Inspirations: Practicing

The fascinating work in a dance is the moment connecting two moves.  As a long time choreographer I’ve watched a lot of dance.  The ahaaa moment is not necessarily when the leg extends high into the air, though that is glamorous and exciting, rather is is the connective fiber taking the leg toward its next move that is the emotional ahaaa, the emotional glue of the dance.  The go-between moments are the truly creative work in any process.  This prepositional-concept is true in all areas, such as having a fascinating idea.  In dance, the high-held-leg is a magnificent moment. But where does it carry you from there?  What will it become?  How is it powerful, or not?  This is true of Yoga, especially Vinyasa Flow. It is true of Pranayama, in that it is the moment between inhale and exhale that holds the key to an expanded life.  The intention and ability to create strong binding, the fine weaving that holds something together, be it Asanas, Pranayam, dance, poetry, engineering, research…  this is the heart of a creation.   Here, in the space-between, is where bodies and minds, sinew, and soul expose themselves.  This in between moment, like a good preposition, is the gatekeeper toward deeply expressive wisdom. In the Spanda System, the fourth system of the Trika philosophy of Kashmir Shaivism, Hatha Yoga is given focus and direction for seeking experience of the Self, not only to undertake a physical Practice, but a practice of self discovery.  ”As the heart and power of inspiration behind the practice….We look for the ‘in-between’ places, between breaths, and between actions, in which there is the experience of quiet awareness and inspiration.  This awareness of Spanda is the essence of the qualities of the heart expressed in our Practice.”* “Heart of the Yogi.”  By Doug Keller.        When learning something for the first time,… Read more »

 Maintaining a Practice, any Practice that supports the soul we hope to know, the person we wish to be, offers a fighting chance to fully embody life.  It holds the possibility to fulfill wide dreams.  It offers re-newed hope to create the world we wish to live in.  Otherwise, all bets are off. As we rush and push to produce, meet deadlines and obligations, it is unbelievably easy to lose Self, to have visions grow befuddled, and dreams die because we think they have a shelf-life that expires. It is only by finding a Practice that returns us time and again to essential self that we do not lose soul- essence.  It is too easy to succumb to demands where a superficial self is ‘good enough.’  Soon we believe that is who we are.  Nurturing Practices hone us within time and again.  They are talismans of faith, and beacons of good will. Whatever the Practice, be it meditation, time on the mat, chanting, breathing, singing, walking, knitting…it is whatever dedicates you, whatever offers space and time to simply re-engage essence.  A good Practice bears non-judgmental witness to our hodge-podge of desires, our flailings and failings, and half baked attempts.  It is the silent friend standing by our side.  No small gift. Asana: Kapinjalasana/Bird Drinking Raindrops Pose, or a mundane Partridge, one that lives on raindrops and dew.  Nice.  Iyengar writes that it is a cross between Vasisthanasana and Padangustha Dhanurasana, an extreme Bow Pose.  Enter it from Vasisthanasana, with body turned sideways to R, balancing on outer edge of R foot and R hand. On exhale, bend L leg back and reach back with L hand, grabbing big toe, or ankle.  Now rotate L elbow and shoulder to bring arm up and over, pulling L leg higher toward the back… Read more »

Does the end justify the means? I used to think so. Now, seeing the means are the end, and the end simply another piece of the means… I don’t agree with the old quote. Looking back, each time I gave gravitas to ‘justifying the means,’ I was more careless and cruel, worse, I gave myself permission to be so because the end result was seemingly fabulous. We are creating a new world. Old ways and mean-means cannot apply. We need new tools that help us rise above, move through, and embrace this frustrating, frightening, exciting, changeable Universe we are creating by thought, word, and deed….Indeed. Perhaps we need to re-visit old and favored sayings? “The devil is in the details.” So it is, but do we want it there? “What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.” Is revenge that important? “All is fair in love and war.” Only if the ends justify the means. Before ‘throwing the baby out with the bath water,’ let’s hold on to the keepers: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” “Fear always springs from ignorance.” “Gratitude is the heart’s memory.” If means and ends are one and the same, then ingrained/unconscious habits in thinking and speaking, outdate and drown us in the devil’s deep blue sea. Multi-tasking demands attention in every moment. Distractions tweet at every turn. Mindlessness is the sugary icing on every devil’s cake. As we are entering the Aquarian age, we must abide by its Uranian rulership: Energy is first, and thought-forms of that energy are the electromagnetic playing field. We are responsible for creating every heedless idea, word, and action of our ‘means,’ for they are the end…and the beginning. Asana: Pick a pose where the means are the end, like Happy Baby…. Read more »

What stories will we tell ourselves on dying? Will we look back in wonder & awe at our asinine adventuring? Or, will we be dazzled by the lists of good intention constructed each morning? Will we be enthralled by a vigorous growth of spirit, or shamed by lingering cowardice? All things, I suspect, though the assumption of seeing the bigger picture at death is specious at best. It’s difficult to imagine even constructing a story when going at this speed, impossible to create the plot line. Perhaps it’s time to p r a c t I c e? What story do we have to tell ourselves at the end of the day? Mine runs something like this… “Egad, didn’t get the report done, the books put away, can’t check daily-pages off, or meditation. When am I getting car to the mechanic? And I still can’t get into that size six. Fewer fats tomorrow.” Now there is a story I can’t wait to read! What a bloody cock-up of a beautiful life. Perhaps it is time to Practice. Instead of collapsing into wine, whining, and TV at the end of the day, what if we told ourselves a story of that day, and all day long we saw ourselves as the hero/heroine of this fairy tale. Would we change the day? Fewer lists, more costumes? Less dishes, more black stallions, and swords? What if we grew enough awareness to realize this could be the last day, the ultimate story we have a chance to create and tell? What if this is my day for a ‘Once upon a time histoire, and I bollux it by checking it off as an item on my list? A moment never to return, be cherished, or re-told. Asana/Pose: Is there a pose that gives you… Read more »

I see, despite every desire and intention, I do not surrender gracefully. My mind-energy, that powerful, invisible, elixir of feeling and thought, refuses to grow peaceful, graceful, let alone joyous, at fall’s arrival. Yes! It’s an exuberant season of change. I love change. It’s beautiful, with wind blown gold’s and yellows, colors of wisdom and sunny dispositions. But fall’s plot-line is a short story to winter’s darkness. Perhaps fall shapes and shifts us toward our dying process? Knowing I can choose to have any ideas around fall I wish makes it worse. If I were a sage I could write another plot. If I were a great sage, I could change the mind-energy to even grow ebullient on the summer’s closure of this plot line. I am neither. I am a rube of a metaphysician. Here’s what I know, not what I have necessarily attained: Thought creates our world, real and imagined. Word follows thought, adding power and majesty to the thought. Speaking our ‘thought-energy’ is the next layer of building credibility for belief. The more mindful, read choice-full, we are in our thoughts, words, and expression, the more profoundly we inhabit our lives. It stands to reason that the more consciously we inhabit each thought, the more our inner life responds to conscious ideas, and vice versa. This all works swimmingly until I think of fall, and cave into trauma and indigestion over its arrival. Even as a rube I realize I need to sit, however uncomfortably, with the intensity of my anger, or is it depression? Is it angst covering depression, covering anger? What lies below this hijacked story-line…hijacked because I’ve not taken it into my heart and mind. It remains in my gut where I’ve let it take little bites out of the stomach lining. The last… Read more »