Thoughts on yoga

My wonderful yoga teacher Kirstin recently asked me for my thoughts on my yoga practice as a testimonial to try and entice potential new students. I wrote instinctively and fairly quickly for her to edit as required- I know my tendency to waffle!.... I'm quite pleased with what came out, so I thought I'd share it. I haven't navel gazed here for a little while ;-)

My yoga practice keeps me sane: it's my best friend and my teacher, a very reliable source of inner strength and energy. It doesn't matter what's happening in my life when I get on my mat and start breathing, everything else just melts away. It's so nourishing and enriching to my body and my soul, I don't know how I lived without it now. 

Recently I've been feeling quite intoxicated by my practice. It's challenging in so many different ways and I constantly surprise myself with what I am doing. I love to surrender my expectations and test the boundaries of my physical and my mental stamina. My body is opening up, lighter and leaner than I thought possible. I find it much easier to stay calm and centred. I know that yoga has been the catalyst for some deep emotional healing for me, and I'm so grateful for the growth this practice has brought. 

It's still less than a year since I resumed my practice after a 6 year break, I practised fairly regularly for 5 years or so prior to that. I'm so glad I found ashtanga yoga again, the reunion has been so good for me. 

In the past I have sometimes lamented that I wish I'd never stopped practising. Recently I've been feeling fine about the break and just fabulous about the fact I've resumed. Right now is the first time I've managed to sustain regular (3-4 times + per week) practice, ever. It feels fantastic. Even if I had carried on practising for all the wilderness years when I was bumming about doing nothing much, I might not have had the insight I have now. It makes me realise how many lessons I've had over these "lost" years, even if the lessons weren't on my mat. 

I love this meditation about the golden path, which sort of sums up what I'm trying to say: if you're on your path then it all feels good and it's the right place for you to be at that time. Sometimes the right place for you to get what you need isn't where you think you might need to be.  

Speaking of the Golden Path, my brain finds it quite impossible not to think of this tune......

A moving experience (Part 1)

It's all happening!... We're set to move house at the end of the month. Our home is half packed up and in a slight state of disarray.  I'm a real home bird and love being snug and cosy, I'm trying to get used to the idea of home not being quite how I want it for a while.

I always wondered why  people talk about moving as being high up "the list" of stressful events, I've moved house at least 6 times in the last 15 years or so since I flew the nest and it's always been fine. I suppose you have to be settled to be uprooted, and perhaps I've never really been that settled before. This is the first time I've moved from a home we've owned, and the first time we've moved since having children. I'm beginning to realise why it's stressful now though, which is not to say I'm feeling stressed (well, not consciously at least).

It's not really the practical issues of packing, moving, unpacking that are taxing, though I'm not denying the effort required in this. It's the intensity of emotions that get thrown up that are harder to cope with. It would be easy to begin to be overwhelmed and not really know how to deal with that. Some examples:

Editing possessions and sorting the past. I'm finding going through Esme's artwork particularly harrowing: I can't believe the children are growing up so fast. The feelings of grief and mourning I've had have surprised me in some respects as I'm also so happy to see them growing up.

The sense of somehow, gently, disconnecting from where you are, without losing precious friends and appreciation of the place that has been home. And hoping, hoping, hoping that the new connections you wish to create will be created, and be fruitful, fulfilling, fun!

It's also challenging to family relationships, bringing up potential conflicts with many important issues: money, equality and justice, co-operation, support, respect. A minefield when your resources are already depleted by all of the above!

I can't get my head into the people who seem to change their homes motivated by "investment" or just because they fancy a change. I don't want to do this again too soon, even though (fingers and toes and everything else crossed) it's seeming fairly smooth for us right now...

I'm more than a little nervous about making a new life somewhere quite different, even though that place is "home" for me. Bonkers. I'm also quite confident this is the right thing for us to do. It feels momentous, but I also have a sense I'll look back in a few years and wonder what I was making a big deal about!

Our family is ready for the space it needs to grow and reach it's fullest potential.

Presents and Furoshiki

Lovely Jeanette posted this fab link which has inspired me to try something different with wrapping for the gifts we are giving this Christmas, I wanted to pass it on too...even though I'm not as organised as her and I haven't even finished making and buying all the gifts yet! I am certainly not organised enough to have wrapped any up, though I'm feeling encouraged to get on and do it now ;)

We are making lots of consumable things to give- edible treats and bath bombs, and the rest of the things we are giving tend to be practical or things that people have specifically requested. I can't bear the waste of buying for the sake of it, though it's easy to fall into that trap at this time of year....crazy.

I am looking forward to bringing Solstice into our celebrations more this year, as that really resonates with me more than the Christian festival ever has.

Hope you are all snuggled up warm and cosy wherever you are, and that you enjoy your celebrations!
Warmest winter wishes, love and light and blessings for 2011 to all
with much love Sarah xxx

Worry

I'm worrying about money. It's probably daft to do this but such a lot has gone out this month, and not on nice frivolities and the festive season: sadly it's more mundane costs that are draining our purse.

There's more than this though: I'm worrying that worrying might be trying to creep back into my habitual behaviour! I've been feeling quite relaxed and cool about things lately, and I've been doing well with embracing the spirit of abundance. "Love is money, money is love" and " there is enough". All that.... but actually, there isn't an abundance of hard cash here right now! Quite the opposite...we're really skint.

Also, our circumstances are really starting to change. I don't want to get into feeling anxious about life changes now, right at the beginning of the next bit of the journey. I need to go forward with the same sense of clarity and purpose I've been feeling, not turn to jelly the moment the going gets a little bit tougher. Seems it's that same old thing about life playing tricks on you, just when you think you're "getting" how it works everything changes again!...Here come some more lessons ;)

Anyway, I just opened the back door to let the dog out and there is a layer of snow over the garden. I love snow. I love the way it muffles and mutes the sounds of the city, how it illuminates the night with a clean light, tidies away the rubbish and hides the imperfections. It changes the way we see the world. And then it just goes, melts away into nothing and it's almost like it was never there. It's a good reminder of the importance of perspective and the impermanence of everything.

A kind friend remarked on a strategy for managing worry today. Ask yourself:  "Will this matter in five years? Will you remember?" The chances are the financial details will be very different in five years, hopefully better. I can't think of anything I would really remember feeling anxious about, or be likely to still be worrying about in 5 years. This is good.

When I start thinking like this again, it's a bit like a blanket of snow falling over my rubbish heap!.I still need to sort out what's there and take it to the tip, but this buys me some time and for now it is as beautiful as everything else. With a sprinkle of snow I can appreciate my anxiety for what it is: part of my journey, a lesson....even if it hasn't melted away it's a bit better like this.

Releasing fears

What people really want, if it doesn't sound too soppy, is to live their love. Every day! Eat things because they love them, share food because they love to be with people. Just live out of love, love for beauty, love for truth, love for children and animals. It is our nature to live expansively and generously, not cautiously and calculatingly. The opposite of love is fear, not hate.
-Jean Liedloff, Author of the Continuum Concept

This quote has been attached to the bottom of my emails until fairly recently, when I changed it on a whim. I love it all, but particularly the final sentence: "The opposite of love is fear, not hate".

Something that's cropping up a lot for me at the moment is how fear can really keep you in a place you aren't entirely happy. Half the time we don't recognise it for what it is or we dress it up in rationalisations and justifications. It's truly a wolf in sheep's clothing. No wonder so many people are miserable when they don't even know they're living in fear instead of "living their love".

I went to a fabulous yoga workshop with Danny Paradise last weekend (the post about this is still sitting in my drafts folder....). He talked about Ashtanga yoga being a practice that promotes deep emotional healing, and how the roots of depression are related to unfulfilled dreams and not following what your heart really wants to do. It was meaningful to me because I know I've ignored my heart's desire in the past. It's so easy to make excuses to yourself when you're terrified of being out of your comfort zone. At the time I probably wouldn't have seen that my reluctance to take a risk was fear, though it seems clear with hindsight. I obviously wasn't ready to do what I wanted to then, or I'd have done it!

About a month ago I was taken by surprise by my first really open/easy full backbend. My body suddenly seemed to yield to an asana it has so far disliked participating in! The backbend released some really powerful emotions. For a week or so after my heart was so open, and I felt overwhelmed by love of life, and the sensation of letting go.... I only realised it was fears that were dissolving after the inital wave of change happened. Funny how I didn't know fear was there for ages, and then I didn't know it was leaving.

I managed a very brief handstand against the wall today, dispelling a long held belief that "I can't do it" and "my legs are too heavy". It was exhilarating, I was so giddy! I realised the weight I felt in my legs was partly fear: the immediate physical fear of falling over, but also the fear of failing and not being good enough.

All the other lifting and lightening sensations I've been having recently in yoga are starting to make sense. I'm letting go of my fears in favour of living my love.

Begin with the end in mind

I thought this was the first of Steven Covey's "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" but when I just checked it, the first is "Be proactive". I guess I must be being proactive already to be thinking about beginning with the end in mind!

Anyway, what I was going to say is that I am astounded how much easier it is to achieve something when you decide in advance what it is that you are going to do. Some recent examples of  a few "new and improved " thought processes:

Eating- I want to exorcise my food demons, stop comfort eating and have an easy relationship with food
Before- eat until I decided I was full (never) at mealtimes, picking between meals, bingeing uncontrollably at any type of buffet meal or snack
Now-   decide how much I am eating in advance and then stop! Review. Eat a bit more if I want to (I hardly ever do)

Yoga practice- I want to establish a regular daily yoga practice
Before- sporadic! 1hr class Saturday, maybe practice 1 hr Monday, nothing til next week, then do a class, 20 mins Wednesday, maybe the same on Thursday, sometimes no practice from one week to the next....
Now- any yoga is better than none, mat comes out when the kids go to bed and I aim to do a 45 min asana practice and take 10 min rest, daily. But I can be flexible about this, some days a little will be better than a lot.

Keeping my cool- I don't like raising my voice in anger
Before- bottle it in, grind my teeth, explode periodically
Now- self empathy, observations, feelings, needs, requests. Still explode periodically. This one is hard!
Hehehe.

I've found a subtle change in the specifics of my vision have a big impact on what I do. If I'm fuzzy it doesn't work. "I'll practice yoga for an hour" is much harder to stick to than " I'll do 5 Sun salutation A, 5 B, A series of 6 specific standing postures and 3 seated postures finishing at Marichyasana C, and then close" works much better. For me it's no good trying to run 'til I'm tired, or eating 'til I'm full because I'm too likely to stop at the "wrong" point! It's heartening that I can't be the only one this happens to, otherwise it wouldn't be on Steven Covey's list to do something different ;)

Change

I've not written anything here for ages. I think I know why (apart from time being in short supply).

When I started writing less about EC, I hoped my blog would be filled with tales of our wonderful home learning activities, a diary of what we get up to together with a feast of photos and recipes and lots of other inspiring stuff: art, craft, sewing, poetry, music. Perhaps the odd bit of self discovery. But my musings have been very inner-self oriented lately, and I've been feeling slightly anxious that I might be hogging the limelight. 

Of course, our family is doing all the cool things I hoped to document. We're learning together, having fun and eating lots of nice food and all that, struggling along sometimes but mostly all is as I would wish. I've been finding that I just don't feel that inspired to write about our day after I've spent all day "doing" it.

The things I do feel the need to write about right now are much more personal. Since I got back on my yoga mat this year I'm really feeling like a very different person. And actually, writing about the changes in my inner world seems far more useful and important to me. I feel a bit vulnerable and naked to think that people might actually read what I write. But that's also a motivational aspect of having a blog, I probably wouldn't just write in a notebook in the same way I do here. I think the benefit of reflecting on my journey and the soul work of artistic creation through writing is worth the risk of publicly exposing myself. 

I'm going to stop feeling apologetic about documenting my navel gazing. I have to remind myself that you can choose not to read if I'm irritating, boring, self-absorbed.... Can you tell I'm still struggling with the pain of some past experiences here?! I am also going stop comparing myself and my blog to all the other talented bloggers and beautiful blogs out there.

I'm just going to carry on doing my best to be a better person and write about it from time to time. 

And perhaps if I let go of my attachment to creating a beautiful diary, I might share some recipes and a few choice pics here and there too ;)