Taking a break from yoga instruction during lockdowns and closures has helped me to inhale a big, fresh breath of gratitude for leading classes and being in community again. I simply feel that I am showing up and exhaling more of myself.
In a note I wrote and handed out to yoga students in February of 2019 (included below), I said, ‘we are in this thing together,” a sentiment that has been used to describe the pandemic to evoke a feeling of solidarity.
When is anyone really in anything together? I have considered this phrase so much during lockdowns aware that one person’s experience was certainly not someone else’s. And yet, community is a powerful way to not feel so alone. To be understood. To belong. To feel wanted. To be aligned with purpose. To feel brave enough to ‘jump in’. The thing is, you still have to jump. No one can do that for you.
Once your basic needs are met, what stops you? What holds you back from living authentically?
Do you create a list of reasons of why together won’t get you there, why some of the gifts you bring to the world are unworthy, or you don’t deserve a certain kind of life because it is too late, you are too old, too comfortable, too set in your ways, not old enough or smart enough or not something-enough yet.
Isn’t there a middle ground like the letter below suggests? What about committing to showing up for yourself? What about showing up for yourself with others cheering you on? And then, showing up again and again for something that shifts you? What about committing to nothing else but to overcome your own objections?
I was outside in our backyard this morning looking at our tomato plants that have produced so much fruit this year. There are still tomatoes ripening, at least until the first frost anyway. It is hard to believe that those rows of giant plants were once fledgling little ones we nurtured under a light in our basement this spring. I often think I am just like those small plants aspiring to be the robust ‘adults’ that unabashedly reach for the sun and flourish all season long. Do you ever wonder the same?
In my thirties, I completed my second 200 hour yoga teacher training program, this time in rural Mexico. I was ripe to learn. My practice had shifted from an almost exclusive physical focus to one that included mindfulness through movement and a seated meditation practice. I was like the tomato plants that began as a protected seed in my practice who sprouted into childhood and who was gradually growing into a gangly adolescent. I wanted to be ready for the outside world but it was necessary to be exposed to the challenge of spending a short amount of time outside for many days in a row (away from direct sun and wind) before I could ever survive being planted in the ground. I had to face difficulty; to be hardened off if were to thrive.
I was challenged on my way home from this month away (and many times since). I remember peacefully sitting alone in the small Mexican airport terminal waiting for my flight to Houston. I wrote in my journal something to the effect that I was dedicated to maintaining the shifts I had observed in myself over the month. I was more of a watcher of my mind chatter and I had begun to recognize my reactivity. My experience of myself and others was also one of tremendous love; there was a generosity in me that was newly present.
I flew to Houston in a kind of bliss bubble. When I arrived, I had to go through security again. This was shortly after 9/11 when nothing about flying was efficient. I recall standing in line in Houston and seeing the craziness. I mean, really seeing the hyper activity and anxious tension of everyone around me. The woman directly in front had her laptop open on her rolling suitcase and was typing away madly while she aggressively spoke on the phone. There were arguments and lots of yelling everywhere because there were so many people missing flights due to the hold up. No one was wearing shoes or belts because airport staff was telling everyone to remove them even if they’d just entered the cue. Everywhere I looked I saw a kind of suffering and recognized that I largely lived my own version of this in my regular life at home by constantly running away from myself and toward my long to-do list. I could 100% feel the collective frenetic response to the stress of the room in my body and still I was somehow moving through the line unfazed.
I was calm of course only until I realized I’d missed my own flight out of Houston to Toronto. I got to my gate and the ground crew representative from the airline said there was nothing she could do for me. She told me that my name had been called and I didn’t respond and that made the three hour delay in getting to my gate my problem. I was advised that I would have to purchase a new ticket or fly on standby which meant at least spending that night at the airport.
I was incensed at the unfairness of it all. I had gone directly from my connecting flight into the security line and directly from there to my gate. I didn’t hear my name called because going through security had been complete madness. I communicated my perspective through angry tears; my equanimity entirely tossed aside.
I love this quote about meditation by Daniel Goleman, “It’s not the highs along the way that matter. It’s who you become.”
I am reflecting more and more on this lately.
What experiences have shaped who you have become? What changes stuck around and what made them stick? Do you know?
What difficulties have helped ‘harden you to the elements’ for better or for worse? And how many difficulties, if left to your own devices, would you have likely pushed away and said, ‘Not me, not now. I would prefer another manageable serving of joy please.’
Doesn’t a range of experiences create fertile ground for growth? Aren’t the highs important because they give you a glimpse of your true nature, your better self? Aren’t the neutral moments like the magical (often ignored) hum of insects, a kind of baseline of the beauty of being human? And the difficulties? Don’t these force you to root deeply, to sometimes pour more energy (and consciousness) into the earth and branch out under and above ground more than you can possibly imagine when you are still a seedling?
Isn’t it all necessary?
Before you can ever sustain bearing the fruit, don’t you first need the capacity to steadily reach for the sun?
What do you think? I would love to hear your thoughts.
On one of our canoe camping trips with friends this summer I could hear this blog post writing itself; the wisdom of the woods was a total chatter-box, especially on the third day.
We paddled a fair way and then came to our portage that was just a little under 1km. The terrain wasn’t as tough as the portage a couple of days prior but it was muddy. In fact, the trail told a pretty good story about the effect of thick mud on those treading through with heavy packs and canoes. There were two different abandoned shoes (presumably more than one person), wanted to see the lake on the other side so much that they just kept going and didn’t look back even when their shoe was sucked clean off their foot.
I could easily imagine how they must have felt. The pack I was carrying was ridiculously heavy; I actually couldn’t lift it on to my own back. Once I was strapped in, moving forward and staying on my feet was my goal. In places that were particularly muddy, losing my balance wasn’t an ideal option even though I was tested a lot walking along logs that were placed in the thick of it or trying to find tree roots or rocks to avoid sinking into the mud. Finally I reached the end, grateful to take off the pack, to catch my breath and drink some water.
When we were all gathered at the end of the trail, I realized I had to double back for a few extra things that were left behind.
I walked back along the exact same trail with no pack. I was lighter, more energetic and agile but it wasn’t just the feeling of my body that instantly transformed. There were still lots of muddy spots. I saw the same detours around the mud I’d seen previously but I also saw alternate routes that were literally not part of my awareness when I was weighted down by the pack I carried. Those options didn’t exist for me because I didn’t see them. On the way back, I hopped from rock to rock and over tree roots and around trees. I could now more easily navigate. I was looking wider and farther. The trail also seemed brighter. I noticed the different shades of green as the light filtered through the trees. I saw birds and butterflies and chipmunks. My perspective was expansive and I had a range of choices.
Get Out of the Muck
Isn’t this also true with the weight we may choose to carry through our lives? Demanding relationships, endless tasks and responsibilities, destructive habits, retelling ourselves stories about the way things should be or have always been. When it feels like you are carrying the weight of the world on your back, your vision narrows and so do the options available to you. With your head down, trudging through the muck to your destination you can miss the quality, affects and beauty of the light and life in the trees. It may not be necessary to carry the weight you bear to begin with and other times we may not realize when we get to the end of the trail that taking off the bags we carry is even an option. Sometimes we can get used to seeing no way out of the mud or beyond the well-travelled trail.
Something to Think About
Get honest about the weight you carry. What stories do you tell yourself that you can let go of? In your quiet moments, what do you know in your heart would leave you lighter and more agile than ever if you set down the weight of it for good?
When I was about five or six years old I had an unfortunate incident with silly putty that forced my mother to declare that she would NEVER, EVER buy it again. Sadly, she kept her word.
I loved everything about silly putty: It was a toy I could take anywhere inside its travelling egg case. It was malleable, sort of like play dough but also surprisingly different. It had an endless stretch if you pulled it apart slowly and a clean break if you ripped it apart fast. I liked that it bounced (even if it picked up strands of hair or bits of whatever else off the floor). I didn’t mind that the colour of it went from a pale pearly white to a dull grey because it did something else that was entirely miraculous: it glowed in the dark.
One night I got ready for bed in record time. I was tucked in, lights were out and for once I wanted it to be really dark. I’d been charging up my silly putty on a lightbulb for as long as my patience allowed before I took it under the covers I’d tented over my head. I had seen it glow a bunch of times already in my closet but this technique was better. It was super dark and it glowed more than ever. The coolest part was that when I stretched it really thin, I could see the tiny bits of stuff stuck in it that wasn’t silly putty. I didn’t get tired of stretching it and stretching it and stretching it, until of course I finally did and fell fast asleep.
In the morning silly putty was everywhere. It was in my hair, on my pyjamas, on the sheets, the blankets and, since I was such an active sleeper, it even found its way onto my mattress.
A weird haircut and lots of harsh words later, I was acutely aware that my silly putty days were over.
Currently, I’m taking a course with spiritual guide, Eckhart Tolle. So many of the teachings resonate but the wisdom that I have the most sincere desire to take-in and live is this:
“No relationship can be satisfying for long in the absence of the transcendent dimension.” —Eckhart Tolle
Even silly putty, Eckhart?
Yes. I am convinced he’d say that even my exhilarating and pure relationship with silly putty would have gone south. My fascination would have run its course. The egg container may have become too odd a shape to take everywhere. The bits of gunk I accumulated in it would have looked gross eventually. The stretch and snap would have been ‘just what it does’.
Think about all the stuff and achievements you’ve obtained in your lifetime that held the promise of happiness, of telling you who you are, of taking away your pain. All relationships, whether with another human being, with desired material possessions, work or other accomplishments, might make you happy at first but it doesn’t last for long if you are using these as distractions, as a way to fill yourself up or to ease your dis-ease about yourself.
This becomes most evident when the object of your attachment is withdrawn. Your neediness and clinging cause the real suffering although that won’t be what your mind tells you. Think about a specific situation in your own life and weigh the truth of this.
Without awareness of your own being, doesn’t everything have the potential to become a prop in the stories you tell yourself about yourself?
Until a commitment is made to practice presence; to reside in the joy of being, a joy without cause, then the same make-me-happy-demand on everything in life continues. It is a cycle I want to break for good. It is a cycle I want to help others break too.
Here is a practice to try: When you catch yourself irritated about something, decide to experiment with dropping the story you are telling yourself in regard to the irritation. Start small and be relentless. You might watch the feeling in your body associated with the irritation but instead of fuelling it with thought, notice what is simply there. Each time you want to contribute to the story in your head, move back to what is happening right where you are in the moment. Begin to cultivate awareness of being.
As a yogi, I have a fairly flexible body. What is the best yoga trick I know? The one that truly stands out as noteworthy and worth the effort to practice again and again, is to nurture that same kind of flexibility with my mind.
I am staring down a very rigid mind this morning. I am drinking a green smoothie, and thinking about the portaging trips this summer. The planning must begin. I am also thinking about what that means for my morning smoothies and fresh produce in general…these things will not be on the menu. Meh.
Portaging food will be tasty. Our dehydrator will run non-stop for a few days in preparation. The lists will be exhaustive and so will the organization of all the gear. We will be in good shape all the way around. Even though I am not leaving tomorrow, and despite my awareness that this is something I actually enjoy doing, merely planning is making my mind put on the breaks.
I’m filled with excitement but also with dread. My mind is sticky. It likes what it likes. I wrote about this last summer too, in the post Discomfort and Pleasure.
I am dreamy about the sound the paddle makes as it moves through the water. I am looking forward to adventuring through the woods with everything we’ll need on our backs and the undoubtedly endless sources of awe.
I am not anchored in the beauty or awe right now.
Instead my mind is dangling the carrot of comfort that exists in my current reality. This morning I appreciated my insect free environment while I practiced yoga and the freedom to stand upright as I made my breakfast shake using my blender to make fresh produce (easily accessed from my fridge) into a smoothie. Noticing the sound of the toilet flushing and the shower as it was turned on upstairs were things of beauty today. These observations and many more have reentered my awareness as luxuries in the anticipation of their absence.
It occurs to me once again that my flexibility needs some work. Change brings awareness and facilitates growth. What ways do you recognize this in yourself? How might you plan for a switch-up even if it feels uncomfortable in the moment?
Things to try
Remove access to tech and modern conveniences by going wilderness camping
Place your phone on silent at home or work and batch-check messages if necessary
Take a social media holiday
Try new foods or recipes even if you eat a varied diet
Plan a fresh-pressed juice cleanse
Deliberately wear colour if you dress in neutral shades
Try a new workout and complete it at a different time of day
If you lack structure, schedule regular activities during the most stable/unchangeable part of your day like first thing in the morning
If you tend to watch movies, start a book and if you read more than you watch do the opposite
If you are naturally chatty explore being quiet and pay attention to others
If you tend to be quiet, challenge yourself to say hello to strangers when out for a walk, pick up the phone and call someone you haven’t connected with in awhile
Garden
Paint a room
Rearrange furniture
Declutter
Allow a space for clutter if it makes you uncomfortable
If you feel compelled to do dishes immediately after a meal, try going for a walk after dinner first and then do the dishes.
If you tend to put off everyday chores, complete them first thing in the morning
Spend time paying attention to animals everyday for a week even if you don’t have a pet (we all have access to birds, squirrels)
Smile
Find reasons to laugh
Do one thing that brings you closer to something you know in your heart is good for you
I am so moved every time I read this poem by Lorna Crozier. It reminds me of how fragile and misguided we can be as human beings; always searching outside ourselves for what is right there inside of us. Why do we believe more readily in,
“…the birds at false dawn…” then our own unique wisdom and music?
What if you knew the unwavering answer to the question posed in the poem, “Where does the singing start?” Where does abiding beauty and goodness; “pure light…” begin? What if you could hear that answer whispered to you with deep, assuring love each time you needed reminding?
Imagine a patient knowingness, coaxing you to remember that it all begins,
“Here, where you are, there’s room
Between your heartbeats…”
What if the perfect marriage has always been between being and doing? And your rightful work is knowing and practicing how to step outside of the thoughts that are steering your life? How might giving yourself the gift of your own attention and the gift of your own no-strings-attached love, how might this affect all of your relationships…all of your moments big and small?
What if you got out of your own way so that,
“…everything you have ever been
Begins, inside, to sing.“
Something to try:
Practice paying attention to your breath, your heart beat and the sensations of the body, more often than you check messages on your phone this week.
My nephew gave me a jar of homemade strawberry jam yesterday.
I remember all the times my sisters and I made jam with my mom. How the fresh berries we’d pick, that I wanted to eat right then, were marked for jam. It felt like an enormous injustice in the moment but by winter it was a distant memory when I layered summer sweetness over buttered toast.
The gift of jam also made me think of the poem, “Answers,” by Mary Oliver and of how sweet simplicity is; uncomplicated happiness without the weight of obligations, and of how things were or should be.
In these first days of summer, what calls you home to simplicity? Allow yourself to be at ease with whatever is; allow being to be the answer.
Do you know that expectant look on someone’s face, accompanied by food in hand and the words, “Try this. You’re going to love it!”
Food can be an experience if you are paying attention.
After travelling when I was younger, I came home with a dismal bank account balance but a big appetite to work. My day job was in advertising as a copywriter, a few days a week over lunch and weeknights I led yoga classes from various locations and on Saturdays and Sundays I worked at a hair salon/spa, massaging. I was a busy bee.
The owners of the salon and spa were busier. They had a work ethic that was astounding. I learned a lot through them the seven years I was there. I also ate a tremendous variety of foods that were entirely new to me and was presented with that expectant look that I would ‘love it.’ Often I did.
Weekends were almost always fully booked for massage so I usually only had time to eat during the cross-over from one client to the next.
I would bring food and the owners often had something they’d made me or bought for me from the Asian supermarket nearby. I ate it all in fast and mindless bites whenever I had the chance.
One afternoon I was excited to try a baked good that had been talked about a lot that morning. It was a very pale white/grey and sort of smelled like play-doe (in a good way). I thought it might have been bread but I wasn’t sure. It wasn’t that big and I popped the whole thing in my mouth. I noticed immediately that there was excitement amongst the others in the break room as I ate it. They watched me closely.
The texture was really odd but I didn’t want to let on and hurt anyone’s feelings. It was pillowy soft and also the chewiest thing I’d ever eaten. It melted in my mouth and also didn’t break-down no matter how much I chewed and chewed. I was in a hurry and literally didn’t feel like I had time to keep chewing this thing. I pictured my next client already on the massage table. I gulped some water and chewed and drank more water and chewed and finally I got it down. There was a lot of laughter and chatter in Cantonese and then one woman finally said to me in English, “You ate the paper.”
Eating with presence is one of life’s true sensual pleasures. It is a doing that is ripe for practicing being. When you are in a hurry or your mind is everywhere but the present moment, you are missing out on the feedback from your senses….you might also miss that something is wrapped in paper 😀
How often do you eat without the slightest recollection of any part of the meal?
Try this:
Carve out time for all your meals (or at least one a day) this week. Remove distractions like clutter, screens, noise. Arrange your food on your plate in a way that is pleasing to you. Notice the visual texture of your food, how it smells and feels as you touch it or cut through it. Notice the sound of your breath as you lift the food to your mouth. Allow an awareness to sink into you that food keeps your miraculous body functioning; it is vital to keeping you alive. Once your food enters your mouth, pour all your attention into texture, the first taste. Don’t be in a hurry. Noice what flavours emerge and the changes in texture, the movement of your jaw, lips, the role of your teeth and tongue. Watch for flavour even as you swallow and then once your mouth is relatively empty again. Try to be there for every single bite. Explore what it feels like to be with your whole body too so that you might also realize when you truly have had enough.
Someone I know once gave me what I still think is pretty good advice on how to have a difficult conversation over the phone. Here were the 3-step instructions:
Stand tall and take up space; apparently you sound more confident.
Be sure that you can at least see your face in a mirror and be vigilant about keeping a neutral to pleasant facial expression that will be reflected in your voice.
Write out all the points you would like to make beforehand so these are fresh in your mind but don’t use your notes during the conversation, choose to actively listen instead.
When I first started to lead yoga classes, I worked from various locations. One place I held classes, was a dance studio I sub-letted from another woman. She had a strong personality, she was a force field actually, and I was a bit scared of her 😉
Initially, her own classes were few and far between. The first part of the year things went really well between us but mostly because we rarely crossed paths. Once she started using the space more often we ran into difficulties around scheduling. Here are three of the bigger examples:
A: The days/times I would use the space no longer worked for her schedule after we’d agreed and I had printed my flyers. I was out of pocket for printing but since I hadn’t distributed them yet, I decided not to rock the boat.
B: An hour before one of my classes was scheduled, she left me a voice mail to say that the space was not available to me or my students that day because she would be using it for a private session. I received her message only after arriving for the class since I had driven straight there from my day job.
C: Much like the situation above, I was called the same day of a class (the morning of this time), and advised to call my students right away so there wouldn’t be an embarrassing repeat of our last scheduling conflict. From my perspective these weren’t examples of unforeseen or unavoidable conflicts but an emerging pattern of poor planning on her part. She saw it differently.
This is when I employed the ‘difficult conversation over the phone’ guidelines for the first time. Here they are again under a mindfulness lens:
Stand large (remain grounded in the body).
Watch your face in the mirror (stay present, act with intention, allow emotions to move through you).
Write out your concerns clearly so you are ready to listen (appease the voice in your head that compares, critiques and needs to be right and remove the distraction of planning your response while the other person is speaking).
The call was like a magic elixir for me. I stayed grounded, calm and kind. I expressed how I perceived the situation and responded to her concerns from the present moment. It was a very different experience from previous interactions between us. I also made the decision during the conversation that it was necessary to go our separate ways…and not in a hot-headed way, it just made sense.
Mindfulness practices are practical.
In retrospect, here’s what I also learned through this relationship. Her behaviour was a problem. My behaviour was equally the problem.
She was able to steam roll me because I was willing to be steam rolled. She could be unclear about boundaries because I was also unclear about boundaries. She chose to fixate on my inadequacies (my lack of responsiveness to her needs as the primary user of the space) and I chose to fixate on her inadequacies (her lack of respect for our agreements and my students time). We were stuck in this struggle with each other that we each created and upheld. Years later, I chatted with her during a chance encounter in a parking lot and she shared the strain that she was under at the time which also placed a lot in perspective.
Examine your own difficult relationships this week. Start in the past for more ready-access to reflections with fewer emotional attachments. Then, work forward to a present-day struggle. What is at the root of your difficulties with others? How do you tend to project onto the other person? What role do you play? How can you start with yourself right now to make a shift?
You can’t change another person but you can create the conditions for their response when you make a change in yourself.
You could work this out on paper, with a therapist or explore an openness to ‘what is’ through a meditation. Or maybe…try picking up the phone. Good luck.
