APARIGRAHA

Aparigraha is the last yama, it reminds us that clinging to material objects and people weighs us down.  Aparigraha means nonpossessiveness and asks us to practice letting go.

Aparigraha is a multifaceted concept that means nonattachment, nongreed, nonclinging, nongrasping, and noncoveting.  Simply, it is “letting go.”  Change is one of the few certainties in life and change is natural.  By failing to let things change or move on, they begin to disappoint us and our attempts to hold on begin to make us stale and discontent.  What we try to possess, possesses us.  Aparigraha is a yama that asks us to love deeply and engage fully, but not to get attached.

 

Listen to your breath.  Allow your breath to be your teacher for this concept of aparigraha.  Trust life as you trust the breath.  Take in all the nourishment of the moment and then let it go fully, trusting that more nourishment will come.  When we forget to trust life, to exhale and let go, the breath is held too long and becomes toxic.  The same goes for attachment, often unconscious, which disturbs ourselves with expectations, opinions, criticisms, and disappointments.  But remember that the nature of our universe is impermanence, nothing stays the same, everything is transient and there is abundance of people, experiences, and things to fill you when you let go of one thing to find another.

 

Letting go is a skill the demands courage and practice.  Everyone prefers to let go when they know what is coming next, but sometimes you must let something go when its time is up without a plan.  This is risky, it is raw, vulnerable, and uncomfortable.  It feels like being suspended in mid air without anything to hold on to.  But our freedom from greed and possessiveness is important to our spiritual growth and the unfolding of our lives.  Aparigraha asks us to value this freedom and flexibility over our reflexive tendency to grasp and hold on to something that pleases us.

 

Attachments are like nailing ourselves to our need for someone or something to continue to be the same and to always be there for us in the same way.  There are many types of attachments.  Subtle attachments come in the form of our images and beliefs about ourselves, about how life should be, about how others should be.  These images keep us in bondage to our own learning and growth.  The material items we hoard, collect, and buy take up space and demand our attention.  Clutter in our physical space blocks our ability to physically move, while clutter in our minds blocks our freedom to expand and have space for the next thing life wants to bring us.

 

Nonattachment does not mean that we don’t care or that we somehow shut ourselves off from the pleasures and joy of life and each other.  We are asked to let go of the clinging to the thing, not the enjoyment of the thing itself.  The fewer attachments we carry with us, the more we are free to enjoy and engage and live every moment before us to the fullest.  The more we generously share and give away, the more expansive and light we become.  The journey of life is towards freedom.  Practicing constant generosity and unfailing trust will keep our greed in check and keep us open to life’s unfolding.

BRAHMACHARYA

 The fourth yama is brahmacharya, or nonexcess.  This means creating an awareness of sacredness in our actions and an attentiveness to each moment that moves us into a stance of holiness. From this point we are grateful and mindful of all, living within the limits of enough. 

We all have desires for pleasure, but we must learn how to deal with these wants in a manner that gives us more energy and vitality, rather than giving over to the bloated discomfort and guilt that comes with greed and excess.

 

In yogic thought there is a moment in time when we reach the perfect limit of what we are engaged in.  It is this moment of “just enough” that we need to recognize.  The mind has a tendency to be extravagant and through yoga we help it connect and listen to the body which knows its needs and is more easily satisfied.  Nonexcess is not about nonenjoyment.  It actually is about enjoyment and pleasure in its fullest experience, without the chains of addiction or discomfort of excess.

 

Brahmacharya also asks of us to be fearless in facing our saness, grief, and disappointments without needing to soothe them with food or sex. Emotionally unattach from the things that serve as a crutch to prop you up when you seek comfort or distraction.  Codependency can be a negative relationship with people or things, and Brahmacharya asks us to value and protect our independence. Vulnerability is the courage of the true self and will satisfy you more than any external band aid.

 

Finally, Brahmacharya becomes easy when we return to that child-like sense of wonder for the world around us.  Can you honor all as sacred?  Can you honor yourself as sacred? Excess overdoes us, overextends us, and takes us away from ourselves, seeing everything as sacred firmly roots us and balances.  If things have become dull and ordinary to us, it is because we have kept too fast a pace for too long, pushing our boundaries and causing imbalance.  When we are rested, nothing is dull, everything glows with mystery.

 

Be true to the purpose and limits of each thing in existence.  Behave purely and serve purely the reality of what you are given.  Practice gratitude and you will always have abundance and excess.

 

I am currently reading “Dry. A memoir” by Augusten Burroughs.  Anyone who has tried to make a dramatic change in their life, not exclusive of addiction, can relate to the struggle and hard work self-improvement takes.  Here is a passage that reminded me of how a grateful perspective can change our mind.

“People in crisis are always looking for these big, dramatic miracles.  How we want the glass of water to magically rise up off the table.  How we overlook the miracle that there is a glass at all in the first place.  And give the universe, isn’t the real miracle that the glass doesn’t just float up and away?”

ASTEYA

 Asteya is the yama, or restraint, of non-stealing.  

It addresses the tendency we have when unsatisfied with ourselves to look outward and steal what is not rightfully ours.  We can steal from others, the earth, but also we steal from our own opportunity to grow ourselves into the person who has the right to have the life they want.  Asteya calls on us to live with integrity and reciprocity.

When we compare ourselves to others, we either find ourselves lacking, which makes us feel cheated and jealous, or we find ourselves superior, which leaves us feeling arrogant.  We steal attention from others by “one-upping” them — interrupting them with our own more fabulous tale.  Rare is the person who spends more time at a party listening than talking about themselves.  Yogi Bhajan says “be a forklift; you should always be lifting people up.”  Ask yourself if in your encounters with others, does the person feel uplifted and lighter because they have been with you?

In the most universal sense of life, we are visitors to this land, to our bodies, and to our minds, lucky enough to have a human experience. Nothing can, or truly does “belong” to us.  “My clothes, my car, my class, my space”…  notice how the overuse of ownership creates barriers around you and steals from the people around you.  Asteya asks us to view everything in our possession as something precious that is on loan to us.  And for the time that it is on loan to us, we are asked to care for it.  Imagine what would happen if each tie we took something, we gave something back.

Asteya asks us to cultivate daily gratitude.  Our focus seems to be on what we don’t have or what we might not have in the future, rather than on the abundance right before us.  If we stop long enough to gaze at what is laid out before us, to let the mystery of beauty and the wonder of the seasons sit deeply in our soul, our hearts cannot help but burst forth in thanksgiving and gratitude to life itself.  Inborn to this kind of wonder is gratitude for where our life came from and indebtedness to the future.  Your existence stands on an incredible lineage of people that worked to give you this gift of life.  Imagine if you made all decisions as if they mattered seven generations into the future.

Give yourself time to digest or assimilate the experiences in our lives.  We need time to rest and to reflect and to contemplate. Observe all the self-sabotage you commit, and know that it is a form
of stealing from yourself. Our outcomes in life are consistent with our abilities, not necessarily our wishes or our goals.  So do the work, challenge yourself to grow the competency to keep what you want when you finally have an opportunity to get it.  Don’t steal and see yourself as a victim, but rather build your skills and competency and the world will seem joyful and full of possibility as we shape ourselves into someone of value.

Our meditation on asteya comes from the humble words of Albert Einstein:
“A hundred times a day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other people, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the full measure I have received and am still receiving.”

SATYA

 The second yama, satya, is truthfulness.

When we are real rather than nice, when we choose self-expression over self-indulgence, when we choose growth over the need to belong, and when we choose fluidity over rigidity, we begin to understand the deeper dynamics of truthfulness, and we begin to taste the freedom and goodness of the jewel of truthfulness.

Truthfulness is partnered with ahimsa, truthfulness keeps nonviolence from being a wimpy cop-out, while non-violence keeps truthfulness from being a brutal weapon.  When there is cause for disharmony or confusion between the two, truthfulness bows to nonviolence.   First and foremost, do no harm.  This gives a fluidity to truth, that it is situational and changes over time.  Always we must view the world with a fresh lens, being vulnerable to new ideas, and people, and ask ourselves if we are engaged in the truthful pursuit that is right for this time of our lives.

Real has a boldness to it, an essence, a spontaneity.  It is a contact with the moment that is not superimposed or prepackaged. Real, though not always pleasant, is trustworthy.

Truthfulness lies at the core of self-expression.  When we habitually silence and distort ourselves, we begin to lose our lust for life and look towards other things to fulfill us.  We forget that we are here on this earth to self-express in a way no one else ever has or ever could.  Our humanity is the truth of our experience.

When a conflict arises between the need to belong and the need to grow, we have to make a choice.  We must either sacrifice a part of ourselves to maintain our belonging, or we must risk the approval and support of the group by growing.  More often than not we know what to do; the cost our realness just seems too high at the time.  Listen to yourself to know when its time for you to move on and grow.

Be truthful from the first opportunity, because the clean up and guilt that follow dishonesty are a waste of valuable energy and time.  Note that we tell ourselves lies as well, often making promises or obligations to ourselves or others that don’t allow for the reality of interruptions, rest, or play.  We must be willing to take the risk to tell ourselves the truth and grow ourselves into someone that can trust themselves, in order that then we will be able to easily bear others’ trust in us.

There is profound courage to this kind of willingness to be raw with reality as it is, rather than to run from or construct a barrier to soften it.

The meditation is to reflect on this quote from Gandhi: “I know that in embarking on nonviolence I shall be running what might be termed as a mad risk.  But the victories of truth have never been won without risks.” 

AHIMSA

In the following ten weeks we will focus on incorporating the tenets of the yamas and the niyamas into our yoga practice.  There is an abundance of information available on these ten pillars of yoga, which should be practiced BEFORE if not IN CONJUNCTION with your physical practice.  But, yoga feels great, so I say do both.  For purposes of class, I have used Deborah Adele’s book, The Yamas and the Niyamas.  She makes each one easy to understand and delves into how it effects others and ourselves.

But first, a brief overview:

Yamas, restraints, and Niyamas, observances, are guidelines for the moment-to-moment decisions of life that in turn to build an ethical code of skillful living.  They help the small details of life become quality moments that accrue to become a grander vision of a joyful human existence.

The result of a skifllully lead life is nothing less than joy.  Not the kind that comes when things are going our way and disappears just as quickly, but the kind that bubbles up from within.  The kind of joy that comes from our own sense of mastery in life that no matter what life brings, we are ready.

We start with the first yama, ahisma, or nonviolence, literally meaning to do “no harm”.  It is the foundation to all the other guidelines.  Nonviolence is a stance of right relationship with others and with self that is neither self-sacrifice nor self-aggrandizement.

The first step to ahimsa is finding our courage.  Fear creates violence.  If we are to address our fears, we need to know the difference between the fears that keep us alive and the fears that keep us from living.  The first kind of fear is instinctual and built in us for survival.  The second kind of fear is fear of the unfamiliar.  It is only our minds that have created the turmoil in our gut and kept us hostage to the possibility of our lives.  Instead of being afraid and complacent can you be courageous, discern between fear and the unfamiliar, and get excited about something that scares you?  Where in life can you practice courage and stop holding back?

In life when we feel like we’ve run out of choices the feeling of powerlessness can overwhelm us. Feelings of powerlessness can lead to outward aggression in the form of frustration and anger or withdrawal inward into depression and victimization.  Ahimsa invites us to question powerlessness rather than accept it.  We have a choice to take action and we have a choice to change the story we are telling ourselves about our powerlessness.  Is there a situation in your own life where you can shift the way of thinking about a situation where you feel powerless?  Is there an area in life where you can practice more gratitude, more trust in the moment, more empathy towards others?

Ahimsa asks us to do no harm to ourselves.  How we treat ourselves is in truth how we treat those around us. Can we create balance in the body by giving ourselves real rest and nourishment? How can we be so harsh and demanding with ourselves and then expect to be loving with others? Love lies at the core of non-violence and begins with our love of self.  Not a love that is ego-centric but a love that is forgiving and lenient; a love that sees the humor in he imperfections and accepts the fullness of human expression.  There is no need for high expectations or critical judgements.  Remind yourself now that you are complete. Inhale I have, exhale everything I need.

After we practice nonviolence with ourselves, we must give it to others.  There is nothing to fix or save in another, there is only the gift of listening.  People need a “safe place” to hear themselves. Thinking we know what is better for others becomes a subtle way we do violence.  Worry says “I don’t trust you to do your life right.” Give the people you care about love, not worry. Nonviolence asks us to trust the other’s journey and love and support others to their highest image of themselves, not our highest image of them. Acceptance and love rather than worry is a better use of our energy.

The last part of embracing ahimsa is to develop compassion.  We learn compassion as we strop trying to change ourselves and others and choose instead to soften the boundaries that keep us separated from what we don’t understand.  Remember that every pair of eyes facing you has probably experience something you could not endure. Ground yourself in your body, in reality. We learn compassion as we do simple acts of kindness and allow others’ lives to be as important as our own.

Whatever we find ourselves engaged in, this jewel of Ahimsa, or nonviolence, asks us to step lightly, do no harm, and to honor the relationships we have with the earth, with each other, and with ourselves.

 

VATA SEASON

This class sequence was based on balancing the VATA DOSHA.  If you’ve never heard of a dosha before, I encourage you to take the quiz and check it out here:

http://doshaquiz.chopra.com/

A dosha (doṣa) is one of three bodily humors that make up one’s constitution according to Ayurveda. These teachings are also known as the Tridosha theory.

The central concept of Ayurvedic medicine is the theory that health exists when there is a balance between three fundamental bodily humours or doshas called Vata, Pitta and Kapha.

These doshas also refer to different elements and corresponding seasons.  Vata season is fall and early winter, corresponding to air, dryness, and wind.  In Vata season people will be pulled to this particular dosha, and exhibit more personality traits associated with Vatas.

Vatas love excitement and new experiences. They are quick to anger but also to forgive. When unbalanced, they are prone to worry and anxiousness and often suffer from insomnia. When they feel overwhelmed or stressed, their response is, “What did I do wrong?”  When Vatas are in balance, they are energetic, creative, and flexible. They also take initiative and are lively conversationalists.

Vata types are known to be airy, maybe even flakey.  People that tend to be dreamy, can often become ungrounded easily. Vata also has a spiritual lean, and people who naturally take to meditation are typically Vatas. However a Vata imbalance causes ungroundedness. Over-drinking and over-eating are ways that spiritual people are trying to ground themselves in what is earthly and tangible, cutting their relationship to the spiritual or subtle.  Stay balanced in diet during this season, eating warm, moist foods, whole grains, and root vegetables.  Most importantly, listen to the body to balance the heady nature of the Vata season.

Reading for meditation adapted from Melody Beattie:

So much of growth is spiritual.  Sometimes we feel our soul flies into high spiritual realms.  That is as it should be.  But we need to stay grounded, too.  Even the tallest tree, the one that reaches the hundreds of feet into the sky, has roots that go deep into the earth. The higher we want to travel on spiritual planes, the more we need to learn to ground ourselves.  Our roots need to go deep into the earth, too.

You are a soul, a spirit, but you have a body too.  Remember to nurture your spirit, but take time to attend to your body.  Connect with what is physical,  connect your body with the rhythms of nature. Let your spiritual growth be grounded in daily life and the things of the earth, giving honor to embodied life. Touch things that grow in the earth. Remember the feel of grass. Remember looking out over a great landscape and being awed by the life you see before you. As you sit on the earth feel its presence, its solid grounding energy, rise up into you.

ANAHATA CHAKRA

The Forth Chakra, often referred to as the Heart Chakra or the Anahata Chakra is physically positioned at the heart region. Traditionally, this chakra is represented as a green flower with twelve petals.  It is also associated with love and compassion, charity to others, healing, and our ability to make decisions guiding our own fate, think of the phrase “follow your heart.”

Anahata is also related to a smaller chakra, The wish-fulfilling tree, kalpa taru, that resides here at the physical heart, symbolizing the ability to manifest whatever you wish to happen in the world.

When energy is not flowing freely from this chakra there is a disruption of love, balance, peace, hope, growth and healing. When the chakra is blocked there is an inability to express deep emotions such as joy, fear, sadness and serenity. This imbalance is manifested physically by a protective and rounded upper back, shrugging or lifted shoulders and hollow chest.  Emotionally an imbalance can manifest itself as selfishness, depression or envy. 

This chakra is fed by finding your passion and following your heart. Have faith, find ways to express yourself and practice appreciation, balancing giving and receiving ,and forgiveness of yourself.  Practice being compassionate and kind to yourself first before you give it away.  Love the person you are now, not the person you want to be.  It will help you stay present and ready to take on the inevitable obstacles in life.  Love is easier to give away freely when it is something you already have and know well.

Yoga is about removing the blockage, the build up, letting your light release. You have everything you need already inside of you.  In yoga there is an upward wind – talking & expressing ourselves and downward wind, releasing and eliminating. All merge in one center of the body, where the belly is, inhale into this space light, exhale anything that doesn’t serve you or that blocks your light. Get rid of that which does not serve you. Maybe it’s a person, a habit, or a mantra of I can’t or I’m not good enough. Let that go. Forgive, forgive, forgivenss is the path to lightness. All you need you already have, it’s just about managing the obstacles in life to keep your light shining.  Face these sensations on the mat, when you want to turn away – breathe. Stay in it. Find the strength to relax and do what’s difficult. You practice this here for real life when you’re in those real difficult situations.

Meditation to balance the anahata chakra:

Inhale I have the right to love 

Exhale I have the right to be loved

Steadiness

beautiful!

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MANIPURA CHAKRA

Hello yogis! Last Sunday was my first Sunday back after an absence from restorative and it was a wonderful gift to have a full class.  Many thanks to all who attended and I look forward to seeing you again soon.

We went back right to where we left off, this time doing a series of poses focusing on the Manipura Chakra.

The third chakra, often referred to as the navel chakra or Manipura chakra is positioned at the navel region. Manipura is associated with dynamism, energy, and will-power. It is associated with the power of fire, and digestion.  Its color is yellow, relating to our self-worth, personality, and ego.  People with a strong manipura chakra will be confident, alert, optimistic, and good humored.

When energy is not flowing freely from this chakra we have problems with self-esteem and confidence, our sense of adequacy, issues around responsibility and feeling “caught in the middle” and deprived of the sweet things in life.  Manipura is the power center of the body. Will power, being perfectionistic and self critical is a problem with a third chakra imbalance. A Manipura imbalance can often manifest itself in digestion and eating disorders.  Balance of this chakra will cultivate will-power and self-motivation.

This chakra is fed by disengaging from responsibility for a time in order to turn inwards, by practicing loving and nurturing yourself — not depending on others to nurture you.  Practice acts of personal courage. Do what makes you happy, not what makes everyone else happy. Refrain from wasting energy blaming others for not being able to do what we would rather be doing.  When you do so, others will recognize your individuality, and they will know what your limits are. They will respect you more because they will know what to expect of you. Practice allowing others to also be themselves, too.  Begin compassion with yourself, and then give compassion away.

As a class we then moved on to a metta meditation, or a loving kindness meditation.  Practice repeating these phrases to yourself on an exhale, giving it away (or giving it back) to the universe.

The source of all my will power is within.

The source of all my love is within.

The source of all my wisdom is within.

The source of all my compassion is within.

 The source of all my ___________ is within.

 

Then visualize yourself in a place that makes you happy with an expression of joy and freedom.  On an exhale give yourself all those qualities from above you just stirred within yourself.

Practice this with a friend; visualizing that friend in a beautiful place and on an exhale give them these qualities.

Practice this next an acquaintance.

Finally practice this with someone you have trouble connecting with, and on an exhale give them these qualities, and release any negative feelings you have towards them.

 

The following is adapted from Leo Babatua, who has a great blog called zenhabits.

 

Each day, we repeat movements, thought patterns, ways of interacting with others … and in this repeated practice, we are becoming (or have already become) good at these things.

When you smoke, or eat junk food, or speak rudely to others, or put yourself down internally, this is something you are practicing to be good at. You may already be good at these things.

What if, instead, we practiced consciously, deliberately, and became good at the things we really want to be good at?

What if you first, above all skills, learned to be more aware of what you are practicing? What if constant conscious action is the skill you became good at?

The first step is always awareness. When you are conscious of what you are doing, you can decide whether this is an action or thought pattern you want to practice, or if there’s an alternative you’d rather be good at.

As you go through your day, practice this awareness. It’s the first skill, and it’s the most important one. Be aware, without feeling guilty or angry at yourself, of what you’re doing and thinking. 

As you get good at conscious action, start to practice those actions and thought patterns you want to be good at. Start to notice the ones you’d really rather not be good at, and see if you can deliberately practice other actions and thought patterns.

As you consciously, deliberately repeat these things, you’ll get better at them. It takes a lot of repetition to get good at a skill, but give yourself patience and time.

SWADISTHANA CHAKRA

The second chakra is known Swadhisthana or the Sacral chakra.  It is positioned at the tailbone, two finger-widths above Muladhara, and so the two are very closely related. This chakra is associated with the hips, sacrum, lower back, ovaries or testes, womb, bladder, and kidneys, and is involved with sensuality, emotions, intimacy, and desire. Its color is orange and its element is water.  All watery things about us have to do with this chakra: circulation, urination, menstruation, orgasm, tears. Water’s quality is to flow, move, and change and adapt, and a healthy second chakra allows us to do so too.

The second chakra encourages us to feel the feelings that arise as we open to life just as it is. As we allow ourselves to accept what is, we taste the sweetness (and bittersweetness) of life. When we relax our resistance to life, our hips let go, our reproductive organs become less tense, and we’re more open to savoring experiences.

These even numbered chakras, including Swadisthana, are associated with more yin qualities, or “feminine” qualities of relaxation and openness. These chakras exercise our rights to feel, to love, and to see. Some chakras ask us to assert ourselves in the world, but this chakra as well as other feminine chakras cool things down, attracting energy inward, and ask us to accept and surrender to what we feel.

The key issues in the Swadisthana chakra deal with relationships, violence, addictions, basic emotional needs, and pleasure.  Physically, Swadisthana governs reproduction, mentally it governs creativity, emotionally it governs joy, and spiritually it governs enthusiasm.

When out of balance, one can suffer from oral fixation, addiction, codependent relationships, poor boundaries, possible outbursts of violence, or simply not having our emotional needs met.  Physically an imbalance can manifest in decreased libido, stiff lower back, kidney trouble, and other sacral issues.

 

When in balance, we can experience joy, deal with change well, nurture others, and have the ability to enjoy romantic and creative acts.  When this chakra is strong there is a balance between power and vulnerability. Swadisthana is about optimism, self-confidence, enthusiasm and courage. If your second chakra is strong you have no problem saying no.  This chakra is fed by developing support systems and boundaries. Taking responsibility for what is happening in your life and “owning” up to your downfalls. Feeding your creative side and taking care of your body.  Honor your self by finding a hobby or activity that provides you with pleasure and that expresses who you are to others.

 

Here is an excerpt from Melody Beattie that I hope you feel relates to the Swadisthana chakra:

 

Let Your Storms Subside

Watch the pounding surf.  Watch the waves lap against the shore, their beginning somewhere far out to sea, their beginnings in a storm we might never see.  Know your oneness with those waves, with the water of the seas.

Your emotions are like the surf.  Sometimes they pound gently, sometimes fiercely.  Sometimes the color is blue, sometimes gray.  They may be the result of a storm, sometimes a squall far away.  Let them pound.  Let them pass through.  Let them subside.  Let them turn into the next wave.  Each emotion is connected to a belief, a belief embedded in your soul.  I am abandoned. I am deserted.  I am separated from love.  But you are not your emotions.  Your emotions don’t control your life, no matter how fierce, no matter how strong.  No matter how relentless.  No matter, at times, how overwhelming.

Let the emotions pass through.  Feel all you need to fell.  Say all you need to say to let the storm subside.  Then pause.  Wait.  Rest.  Let your body regroup and heal.  You will have grown.  You will have changed.  And you’ll be on your way to learning something new.