The Triple A's of Identity

There are three words in Yoga philosophy that I like to call the Triple A's of Identity: Atman, Ahamkara and Asmita. All three of these words come up when we're posing the eternal question, "Who am I?" 

First let's dig them out of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras and define them: 

Atman: This is the Sanskrit word for the true self, the inner self, or what some people call the soul. Yogis believe it to be the most real and enduring part of us. 

Ahamkara: The literal translation is the "I maker," that which gives the sense of a separate existence. It is your own distinct entity, appearing, thinking and acting in the world. It is somewhat close to the Western concept of "ego," and to live in this world, we need to have some sense of our self that is part of a healthy ego. However, the ahamkara is distinct from atman. 

Asmita: This word has a more negative connotation than ahamkara, and it literally means "the false self," or "the thing other than the real I." Asmita is listed as one of the five obstacles preventing enlightenment and leading to suffering. Asmita is mistaking your ego, your thoughts, your body, your senses, and all other impermanent aspects of yourself for the real you. 

I have thought about the Triple A's of Identity all week, due to things coming up in my life related to image and appearance, and how these relate to yoga. 

I have a certain teacher I love, though I can rarely attend her classes anymore. I follow her and some of my other teachers on Facebook and Instagram. This week she put up some cool videos of herself doing a beautiful wheel posture from standing, and an impressive handstand. She accompanied these with inspiring words along the lines of perseverance and dedication, basically "show up" and "work hard." I see similar images and words from other teachers on a regular basis. Though I love to practice the physical postures and link them up with life off of the mat, sometimes I feel like backing off of the more difficult postures as end goals. I even feel at times like yoga gets shortchanged as gymnastics with a veneer of self-improvement. (Many of the postures we do are truthfully from a Scandinavian gymnastics system developed in the 19th century and imported to India. More on that later.) 

I also noticed another of my teachers posted a different sort of message this week, an article called "Un-cover Girls," featuring two overweight yoga teachers in a photo shoot. These women were interviewed about how yoga helps their body image and self-esteem and how they have something unique to offer as opposed to the slender and flexible looking models we see in most yoga advertising images. These women want to prove that yoga is truly for everyone. 

These varied images of other people doing yoga made me a little nervous about a website I am planning to unveil this week. There will be photos of me doing yoga on the site, and I feel conflicted about this. I want to share my practice and be able to market myself as a teacher, but I don't want to send a message that people should admire my practice for how it looks, or that I resemble some sort of ideal yogini, or that an ideal yogini even exists. How do the Triple A's play into this? Well, to market myself as a coach and yoga teacher, I need ahamkara (the I-maker) to work for me, not against me. I don't want to fall into asmita, a sense of false identification with my image and my body. I want to work and serve from a pure place, and to live from my atman. 

What helped me make sense of all this was a conversation I had with my father this week--He is suffering from Bell's Palsy, (facial nerve paralysis). I have long-lasting residuals from this same condition, which I experienced while pregnant with Lyme disease. When I talked to my Dad about how hard it is to deal with, I was able to speak from experience. I told him he may be able to find some comfort in meditation, since that was where I found comfort when it first happened to me. He said he doesn't want to scare my little niece when she sees his face; I remember feeling that way, too. I told him that the experience helped me to stop overly identifying with the way I looked. I found comfort in meditation, because it was there that I was able to connect and identify with my inner self, the part of me that is real. I was able to stop identifying completely with my appearance, and start identifying more with the real me. It didn't take away the reality of a changed appearance, or even of the importance of appearance in real life, but it took away the anxiety I was experiencing from overly identifying with my condition. So in terms of my yoga teaching and website, I know that appearance is part of it, but there doesn't need to be any preoccupation with how any of that looks from the outside. 

Please don't get me wrong: I know we all have to care about our appearance and take good care of ourselves. I also know the physical practice of yoga is a healthy way to take care of our ego and nurture positive self-esteem. There is nothing wrong with admiring and aspiring to execute beautiful asana. None of this becomes a problem unless it is taken to extremes and we begin to over-identify with how we appear. When we start comparing ourselves to other yoga students or teachers, focusing on our image in a mirrored studio, feeling offended when a teacher tries to help with a pose, thinking about impressing the person on the mat behind ours, that's when we know we've stepped into false identification (asmita). The same is true in our life off the mat; when we get too caught up in our role as an earner or an achiever or a supermom, suffering from either inflated self-esteem or a feeling of not measuring up, we know we are off-balance and could use an ego check. 

We can work with the Triple A's of Identity in our yoga practice, not judging ourselves for being ego-driven, but instead just noticing which one of the A's we're experiencing. We can simply observe ourselves as we move through the practice, noticing our thoughts, sensations and reactions. We can do this is in asana, pranayama and meditation. If we are pleased with ourselves in a posture we love, we can note that. If we feel inadequate in a backbend our neighbor excels in, we can note that, too. If our breathing feels smooth, we note it. Witnessing our practice in this non-judgmental way, we start to connect with our internal witness, leading us back to our authentic self. We become aware of what changes and what remains steady, learning to identify with the part of us that endures. In the end this is a comfort to each of us, irrespective of appearance or physical condition. 

The Yoga Pendulum

Here in the West, we live in a culture of extremes. The ideal we are taught is the maximum benefit for the maximum number of people; be all you can be; go to your edge; supersize your meals; give yourself an energy boost; a flavor boost; an extreme makeover; be the biggest winner, or the biggest loser. Max everything out. Do it big. Go long.

Last week I attended a yoga retreat led by Judith Hanson Lasater, someone who has been teaching yoga since the year I was born. I took away many gems from her teaching, and I listened well when she talked to us about extremes. Many of us bring our penchant for extremes to our yoga mats. We may come to yoga because we are already flexible and we really want to max out those splits or see how deep we can go with our backbends. Yoga becomes about the asana (postures) and how extremely well we execute them. Many of us get hurt this way, and end up with overuse injuries. Why do we do this? And why do we push so hard in our culture in general? Judith gave the simple answer that we are afraid of not being enough. If this is true, then our penchant for extremes is born of our fear. How accurate, yet sad, that fear is so often the motivating factor in our life.

For me, yoga needs to be a place I can go to confront the fear of not being enough. It's a place I can get quiet and focused and take a good look at who I really am. It's a place I can find space to just be, to heal, and to find my motivation in love, rather than fear. During yoga teacher training, this was something I struggled with, because the practice was placed within a different context, requiring objectivity, judgment, and an ideal of mastery. Was I good enough to be a teacher? Was my voice good enough? Was my body good enough? It is easy to confuse all of that with, "am I enough?" This mentality created a lot of friction for me internally and with my yoga practice.

Then I started teaching and the students and fellow teachers I met helped me get back on track. I always knew we are all enough and none of us need to chase extremes. I always knew to bow my head to my heart. But I was helped tremendously when one teacher in particular reassured me that I was "good enough" to teach, gave me a chance to do it, and showed me how to let go of the focus on asana and the need to push myself or my students. He opened me up to a new place of exploration and creativity in my practice. He also set the stage for everything I was to learn in my recent retreat with Judith.

Judith taught us last week how we use yoga to reverse a lot of the damage we do to ourselves with extremism. We instinctively know that practicing yoga brings us back into balance, but how?

Think of your daily movements as a pendulum, swinging from active to passive, introverted to extroverted, nervous to calm, distracted to focused, loud to quiet. At the edges, the pendulum swings out to the extremes. In the middle, you find your equilibrium. On the level of the nervous system, we swing from the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight, jump, run and duck) to the parasympathetic nervous system (heal and restore, relax and rejuvenate).

We use yoga to orient our mind/body to the point of equilibrium. This is the purpose of asana, not a pretty backbend or an extreme arm balance. As Judith said, "The asana is not the yoga...the yoga is in the residue the asana leaves in your nervous system. Through yoga we manipulate the nervous system so we perceive in a new way and act out of choice, not reaction." She also suggested that our movement shouldn't come from the brain to the body, but instead from our body to our brain. We are reversing the trend we follow in our daily activities to find equilibrium. "All day long our thinking mind is the extrovert. In asana, our head becomes the introvert and our body the extrovert. We want to be rooted in our own being so that what happens around us swirls around us and never shakes us."

Instead of exerting effort to execute perfect text-book asanas in sequence, think about your practice as using movement to induce calm, stillness and strength. Your body is moving outward but your busy mind is calming down. I sometimes have a tendency to throw my head back and look out into the room with wide eyes when I practice asana. This is a symptom of my often overactive mind. Teachers have told me to keep my head down, but Judith made the reason very clear when she said, "Don't do the pose with your eyes. In any pose, do not lead with the eyes. Tilting the head back stimulates the cortex, the thinking part of your brain." Through our practice, we can give our brains and nervous systems a chance to turn inward as we extend our bodies outward through asana. She applied this line of thinking to what we are doing in our forward bends. She said, "The back body is the unconscious mind. The front body is the conscious mind. We are always pointed up and out. We need more time to go down and in."

I love this concept of using our practice to reach equilibrium through discovering the movements that reverse the effects of what we usually do in our lives. I want to take the concept a step further and line it up with tailoring yoga to the individual. This goes with what Judith said about how her teaching changed over the years. She said she used to think it was about the asana first, then her students, and then herself. Now she says she starts by connecting with herself, then focusing her attention on the students, and then finally zeroing in on the asana. I believe that my mentor teaches this way as well. If we teach like this, it won't always be a shift in the direction of calmness that is helpful. Sometimes we need a shift in the opposite direction. Let's say we've been snowed in for a few days, as is the case this week in New York. Let's say we've been depressed, or bored, or spending a lot of time alone. In that case, the pendulum wants to move towards higher energy and enthusiasm; I have a suspicion that this was part of my mentor's use of backbending sequences in yesterday's class.

Fortunately there are asana for every type of shift we may need. "Each asana is its own mandala, its own archetype," said Judith as I nodded emphatically with my eyes. And each of us will craft our personal practice and our classes from a unique position, from the place where we alone stand. Each of us is learning to use the pendulum of yoga to restore equilibrium to ourselves, our communities, and to the world by extension. As Judith would say, "Jai!"

Hang On, Let Go: Embracing Paradox

Abhyasa Vairagyabhyam Tannirodhah. -The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, I.12

"These mental modifications are restrained by practice and non-attachment" (Translation by Sri Swami Satchidananda). 

This sutra and the ones immediately following it are well-loved by yoga teachers. If you attend a yoga class regularly, you will likely hear your teacher talk about balancing the two wings of practice: steady effort and non-attachment. Because of the nirodhah portion of this sutra, you'll probably hear this in the context of, "why do we do yoga in the first place?" 

What is Yoga, anyway? Well, the second sutra tells us, Yogas citta vrtti nirodhah, "The restraint of the modifications of the mind-stuff is Yoga." You know that stuff going on in your head all the time? Sometimes it gets to be too much? People have experienced that mental excess, that cloudy, disturbed feeling, as far back as they could write and teach. So, thousands of years ago, some people in India developed the system of Yoga to deal with that problem. Patanjali recorded the solutions they came up with in The Yoga Sutras. That text is the primary source of the philosophy being taught alongside the postures we do in classes. There you go. 

Today, in 2014, a lot of people are practicing some type of yoga, at the gym, in different types of studios, on retreats, at home. If you say, "I practice yoga," what does that mean? Is it a continuous practice? Abhyasa means a specific type of effort: a continuous, dedicated practice, reaching far beyond the postures. The practice can start out as a once-a-week commitment, but that's not really what Patanjali meant when he was describing yoga. When you practice regularly enough, it becomes a way of life, a way of breathing, a way of thinking, a way of doing. It is a discipline with an explicit aim, to pacify your mind so you can experience bliss and union with your true Self and with the Universe. That all sounds so good; it makes you really want it! When you want something bad, you really work at it, right? Give me that! That's for me!

This is where vairagya comes in. Non-attachment. Dispassion. This is the other side of abhyasa; the flip side of effort; the other wing of Yoga practice. I have heard teachers describe this paradox as "hang on, let go." How can you hang on and let go at the same time? As soon as you see those words, you may think of relationships. We learn to do this in dating, in marriage, with our parents and with our children. "If you love somebody, set them free," sings Sting. And so it goes with a yoga practice: if you love yoga, if you are working on your postures and your breathing and your meditation and climbing up your own bliss mountain-- you have to learn to ease up. Hang on so you don't fall down the mountain, but let go so the mountain won't ensnare you. If you cling too tightly to that mountain, you'll die before you reach the top. 

In all of life, we will experience more peace and happiness if we can balance our best efforts with a healthy detachment. As you think, so you are. Are you desperate? What are you hanging onto for dear life? What can't you live without? Hang on. But let go. In the end, what can we keep for ourselves? What will endure? Even once we reach the top of the mountain, what part of the journey will we be able to wrap our arms around, save for a scrapbook or record for posterity? We have to travel light to make it up the mountain. And we can't control what happens 100 years after we get there. We can't even hang onto our body for that long. Letting go isn't just good advice; it's part of reality. 

We don't want to be all effort or all detachment. Few people aim to be a Neurotic Type-A Perfectionist or a Total Slacker. So where do we find the balance? If you want to explore this on your yoga mat, experiment with giving your full attention to your breath and postures, moving with as much strength, grace and precision as you can, while also grounding yourself fully into the moment. You're not in a yoga competition. You're not working for your personal best so you can record it later. You're doing, not straining, holding on, not bracing. So you find the places where you can ease up, where you can close your eyes, where you can pause and rest, where you can relax into a pose. You learn to just be there with yourself, without seeking a personal reward. 

It's not easy. It's possible, though. Will you always be able to practice that way? Maybe. Probably not. I can do it sometimes. I have had true moments of peace and a feeling of effortless awareness in my practice. Most of the time it's not like that. I have also had those moments in my life, but most of the time it's not like that. I catch myself clinging and bracing a lot, actually. I ask myself things about my desires, like, "why do you want this? what are you trying to hold onto? do you think it will enhance or complete you, this thing, this accomplishment, this next up sensation? can you let go of this?" I can let go a little more when I become aware of the clinging. Just seeing it helps. 

When you can let go on your yoga mat, you are training yourself neurologically to let go in other areas of your life. Your relationships will improve (mine have). Your general stress level will go down (mine has). If life has ever seemed like a hamster wheel, or if you feel you've stepped out of the ring because it's too disenchanting, then "hang on, let go" may be what gets you back in the game. I have hoped this for myself. I hope it for you, too. 

I looked for a passage to read in class this week that would perfectly sum up the teaching of Abhyasa/Vairagya, Hang On/Let Go. I decided to share Chapter 2 of the Tao Teh Ching, but this wisdom resonates in all spiritual traditions. 

As soon as the world regards something as beautiful, ugliness simultaneously becomes apparent.

As soon as the world regards something as good, evil simultaneously becomes apparent.

In exactly the same manner, existence and non-existence give birth to each other. Difficult and easy define each other. Long and short form each other. High and low make each other distinguishable. Silence and sound make each other conspicuous. Front and back connect each other. 

Realizing this, one does not separate one's being from the subtle essence of the universe. One holds no preconceptions, and does things without insisting on personal conditions. One guides people by living in accord with the essence of life. One brings good things about, but has no intention of possessing them. One performs work, but has no intention to acquire personal power. 

When one's task is accomplished, one lets go of it and seeks no reward or recognition. Because one does not claim credit for oneself, one does not do any damage to oneself. 

-Translation by Hua-Ching Ni, 1995.

A Nontheist Theist, Part II: Embracing Hope

"Three things will last forever--faith, hope, and love--and the greatest of these is love." 1 Corinthians, 13:13. 

Translations of words and concepts like "hope" cause misunderstandings across cultures and religions, 

but when we simplify, we see that we all share experiences of suffering and loss and also joy and triumph. So what does that mean?

Dukkha, Anatta, Impermanence, these are real, but cannot negate Faith, Hope and Love. All of these concepts have emotional components. Our positive and negative emotions are not hindrances to Enlightenment. 

Jesus wept before the tomb of Lazarus (or someone wrote that he did). He cried out in agony on the cross. We feel, the Divine feels, and our feelings can lead us to experience deeper connection when we trust in a reality greater than our small selves and let go enough to be guided by it, and know that we are part of it. Hope does not have to be an obstacle to immersion in the present moment.

You can feel a quickening of hope in your heart in the presence of a dying relative, or in the midst of personal loss. I have. I trust my feelings. I love the Hindu and Christian scriptures, and some Buddhist teachings, but there is also some dogma within popular Buddhist messages about what truth is, 

and what reality is, and what liberation is. Yet, Buddha apparently said, "work out your own salvation with diligence; do not depend on others."

In our culture we can use a correction away from superficial emotion and attraction and avoidance,

but we can also stand to hear that needing to hold onto to something is every bit as much a part of nature and truth as impermanence. 

"Dharma gives us nothing to hold onto," "total appreciation of impermanence," "the teachings must be experienced without hope;" these quotes all sound like Buddhist dogma to me. "The truth is inconvenient," from whose perspective? "You shall know the truth and the truth will make you free," is what I believe. Hope is not an obstacle. Maybe hoping for a new car or job or a cure for terminal cancer is an obstacle, but hope with a capital H is not an obstacle.

Buddhist teachers like to say they are sitting in meditation with no goal, no hope for change, not seeking, yet everything is coming... Embracing paradox is all fine and well until it turns into picking and choosing which paradoxes to embrace. Then if anyone has an objection, the answers are all fancy lawyering, but with no accountability. "The sky is chartreuse. Don't know what that means? Keep meditating on it." 

Bringing compassion to suffering, bringing love to embrace all experience, clearing away needless activity and chatter to reveal joy and bliss--these are the fruits of spiritual practice-- this gives people hope, and it gives people something to hold onto, and it does make life better. All things are coming, and they will, and we can't stop this from happening, so then there is hope. Hope is also inextricable with life. 

Also, there is nothing with which to disagree, nothing to counter, and all truth will come to us in time, when we wait on the Lord (meditate). 

"This experience of the innermost center brings a contentment. You don't bring it; it comes, it simply rains over you." -Osho 

I find hope in this teaching. 

A Nontheist Theist: Where Uncertainty Meets Devotion

I had a strong internal response to this book passage, which prompted me to write something down so that my head could follow where my heart was leading me.

"The difference between theism and nontheism is not whether one does or does not believe in God. It is an issue that applies to everyone, including both Buddhists and non-Buddhists. Theism is a deep-seated conviction that there's some hand to hold: if we just do the right things, someone will appreciate us and take care of us. It means thinking there's always going to be a babysitter available when we need one. We all are inclined to abdicate our responsibilities and delegate our authority to something outside ourselves. Nontheism is relaxing with the ambiguity and uncertainty of the present moment without reaching for anything to protect ourselves. We sometimes think that dharma is something outside of ourselves -- something to believe in, something to measure up to. However, dharma isn’t a belief; it isn’t dogma. It is total appreciation of impermanence and change. The teachings disintegrate when we try to grasp them. We have to experience them without hope. Many brave and compassionate people have experienced them and taught them. The message is fearless; dharma was never meant to be a belief that we blindly follow. Dharma gives us nothing to hold on to at all. 

Nontheism is finally realizing that there’s no babysitter that you can count on. You just get a good one and then he or she is gone. Nontheism is realizing that it’s not just babysitters that come and go. The whole of life is like that. This is the truth, and the truth is inconvenient."

—Pema Chödrön, from When Things Fall Apart

I immediately wanted to discuss this with someone.  My husband was sitting next to me reading his book, so I interrupted his relaxation, per normal. I read the book passage to him and explained that I had put this book down for six weeks because some of the passages were resonating so strongly with me that I needed a break.  He listened and affirmed me as usual.  Then I wrote this with the intent of sharing it with someone, with anyone, who may also be looking for a broader view of a personal Divine being. Who else wants to be a yogini with her own, personal Jesus? (Or Vishnu? Or Allah?)

Do you think one can be a non-theist and a theist at the same time? I think so. 
I am. I don't feel limited by my conception of God. I agree with Paul Tillich 
but I also pray to a personal God and believe that I carry that God as an 
imprint in myself. I believe God to be immanent, transcendent, continuous and 
also infallible. It all comes down to perception, impermanence and the 
indivisible, perfectly whole nature of reality. We can't perceive God or reality 
from our limited vantage point but that does not mean theism is a faulty way of 
believing, or that nontheism captures the changeable nature of reality more 
accurately. Both are too limited, directly flowing from our constrained, binary 
ways of conceptualizing. 

My spiritual practice has space for both devotion and meditation on emptiness, 
groundlessness, transcendence. All of this can arise and flow simultaneously. 
Trying to parse all of that out and say what is more or less wise or true or 
real, always leads back to dogma. All I can say is that there are many right 
ways, and even circling around and zigzagging can land you right in the center. 
Because I trust, I relate to theists. Because I admit my inability to define 
anything, I relate to nontheists. It seems like I will never be a theological 
Christian or Buddhist and I am quite comfortable with that. Comfortable with 
uncertainty, yet keeping a devoted heart. 

Please message me or share comments if this stirs something in you. Anyone else feel a bit singled out as a spiritual infant still wanting to hold Daddy's hand if you choose theism? Have you ever been told you spend too much time in grey territory? Who else has donned a grey habit? Who thinks black and white hounds-tooth is still in style? Anyone in pinstripes? Color blocking? Tell me about it. 

Year-End Review: A Guided Meditation

Year-End Review: three words that can make your heart race a little! In corporate culture this means a sit-down with your manager and some feedback on your work, sometimes framed as "constructive criticism," though euphemisms have come to replace anything that could seem too "critical," unless you are a law firm associate or finance professional. Just kidding. Sort of. Well, I'm really glad I teach yoga these days... but even I had a Year-End Review! "Here's what's working, here's what's not." I asked for it! Old habits die hard. Reviews are helpful!

This is a rich, festive and fruitful week for those of us on the Good Ole Gregorian Calendar. Year-End is a beautiful, sacred time when we can look back and reflect on all we have accomplished, ways we have grown, new relationships we entered and events that shook things up in our lives. Facebook has a Year-In-Review feature that lets you see your notable status updates and photographs. You can do that with an old-fashioned photo book, too, or a personal journal.

Today, I'm suggesting we do this in a yoga class, or on your own in your home practice. I'd like you to direct your mind's activity in a purposeful meditation period today, first getting quiet and centered and then systematically going back through your year to collect impressions, high points, low points and turning points from 2013. I want you to form a mental picture of what 2013 brought to you, good and bad. What do you want to celebrate, and what do you want to leave behind? Make peace with 2013, thankful for both the blessings and the adversities and what they meant for you on your life's journey, so you can step into 2014 with an open mind and heart, ready to receive the gifts of the New Year.

***

Let's begin. We will use a candle to ritualize this moment and our intention, so light your candle and set it down in front of you if you are at home. Find a comfortable seat so you can begin settling into your body with ease: either legs crossed and hands resting on your thighs, or sitting up on a block in hero's pose with the tops of the feet resting on the floor. Now, steady your gaze on the candle. Begin to bring awareness to your breath. Feel the in breath and the out breath. Notice the sound and sensation of your breathing. As you focus your attention on the breath, begin to even out the length of the inhale and the exhale. With the eyes open, still gazing at the candle, we will take three deep, soothing breaths, inhaling to the top of the lungs, and exhaling all the way out, to a hollow belly. 1.....2.....3.

Gaze at the candle for a few more moments.  And now, let your eyes gently close. With your eyes closed, see the image of the candlelight set against the darkness on your eyelids.

Direct your attention to your head. Relax your forehead. Release any tension between your brows. Relax your jaw. Relax your scalp, from the top of your head to the base of your neck. Relax your neck. Relax your shoulders and the area between the shoulder blades. Relax your arms, all the way down to your fingers. Breathe into your belly and as you exhale, fully release and relax your abdominal muscles. Bring your attention to your legs. Relax your thighs and feel them get heavy and loose, the weight of the thighs dropping towards the floor. Relax your knees...your calves...your ankles...and your feet, down to your toes. Direct your breath all through your body, from your heart to your extremities, and feel everything relaxing and releasing. Let go.

Now, let your mind take you on a journey. Begin to take yourself back in time, to this time last year. You had finished celebrating your holidays. You were ready to embark on a New Year. Take yourself back to Wintertime, one year ago. How was last Winter for you? What did it feel like, physically, emotionally? How much did you work? How much did you play? Was it cold outside and warm in your house, in your cozy bed? Or did you go away? Was it warm where you went? When were you happy, or sad? Did you get sick? What was that like? Did you get better? Did you set resolutions? Did you get a financial bonus? Were you focused on gratitude, goal setting, or both? What other things happened in your life last Winter? Stay in your previous Winter for another minute or two.

Now, we will travel just like that through the other three seasons, up to today. Let's move on from Winter and into Spring, 2013. Take yourself back to last Spring, and envision what happened for you then, what you wanted, what you experienced, what was memorable? If nothing pivotal comes to mind, just focus on the sensations and impressions of Springtime, and something notable may come to you.

Last Summer. Go there now. What did you do last summer? Really. What can you be proud of and what could have gone better? How did it feel? Summer. Ahhhh...stay a few moments in Summer 2013.

Fall. Let's go. Autumn in New York...or wherever you were. Where were you? This one is recent. Did your autumn fly by? Take note of what happened in your life, what you achieved, what fell behind and what moved forward, and what did you experience? Who was with you?

And now come full circle, back to Wintertime, here in your body, sitting on the floor, at the tail-end of 2013. How do you feel this Winter, and how do you feel right now? What were the memorable moments of your holidays? What are your plans for New Year's Eve? What do you feel really good about and what do you want to happen?

Keep your eyes closed, but move around a little. Start to come back into the now. But as you are doing that, I want you to envision a big, old fashioned collage on poster board, or on a projector screen...a vision board, if you will. Imagine snapshots of events and people from the past year, and also words and other images that form a picture of your year. Get that image ready, and then, look it over really well, side to side and top to bottom. Hey, you... good job! And also--I'm sorry. And also... what an adventure. You gained some things, you lost some things, but most importantly, you are still here, and you are still breathing. You are a gift, and your life is a gift. Thank yourself. Applaud yourself. Bring to mind those achievements and good times and good feelings you want to keep with you as you move into new blessings.

Finally, I want you to choose a few things you'd like to leave behind as you move into 2013. Remember the candle. Imagine that candle is actually a big fire, big enough to burn anything you are leaving behind. Now, in your mind's eye, I want you to see yourself approaching that fire and throwing onto it all the experiences and sensations and memories you'd like to leave behind you. They're going to burn out in the fire, and in the heat we create in today's movement practice.

Take a few moments, and let your eyes open. Look at the candle. Come back into the room. Wiggle your arms and legs and fingers and toes. Deep breath in, deep breath out, three times. And now open your arms wide, and feel your chest and heart open. You are ready to walk with open arms, an open heart and an open mind, into a new year. Congratulations. And Happy New Year!

In Everything, A Gift: The Wisdom of Madhu Vidya

This moment is a gift--that is why it is called the "present." Yoga teachers often tell you to focus your attention on the present moment, anchoring to the here and now, coming back to the immediacy of the breath and body. Increasing numbers of psychotherapists will give you similar advice, using techniques such as Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, or Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy (MBSR and MBCT).


We live in an exciting era where we are seeing ancient teachings from Eastern wisdom traditions validated by Western science and utilized in various therapeutic settings. Mindfulness teachings (or practices analogous to mindfulness teachings) exist in Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism and Yoga.


In the history of Yoga, the spiritual tradition of Tantra (a Sanskrit word roughly translatable as "expansion leading to liberation") had its greatest influence during the post-classical period, in the time following Patanjali's Yoga Sutras. Some scholars claim that Tantric teachings date back at least 7,000 years, but in the teaching of Yoga, Tantric philosophy came in and shook things up after Patanjali's contributions. Tantra is a non-dualistic spiritual discipline, embracing all experience as a pathway to the Divine. The Yoga Sutras teach that matter and spirit need to be separated in order to evolve consciousness. Patanjali considered the body an impediment or obstacle to developing higher consciousness. Tantric philosophy brought in a different perspective: for Tantric practitioners, the body is used as a vehicle to evolving consciousness; the physical body is seen as a sacred vehicle to enlightenment, so there is an emphasis on nourishing the body and prolonging life. According to Tantra, this body, and everything good and bad that comes with it, is a gift.


In Tantra Yoga, the practice of fully embracing the present moment is called madhu vidya, which means "sweet knowledge" or "honey knowledge." The body is a gift, the present moment is a gift, and fully experiencing the body in the present moment is the path to enlightenment. Click here for an example of tantric mindfulness practice.


“Tantra is the yoga of everything” (Ramesh Bjonnes, The Yoga of Tantric Love: 7 Reasons Why It’s Not Just About Sex). Read the article. The day-to-day peaks and valleys of human existence are the essence of the spiritual journey; this includes suffering, sickness, desire, anger, boredom and vice. Tantra teaches that we can meet the Divine everywhere, in the good and the bad within and without. “This knowledge, this wisdom is called Madhuvidya, or honey knowledge, the idea that the bees of Spirit can turn everything we do and feel, even failure, into nectar” (Id.). Through embracing all experiences, even physical experiences and the great range of human emotions, Tantric yogis make use of vulnerability as a gateway to receive Divine love and compassion. “Tantra is seeing love in everything” (Id.) Tantra is seeing the gift in everything.


The gift is the present. Let's open to this gift, through our practice today. Simply experience your practice, without judgment, and in the fullness of your own embodied presence. Can't get on your mat today? Tantric practice can be any activity or experience as long as you intend it to evolve your consciousness, so open up to the gift of your own experience today, in the wisdom of madhu vidya.