishment for our actions during this life. If I’m wrong, I don’t want to spend an eternity in Heaven with a God who would be as unjust and sadistic as he must be to allow the pain and suffering we observe on earth. Any omnipotent and all-powerful being who would allow war, torture, and starvation is more sadistic than my father was and is not worthy of my worship.
I do believe that we as humans, simple humans, are capable of better than this.
Coming into my 30s I had to look at my own behaviors, my own drinking and craziness. I saw too much of my father when I looked in the mirror and I didn’t like what I saw. I went to a plethora of other 12 step meetings looking for a solution to my craziness. I went to therapy. I learned to meditate and pray and say affirmations.
My prayers looked different than those of my childhood. I began to pray for changes in myself. I used prayer to change my thinking. I literally began to choose different thoughts. I learned to say a gratitude list first thing every morning. Before I got out of bed I was to list 20 things that I was grateful for, the simpler the better: I’m grateful for a warm bed, a dry home, an loving husband, food in my refrigerator, a job, a car, a bicycle, the sun, the mountains… This prayer worked. This prayer works because the mind is plastic and malleable. The mind is transformed by the work that it does. If we give the mind positive work, if we reinforce the positive neural pathways, the mind physically changes. I could reprogram myself out of my alcoholic home thinking and into a healthier way of being.
Twelve step programs teach that it doesn’t matter who or what you pray too, it matters that you pray. You can pray to a door knob if you like. Prayers to a door know will affect change.. They teach that you can design any God you like. And this is brilliant. The face of God does not matter I would say because God with a face does not exist. It is the action of praying that matters, not the being that you pray too. Prayer is a physical process that shapes the brain, just like exercise shapes the body.
Meditation, affirmation and prayer are three forms of brain exercise. They each work in slightly different ways to remold the pathways of the brain. We literally change our thinking and the physical network of our minds. We become better happier people because we choose to do the brain work that makes us better happier people.
We could redefine God so that God becomes the action of change, as the process theologians have done. We can redefine God so that God is the feeling and sensation, the ecstasy, that results from this action of change, as the Tantrists have done. But I personally don’t find that necessary. For me, the word God implies an externality rather than an internality. And I believe the source of change comes from within individual humans. It is the actions of humans that will change the world for good. Each of us makes a difference in the worlds by our actions. In my worldview the best definition would be for each of us to become God: each of us then taking responsibility for the good of the world through our actions. We can repeat the mantra “Hamsah” “I am that” to affirm out own divinity, our own responsibility.
We are divine and what we do matters. How we act and what we think matters. In my early Catechism, they taught that bad thoughts were as bad as bad deeds. We can choose our thoughts, we can shape our world, both the personal and the global world, through our thoughts and our actions. So choose wisely. You have the power to change the world. So I pray to you as I once prayed to God: Stop the violence, stop the torture, stop the pain.
Change your mind and make a difference with your actions.
Then the DJ spun a slow song. The song was an appeal to God to end war, violence and torture. I found my body slowing down and deepening into a dance of despair. The lyrics were a desperate appeal for sanity in an insane world. The artist begs God to change things. I have made the same plea, many times in my life. Beginning when I was very young. God has never answered this plea. I have come to believe that there is no one there to answer the plea.
My personal story: I grew up in an alcoholic home with a father whose behavior was a form of ‘gentle sadism.’ Yes, its and oxymoron, but it’s best descriptor I can manage. He liked to pinch, poke, tickle, and tease to the point that he injured us both mentally and physically. He never tied me up, but he did pin me down and he did drop me from a balcony. It was all done in the name of ‘fun.’ Not our fun but his. Thus I call it sadism.
My family was Catholic and so I was sent to Saturday Catechism classes. We only lived a block from the San Gabriel Mission. Each Saturday morning I’d walk there for a lesson on the Bible, Catholicism and general religious indoctrination. The first few years of Catechism were a preparation for First Communion (at age 7 or 8) and that was followed by preparation for Confirmation in middle school. The teachers were most often Nuns, occasionally a Priest would come to give a guest lecture and occasionally a lay volunteer would teach.
They taught us to pray. Much of praying consisted of repeating memorized prayers, most commonly ‘Our Father’ and “Hail Mary.’ We were also taught to pray to be relieved of our sins. We were taught to ask God to solve our problems. I prayed for my Dad to stop drinking and stop hurting us. I prayed for a long time, long in the mind of a 7 year old, and nothing changed. I prayed over and over again asking God to stop my father from hurting my Mother and me.
Needless to say, Dad didn’t stop. His abuse continued for the rest of his life. Even when he sobered up and stopped drinking, he was abusive in that ‘gentle sadist’ fashion of his. And then he died, at age 54, and left this odd shaped hole in all of our lives.
So at the tender young age of 6 or 7 I stopped believing in God, or at least the God they were teaching us about in Catechism. I considered the evidence and determined that there either wasn’t a God or that if there was a God he had little to do with me. I was also taught that one had to go through the steps, regardless of what one believed. You had to pretend to believe whether you actually believed or not. So, I continued with Catechism.
In preparation for First Communion we were instructed in how to take our first Confession. Along the north wall of the Mission there were small rooms with two doors. The Priest would enter through one door and sit behind a screen. We would wait our turn in line and then enter through the other door and take a sit. Then you would repeat the following a script: “Bless me father for I have sinned, it has been x weeks since I have been to confession….” you listed your sins in a particular order. We were taught just what behaviors were sins and we were told what to confess. I remember that in my first confession I couldn’t think of any sins, so I made them up. I suppose that was a sin itself: sin forgery to please the powers that be. But remember, we were taught to pretend to believe. The entire affair was an act that had to be played out to keep the adults happy.
The Priest would assign us prayers as penance, for example: “say 10 Hail Mary’s and 4 Our Fathers.” We’d go back to the pew and ti kneel to say the prayers. If you were really contrite you might kneel right in front of the altar and weep as you prayed. They said that the Priest talked directly to God. We’d confess, the Priest would relay the message to God, God would tell the Priest what we needed to do to make God happy again, then the Priest would tell us, if we said our prayers with the appropriate attitude and we’d be ‘Good to Go” straight to Heaven. Just in case we got run over by a car on the way home from communion, we knew we were all set.
We must have been taught not to sin, but I don’t remember that part. Sin happened. The church helped you out by making everything all right with God again, through confession and communion. If you hadn’t confessed and went to church with ‘sins on your soul’ then you had to sit in the pew through communion. Everyone would know you had sinned. Priests were the necessary middle man between us and God. As mere lay people we didn’t have direct access to God. And like any good middle man, the church collected tolls along the way.
The results of all this effort, prayer, confession, communion, made no change in the reality of my life. My parents didn’t change. My Dad continued to drink and hurt us. My Mom didn’t protect us. The pain didn’t stop. I stopped believing in the church. Occasionally a friend and I would go to Sunday Mass, but it was an action fueled by a desire for entertainment rather than an action of faith or belief. In fact, the more time I spent around the church the more cynical I became and the less I believed. For whenever I put the teachings to the test, they failed the test. After I was confirmed I stopped to going to church all together. I classified myself as agnostic. I didn’t believe, but I wasn’t strong enough to call myself an atheist either.
Now I’m in mid-life. I’ve continued to try and test a variety of churches and spiritual teachings. But I have yet to find a God in a church that I can believe in. I do not believe there is an omnipotent being who is causal in the world. I don’t believe in an outside actor who has a stake in the outcome of the human experiment. I don’t believe any religion has the answer to the question of ‘why are we here.’ I don’t believe in being saved. I don’t believe in Heaven or Hell or a divine reward or punishment for our actions during this life. If I’m wrong, I don’t want to spend an eternity in Heaven with a God who would be as unjust and sadistic as he must be to allow the pain and suffering we observe on earth. Any omnipotent and all-powerful being who would allow war, torture, and starvation is more sadistic than my father was and is not worthy of my worship.
I do believe that we as humans, simple humans, are capable of better than this.
Coming into my 30s I had to look at my own behaviors, my own drinking and craziness. I saw too much of my father when I looked in the mirror and I didn’t like what I saw. I went to a plethora of other 12 step meetings looking for a solution to my craziness. I went to therapy. I learned to meditate and pray and say affirmations.
My prayers looked different than those of my childhood. I began to pray for changes in myself. I used prayer to change my thinking. I literally began to choose different thoughts. I learned to say a gratitude list first thing every morning. Before I got out of bed I was to list 20 things that I was grateful for, the simpler the better: I’m grateful for a warm bed, a dry home, an loving husband, food in my refrigerator, a job, a car, a bicycle, the sun, the mountains… This prayer worked. This prayer works because the mind is plastic and malleable. The mind is transformed by the work that it does. If we give the mind positive work, if we reinforce the positive neural pathways, the mind physically changes. I could reprogram myself out of my alcoholic home thinking and into a healthier way of being.
Twelve step programs teach that it doesn’t matter who or what you pray too, it matters that you pray. You can pray to a door knob if you like. Prayers to a door know will affect change.. They teach that you can design any God you like. And this is brilliant. The face of God does not matter I would say because God with a face does not exist. It is the action of praying that matters, not the being that you pray too. Prayer is a physical process that shapes the brain, just like exercise shapes the body.
Meditation, affirmation and prayer are three forms of brain exercise. They each work in slightly different ways to remold the pathways of the brain. We literally change our thinking and the physical network of our minds. We become better happier people because we choose to do the brain work that makes us better happier people.
We could redefine God so that God becomes the action of change, as the process theologians have done. We can redefine God so that God is the feeling and sensation, the ecstasy, that results from this action of change, as the Tantrists have done. But I personally don’t find that necessary. For me, the word God implies an externality rather than an internality. And I believe the source of change comes from within individual humans. It is the actions of humans that will change the world for good. Each of us makes a difference in the worlds by our actions. In my worldview the best definition would be for each of us to become God: each of us then taking responsibility for the good of the world through our actions. We can repeat the mantra “Hamsah” “I am that” to affirm out own divinity, our own responsibility.
We are divine and what we do matters. How we act and what we think matters. In my early Catechism, they taught that bad thoughts were as bad as bad deeds. We can choose our thoughts, we can shape our world, both the personal and the global world, through our thoughts and our actions. So choose wisely. You have the power to change the world. So I pray to you as I once prayed to God: Stop the violence, stop the torture, stop the pain.
Change your mind and make a difference with your actions.
3/24/09
Vacation Lesson Number 4: You are the teacher.
The Buddha sat underneath the Boddhi Tree to reach enlightenment. Mohammed sat in a cave in the desert. Jesus went into the desert for 40 days, and often left his followers to pray. Moses climbed a mountain listened to a burning bush.
All of these teachers spent time alone in nature. Enlightenment came when they left society. They sought silence. They sought solitude. They fasted. They listened. They listened to the voices that came to them in silence.
We are bombarded with noise and distraction. Our lives are filled with voices and images from every direction, all at once. Time and space are distorted and transcended as we juggle our pasts and future on the internet. When we are exhausted we turn on the tv and listen to a packaged refrain. When was your last silent moment? When did you last listen to the quiet of your mind.
If we listen to the media and advertising chorus around us, we are told to expect fulfillment through the next purchase. Enlightenment is belittled and obsolete. Enlightenment has been replaced with gratuitous satisfaction. The lives of the rich and famous are the lives to strive for. The American dream is no longer a home and a chicken in every pot, but rather a McMansion with a Hummer in every garage. Look where that dream has brought us. We are sitting on the edge of calamity. The financial system has fallen off its precarious wall. All the king’s horses and all the kings men can’t put it back together again. We need something new in its place.
Don’t sign up for a church or for the next guru to cross your path. Too many churches are supporters of the status quo, apologists for ‘King.’ Even if the ‘King’ today is capitalism and corporate America. No guru has your answers. You won’t find the answers in any book, neither the good book, the old book or the big book. The answer isn’t written on any wall.
Turn off the TV. Head outside for a few hours. Go someplace where you can feel fresh air on your skin and hear the sound of wind and birds. Go outside and observe the world. Find a place to sit still and listen. Feel the rocks beneath your feet or beneath your butt. Sit on the earth. Get dirty. Sweat.
Repeat often, until your mind starts to clear of the cultural fog. When everything else gets out of the way, when the cultural milieu is silent, what is left? What do you love? What is important to you? What do you want when you stop wanting what they tell you to want? If you wipe away the cultural fog, your thoughts will be as profound as those of the Buddha, Jesus or Mohammed. Listen to what arises from deep inside you. You are the teacher. You are the prophet. You are the healer.
All of these teachers spent time alone in nature. Enlightenment came when they left society. They sought silence. They sought solitude. They fasted. They listened. They listened to the voices that came to them in silence.
We are bombarded with noise and distraction. Our lives are filled with voices and images from every direction, all at once. Time and space are distorted and transcended as we juggle our pasts and future on the internet. When we are exhausted we turn on the tv and listen to a packaged refrain. When was your last silent moment? When did you last listen to the quiet of your mind.
If we listen to the media and advertising chorus around us, we are told to expect fulfillment through the next purchase. Enlightenment is belittled and obsolete. Enlightenment has been replaced with gratuitous satisfaction. The lives of the rich and famous are the lives to strive for. The American dream is no longer a home and a chicken in every pot, but rather a McMansion with a Hummer in every garage. Look where that dream has brought us. We are sitting on the edge of calamity. The financial system has fallen off its precarious wall. All the king’s horses and all the kings men can’t put it back together again. We need something new in its place.
Don’t sign up for a church or for the next guru to cross your path. Too many churches are supporters of the status quo, apologists for ‘King.’ Even if the ‘King’ today is capitalism and corporate America. No guru has your answers. You won’t find the answers in any book, neither the good book, the old book or the big book. The answer isn’t written on any wall.
Turn off the TV. Head outside for a few hours. Go someplace where you can feel fresh air on your skin and hear the sound of wind and birds. Go outside and observe the world. Find a place to sit still and listen. Feel the rocks beneath your feet or beneath your butt. Sit on the earth. Get dirty. Sweat.
Repeat often, until your mind starts to clear of the cultural fog. When everything else gets out of the way, when the cultural milieu is silent, what is left? What do you love? What is important to you? What do you want when you stop wanting what they tell you to want? If you wipe away the cultural fog, your thoughts will be as profound as those of the Buddha, Jesus or Mohammed. Listen to what arises from deep inside you. You are the teacher. You are the prophet. You are the healer.
3/23/09
Vacation Lesson Number 3: Stop going somewhere
This morning Allee (the dog) and I set out to hike Dimple Hill. It is a good strenuous hike. Starting at the top of 29th Street, it is about 7 ½ miles round trip with a 1400 feet elevation gain. It took me just over 2 hours. I stopped to have a snack and try to do some video taping at the top of the hill. It started to snow while I was up there and I wasn’t dressed warmly enough. My fingers soon got too cold to operate the camera so I packed up and jogged lightly downhill until I warmed up again. My muscles are pleasantly sore now. My fingers are still a little uncoordinated. It feels good to be able to push my body. I am grateful for this ability to move. I am grateful for my health.
I watched my mind while I hiked. Hiking alone is one of the best times for observing my mind at work. My mind rarely slows down. I am blessed/cursed with an active verbal center and a quick processing left-brain. My mind quickly wraps itself around problems to seek solutions. When idlem, my mind begins to dither about planning the future, coming up with new ideas, and writing text for later (like this). Because of the arrival of Facebook in my life, my mind has been invited back to ponder friends from years and years ago. I find myself wondering if I should apologize for my adolescent behaviors or just let those sleeping dogs lie (like Allee is doing right now.)
Meditation is largely a process of watching the mind. Becoming still enough, undistracted enough, that you observe your own tendencies. Where does your mind go when you are still and quiet? What do you spontaneously think about? Rarely does our mind stay in the present moment. That is the next invitation of meditation: stay in the present moment: stop going somewhere else. You don’t need to sit cross legged on a pillow to meditate. You can meditate anywhere. Silence is helpful. Finding the place or activity that lets you watch your mind is very powerful.
I love being in the present moment in the woods. I love feeling the earth on the soles of my feet. Noticing the chill of the air on my skin. Listening to the sound of the wind moving through the trees, the crick and gaw as the trees sway, the babbling and cawing of birds, and the sound of water flowing downhill. I love feeling the depth of my breath, the beating of my heart, and the pump of my muscles. I love looking at the forest itself, the trees are still bare so that slits of blue grey sky show through; the ferns, moss and lichen lush and rich. And if I slow down and watch closely I see birds and small animals moving through the brush. I begin to notice the details of the forest landscape. It is awe-some.
And all of that observation might last for a minute or two before my mind starts planning again: What will be my next hike? How great a shape I would be in if I did this everyday? How can I arrange my life to hike more? I want to start that wilderness dance group… how will I make that happen? I brought the camera… what will I say for it? Do I want to tape a yoga practice or a teaching monologue.
Oh yeah, I’m on a hike: I bring my mind back to the moment. I take a deep breath and I return to the sensations of being a body in the woods. I enjoy a few minutes being right here, right now before my mind races off again. But in those few minutes there is such bliss, such joy, such awe and such ease. Those are the moments when I know true wealth: the wealth of simply being. I don’t need much in my life. A warm dry place to sleep, a decent pair of shoes, a good meal and good relationships are enough to make me feel wealthy. I am blessed to have those needs fully met. Everything else is a distraction.
Lesson of the day: Stop Going Somewhere. The joy is right here, right now. You have all the wealth you need.
I watched my mind while I hiked. Hiking alone is one of the best times for observing my mind at work. My mind rarely slows down. I am blessed/cursed with an active verbal center and a quick processing left-brain. My mind quickly wraps itself around problems to seek solutions. When idlem, my mind begins to dither about planning the future, coming up with new ideas, and writing text for later (like this). Because of the arrival of Facebook in my life, my mind has been invited back to ponder friends from years and years ago. I find myself wondering if I should apologize for my adolescent behaviors or just let those sleeping dogs lie (like Allee is doing right now.)
Meditation is largely a process of watching the mind. Becoming still enough, undistracted enough, that you observe your own tendencies. Where does your mind go when you are still and quiet? What do you spontaneously think about? Rarely does our mind stay in the present moment. That is the next invitation of meditation: stay in the present moment: stop going somewhere else. You don’t need to sit cross legged on a pillow to meditate. You can meditate anywhere. Silence is helpful. Finding the place or activity that lets you watch your mind is very powerful.
I love being in the present moment in the woods. I love feeling the earth on the soles of my feet. Noticing the chill of the air on my skin. Listening to the sound of the wind moving through the trees, the crick and gaw as the trees sway, the babbling and cawing of birds, and the sound of water flowing downhill. I love feeling the depth of my breath, the beating of my heart, and the pump of my muscles. I love looking at the forest itself, the trees are still bare so that slits of blue grey sky show through; the ferns, moss and lichen lush and rich. And if I slow down and watch closely I see birds and small animals moving through the brush. I begin to notice the details of the forest landscape. It is awe-some.
And all of that observation might last for a minute or two before my mind starts planning again: What will be my next hike? How great a shape I would be in if I did this everyday? How can I arrange my life to hike more? I want to start that wilderness dance group… how will I make that happen? I brought the camera… what will I say for it? Do I want to tape a yoga practice or a teaching monologue.
Oh yeah, I’m on a hike: I bring my mind back to the moment. I take a deep breath and I return to the sensations of being a body in the woods. I enjoy a few minutes being right here, right now before my mind races off again. But in those few minutes there is such bliss, such joy, such awe and such ease. Those are the moments when I know true wealth: the wealth of simply being. I don’t need much in my life. A warm dry place to sleep, a decent pair of shoes, a good meal and good relationships are enough to make me feel wealthy. I am blessed to have those needs fully met. Everything else is a distraction.
Lesson of the day: Stop Going Somewhere. The joy is right here, right now. You have all the wealth you need.
3/20/09
Vacation Lesson Number 2: Your job is to want less, when you want less you have more.
This wasn’t a dream lesson, it was a phrase that spoke itself to me from the trees and the hillsides and the bluebirds on my walk this morning. I think many people would call these voices that I hear the voice of God. But it doesn’t sound like anyone else’s voice to me. The words come from my mind, from the people around me, from responding to the media and the global buzz, from the books I read, my history, our history and our culture. I imagine that Mohammad and Jesus heard a similar voice. I imagine that you do too, if you listen.
Lesson 2, part 1: Your job is to want less. When I want more my life revolves around acquiring what I want. I become focused on making money so I can purchase the things I want. I accumulate stuff. I judge my success relative to what other people have. So, my job is to want less. My job is to notice when my mind is focused on wanting stuff, wanting things I do not have. When I notice I am in ‘wanting mode’ I can choose to sort circuit that. There are certainly things that I need. I need to go to the grocery store this afternoon and pick up bread and milk. I need to quench my thirst, a glass of water will take care of that need. And that is all I truly need at the moment. The list of ‘wants’ might be large: new shoes, clean the car, chocolate. My job is to want less: a miracle happens and I am free.
I take a walk in the woods instead of going shopping. The mantra presents itself quietly in my mind at first: your job is to want less, when you want less you will have more. I begin to repeat the mantra. A deep freedom arises.
Lesson 2, part 2: I open myself up to seeing what I already have. A beautiful place to live. I walk on the paths at Bald Hill and watch the first bluebirds of the season flurry from the fence line to the still leafless oak tree. The chatter like crazy as they return home and prepare to roost. I stop to look at a small brown newt in the middle of the path. They like to sunbathe on these still coolish spring mornings. I hike deeper into the woods. A pair of nesting crows is disturbed by my dog Allee’s and my presence. The crows start to chatter a storm at us and I become quiet and listen to the great symphony of the forest. I restrain Allee from chasing a deer. We find a quiet off shoot of the path and set my pack down and do some yoga. Simple poses using downed trees as props. I breath deep and sit still for a few minutes then return to the path and my mantra. As we walk down the hill a Pileated Woodpecker flies right in front of us and lands on a tree. My body feels strong and healthy so I jog the rest of the way back to the car. This is wealth and abundance. My job is to want less, when I want less I have more.
Lesson 2, part 1: Your job is to want less. When I want more my life revolves around acquiring what I want. I become focused on making money so I can purchase the things I want. I accumulate stuff. I judge my success relative to what other people have. So, my job is to want less. My job is to notice when my mind is focused on wanting stuff, wanting things I do not have. When I notice I am in ‘wanting mode’ I can choose to sort circuit that. There are certainly things that I need. I need to go to the grocery store this afternoon and pick up bread and milk. I need to quench my thirst, a glass of water will take care of that need. And that is all I truly need at the moment. The list of ‘wants’ might be large: new shoes, clean the car, chocolate. My job is to want less: a miracle happens and I am free.
I take a walk in the woods instead of going shopping. The mantra presents itself quietly in my mind at first: your job is to want less, when you want less you will have more. I begin to repeat the mantra. A deep freedom arises.
Lesson 2, part 2: I open myself up to seeing what I already have. A beautiful place to live. I walk on the paths at Bald Hill and watch the first bluebirds of the season flurry from the fence line to the still leafless oak tree. The chatter like crazy as they return home and prepare to roost. I stop to look at a small brown newt in the middle of the path. They like to sunbathe on these still coolish spring mornings. I hike deeper into the woods. A pair of nesting crows is disturbed by my dog Allee’s and my presence. The crows start to chatter a storm at us and I become quiet and listen to the great symphony of the forest. I restrain Allee from chasing a deer. We find a quiet off shoot of the path and set my pack down and do some yoga. Simple poses using downed trees as props. I breath deep and sit still for a few minutes then return to the path and my mantra. As we walk down the hill a Pileated Woodpecker flies right in front of us and lands on a tree. My body feels strong and healthy so I jog the rest of the way back to the car. This is wealth and abundance. My job is to want less, when I want less I have more.
3/19/09
Vacation Lesson Number 1: You have everything you need.
I awoke from a dream on Tuesday morning. I was teaching meditation to a group of martial artists. I was teaching the following mantra: you have all that you need. All wealth and contentment are yours.
You are the martial artist. You are being given a task, you are being presented with a battle in your life time. How will you step up to the challenges that are confronting you right now. Will you surrender to the Gods of Greed. Will you buy into the fear that is permeating our global psychological environment? If we surrender to the fear, we lose. If we surrender to the notion that money is wealth, we lose. If we surrender to the idea that status quo is the only ways our culture can survive, we lose. We have a battle before us, a battle of minds and wealth. The battle is being waged within us as surely as it is being waged without.
The first mantra of the battle: You have everything you need. Look around at your life. If you are reading this and live in the modern world the chances are you have everything you need. Did you sleep in a dry place last night? Do you have food to eat today? Do you have basic transportation (walking is basic transportation)? Do you have people in your life? If these needs are met, you have what you need. My guess is that you have well beyond this basic fare. And so my first invocation, the first tool of the battle, is to daily assess that you have everything you need. Be grateful every day that your basic needs are met: count them. It is here that you will find your wealth and contentment.
Look for the riches in your life as it is. The global culture (as writ on newsstands, business pages and check-out counter magazines) tells us that riches are measured in dollars and in goods consumed. But that is a poor measure of wealth. Look at those pages again: I see no evidence at the checkstand to convince me that more money leads to more happiness. In fact, it looks like just the opposite.
So, lesson number one: You have everything you need. Repeat those words to yourself, over and over again. Tell each cell in your body this truth. Rewire your brain so that it remembers: You have everything you need. Begin to notice how your body changes as it absorbs this information. Let the physical experience of fear drain away. There is a physical sensation to freedom that will replace the fear. More breath, more space in the body. Practice this lesson over and over again. When you feel the constriction of fear returning to your body, repeat the words again: You have everything you need.
You are the martial artist. You are being given a task, you are being presented with a battle in your life time. How will you step up to the challenges that are confronting you right now. Will you surrender to the Gods of Greed. Will you buy into the fear that is permeating our global psychological environment? If we surrender to the fear, we lose. If we surrender to the notion that money is wealth, we lose. If we surrender to the idea that status quo is the only ways our culture can survive, we lose. We have a battle before us, a battle of minds and wealth. The battle is being waged within us as surely as it is being waged without.
The first mantra of the battle: You have everything you need. Look around at your life. If you are reading this and live in the modern world the chances are you have everything you need. Did you sleep in a dry place last night? Do you have food to eat today? Do you have basic transportation (walking is basic transportation)? Do you have people in your life? If these needs are met, you have what you need. My guess is that you have well beyond this basic fare. And so my first invocation, the first tool of the battle, is to daily assess that you have everything you need. Be grateful every day that your basic needs are met: count them. It is here that you will find your wealth and contentment.
Look for the riches in your life as it is. The global culture (as writ on newsstands, business pages and check-out counter magazines) tells us that riches are measured in dollars and in goods consumed. But that is a poor measure of wealth. Look at those pages again: I see no evidence at the checkstand to convince me that more money leads to more happiness. In fact, it looks like just the opposite.
So, lesson number one: You have everything you need. Repeat those words to yourself, over and over again. Tell each cell in your body this truth. Rewire your brain so that it remembers: You have everything you need. Begin to notice how your body changes as it absorbs this information. Let the physical experience of fear drain away. There is a physical sensation to freedom that will replace the fear. More breath, more space in the body. Practice this lesson over and over again. When you feel the constriction of fear returning to your body, repeat the words again: You have everything you need.
3/16/09
yoga practice: shoulders and neck part 4
This is the final section of the yoga practice for shoulders and neck. This section includes anjanyasana (lunge) and setu bandhasana (bridge). If you want to begin at the beginning, scroll down to the first post and then click them in order. Let me know how it goes,
3/15/09
yoga practice: shoulders and neck part 2
The warm up section of the practice starts in the previous post. This is the second section, with sun salutes, tree pose, hands and knees swimming. I'll get the third section up soon.
3/13/09
a yoga practice for shoulders and neck
Here is the latest video. I'm still working on the process, so its not 'perfect'. I appreciate comments on how to keep improving these. I tried to post a full 30 minute sequence, but wasn't able to load it. So now I'm trying to cut it in pieces. This is neck and shoulders part 1: warms ups and stretches.
As with any yoga practice, it is exercise and there are always inherent risks with exercise. Check with your doctor first if that is appropriate. But most importantly, pay attention. Stretching sensations ease with time. If pain increases while you are in a posture, or when you repeat, back off. Give yourself some time and space to ease into the work . And come to a yoga class, seek the advice of a teacher if you find this confusing.
This is the first 8 minutes of a 30 minutes guided practice. Get out your mat, a blanket and a strap. Enjoy!
Lisa
As with any yoga practice, it is exercise and there are always inherent risks with exercise. Check with your doctor first if that is appropriate. But most importantly, pay attention. Stretching sensations ease with time. If pain increases while you are in a posture, or when you repeat, back off. Give yourself some time and space to ease into the work . And come to a yoga class, seek the advice of a teacher if you find this confusing.
This is the first 8 minutes of a 30 minutes guided practice. Get out your mat, a blanket and a strap. Enjoy!
Lisa
2/28/09
Forward Bends from Standing: Pilates Roll Down, Uttanasana, Pandangustasana, and PadaHastasana.
We do a lot of forward bends in yoga. They are great for our bodies. Done well they stretch the entire back surface of the body, from the souls of the feet, through the back of the calves, knees, and thighs, across the hips, up the spine and back of the neck, connecting all the way through the fascia over the head to the ridge of the brows (thank you Thomas Myers Anatomy Trains).
When we stretch the back of the body the nerves themselves get stretched. Within a reasonable tolerance, nerves like being stretched. Even when there is some pull in the muscles and fascia, there is a pleasure sensation in forward bends. They all calm us, help us sleep, and help us deal with stress.
.
Forward bends are also risky. More people injure themselves in forward bends than in back bends . If the intervertebral disks are compromised, too much pressure on the back of the disk can cause further disk damage and result in the disk pushing onto the nerve roots and causing pain and sciatica. Additionally, when the spine is cantilevered forward of the body, the lumbar spine (low back) is working at maximum capacity. If the muscles are not strong enough to support the weight of the upper body you risk injury with a flat back (extended spine, number 2 in the video) forward bend. When your abdominal muscles are engaged, they help in the work of carrying the upper body's weight and the risk of injury is greatly lessened. If you think you have weak abs and back muscles, stick with the Pilates Roll Down (number 1 in the video) until you feel yourself gaining some strength in these muscles.
To support forward bends, continuously engage your deep abdominal and pelvic floor muscles. You can find this work with the following exercises: Place a hand on your belly and feel the softness there. Breath in and out of your stomach. As you exhale you will feel the abdomen hollow. This is transverse abdominus engaging. Lift the belly even further back and hold it there while you breath into your rib cage now. This move engages both the tranverse abdominus and the oblique abdominal muscles. Just this breathing move done every day (3 minutes of conscious engagement about 3 times each day) will begin to improve your ab strength. Keep this engagement throughout your forward bends, and engage even more intently when you return to standing.
You also want to engage your pelvic floor to help support the lumbar spine. Pelvic floor muscles span the bottom of the pelvis in a diamond shape between the pubic bone, tail bone and two sitting bones. The muscles engage when you narrow that diamond and lift it gently toward your center. If this is hard to find, try stopping and the flow of urine the next time you use the toilet. They are the same muscles groups. Keep them lifted throughout the exercises.
If your hamstrings and the fascial tissue in the back of the legs and hips is tight, do your forward bends with your knees bent. After you fold forward with bent knees you can slowly begin to work the back of the knees open and invite more length into that region of the body. Be patient. With patient attention the hamstrings will lengthen over many months or years, not weeks.
Finally, when you add the bow of the head toward your sternum you complete the stretch of the back surface of the body and the spinal cord. Rest in your forward bend for a few breaths, or even 2 to 5 minutes, as your body can tolerate. Longer resting in a safe position (perhaps 80% of your range of motion with abdominal and pelvic floor muscles engaged) will result in gradual changes in the body.
Namaste,
Lisa
p.s. the great music is by my friend Sid Rosen. It is from the CD "Not Alone." You can get copies of the CD through cdbaby.com, Gracewinds Music, or Grass Roots Bookstore.
When we stretch the back of the body the nerves themselves get stretched. Within a reasonable tolerance, nerves like being stretched. Even when there is some pull in the muscles and fascia, there is a pleasure sensation in forward bends. They all calm us, help us sleep, and help us deal with stress.
.
Forward bends are also risky. More people injure themselves in forward bends than in back bends . If the intervertebral disks are compromised, too much pressure on the back of the disk can cause further disk damage and result in the disk pushing onto the nerve roots and causing pain and sciatica. Additionally, when the spine is cantilevered forward of the body, the lumbar spine (low back) is working at maximum capacity. If the muscles are not strong enough to support the weight of the upper body you risk injury with a flat back (extended spine, number 2 in the video) forward bend. When your abdominal muscles are engaged, they help in the work of carrying the upper body's weight and the risk of injury is greatly lessened. If you think you have weak abs and back muscles, stick with the Pilates Roll Down (number 1 in the video) until you feel yourself gaining some strength in these muscles.
To support forward bends, continuously engage your deep abdominal and pelvic floor muscles. You can find this work with the following exercises: Place a hand on your belly and feel the softness there. Breath in and out of your stomach. As you exhale you will feel the abdomen hollow. This is transverse abdominus engaging. Lift the belly even further back and hold it there while you breath into your rib cage now. This move engages both the tranverse abdominus and the oblique abdominal muscles. Just this breathing move done every day (3 minutes of conscious engagement about 3 times each day) will begin to improve your ab strength. Keep this engagement throughout your forward bends, and engage even more intently when you return to standing.
You also want to engage your pelvic floor to help support the lumbar spine. Pelvic floor muscles span the bottom of the pelvis in a diamond shape between the pubic bone, tail bone and two sitting bones. The muscles engage when you narrow that diamond and lift it gently toward your center. If this is hard to find, try stopping and the flow of urine the next time you use the toilet. They are the same muscles groups. Keep them lifted throughout the exercises.
If your hamstrings and the fascial tissue in the back of the legs and hips is tight, do your forward bends with your knees bent. After you fold forward with bent knees you can slowly begin to work the back of the knees open and invite more length into that region of the body. Be patient. With patient attention the hamstrings will lengthen over many months or years, not weeks.
Finally, when you add the bow of the head toward your sternum you complete the stretch of the back surface of the body and the spinal cord. Rest in your forward bend for a few breaths, or even 2 to 5 minutes, as your body can tolerate. Longer resting in a safe position (perhaps 80% of your range of motion with abdominal and pelvic floor muscles engaged) will result in gradual changes in the body.
Namaste,
Lisa
p.s. the great music is by my friend Sid Rosen. It is from the CD "Not Alone." You can get copies of the CD through cdbaby.com, Gracewinds Music, or Grass Roots Bookstore.
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