Spaciousness vs Tension

Tags

Don’t over-work, Freedom, spaciousness, strength, Stress, tension, Wisdom, yoga teaching

Enjoying a little spaciousness while I cycle...

As I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned before, sometimes the words I say when I’m teaching a yoga class seem to appear from thin air. I haven’t planned them or rehearsed them but there they are, being all reflective and wisdom-ish like.

I guess I find my inspiration for what I’ll talk about from observations of my experiences or other’s. Which are really one and the same thing. This is why I can talk of these things and be pretty sure that most people are going to relate to some of what I’m saying.

Because while we all have our own experiences, many of them are shared and/or similar enough in content to be relatable. Shareable. Yes?

So. Tuesday I got to thinking about spaciousness, and how when we tense everything up in our body or mind, there isn’t a huge amount of spaciousness going around. So over-tensing, over-concentrating, over-working, pushing yourself to the limits, killing yourself with running or gym (or intensive yoga) workouts isn’t necessarily helping you.

I told my students what I learned from having a couple of fairly respectable injuries in recent times: you don’t have to push to your edges in order to get the benefit of your yoga practice.

You can do less and it is okay. You don’t have to be sweating like a fiend or waking up sore the next day in order to build strength, stability and openness in your body.

In fact the harder you strain and over-work on strength, stability and openness in your body, the more likely you are to cause an injury. And that’s just on the physical level.

Then there’s the way that pushing too hard mentally can injure your emotional well-being. You judge yourself for not being able to do everything/as well as others in the class. You develop a mindset that says if you’re not pushing yourself to the edge, then you aren’t working hard enough and you won’t get the results you want.

None of this is true, but thinking or acting in these ways can cause physical, mental and/or emotional stress.

And stress is tension. Which makes us feel small and crowded.

But life and our body and mind, feel MUCH better when we have space. When our joints and spine aren’t compacted, we feel better. When we’ve got plenty of time to do the things we want to do, we feel better.

So we practice this in our yoga, and take this idea out into our life.

Be relaxed and comfortable in your poses. Be okay with where you’re at without pushing yourself so hard. Work effectively and functionally, but not excessively.

You will still get stronger.

You will still develop better core strength.

Your body and joints will open over time, to the degree that is possible for your body.

You will find it easier to calm your mind for meditation.

And you will be able to take this sense of calm and spaciousness out into other parts of your life.

So – work as well as you can in your yoga practice, on any given day. Do today, what is appropriate for your health and energy levels today. Do what’s appropriate for you tomorrow, when it is tomorrow. Don’t over-work. Doing your best without straining or forcing is enough.

Find ways to enjoy your practice. You develop more sensitivity and body awareness when you aren’t pushing so hard, because this leaves room to feel subtleties.

You are enough as you are (injured/sick/low energy etc), and you will get the benefits of the practice anyway.

It went something like that, anyway…

~Svasti

Change is a funny thing

Tags

Acceptance, autoimmune disorder, Change, control, deep gorges, Freedom, Hashimoto's, Healing, hidden crevices, Kinesiology, personal power, PTSD, tools, traumatic memories, wherewithal

Often we don’t get that change is happening until it’s already here. The birth of change can be troubling, right? Because sometimes we get a little stuck. But ultimately, change has already happened by the time it registers in our brains and what we actually need to do is accept that our reality is different now.

Of course, reality is changing from moment to moment anyway. But when it changes A LOT in a short space of time; when the process is sped up or jam-packed or just significantly different than our current concept of life… that’s when the proverbial hits the fan, yeah?

So all I know is that mid-November, I had an inkling that things were Different. I mean, I had a pretty major hair cut, which is something women do when they’re acknowledging change on some level.

And when I say major, for the first time in 10-15 years, I significantly changed my hair style. Are you hearing me? I’ve more or less had the same hairstyle forever. And as I sat there in the hairdresser’s chair peering at myself in the mirror, these words rose up: Can you chop it off and make it look good? I want it to be a LOT shorter.

Immediately afterwards, I loved it. The girl who’s always had hair at least 3-4 inches past her shoulders now had neck-grazing hair length. It wasn’t short-short, but it was short enough. And to quote a friend: choppy and swishy and good.

But I didn’t really get it then. I was still caught up in the oh-my-goddess-will-I-get-a-new-job-soon momentum, avoiding (for a little while) my health, and planning for my trip to Bali while wondering if I could really afford it. Funnily enough, everything panned out.

I landed a job I love (and still do); I quit sugar – which has had a major impact on my health; my Bali trip was awesome AND due to the speed with which a new job turned up, it wasn’t a financial strain. I found a new and wonderful naturopath and we’re on EXACTLY the same page in terms of treating my health; and, my yoga practice and teaching are going from strength to strength.

Life is getting… better. At the start of this year I was desperately afraid that it wouldn’t. But so far, setting my intentions for Healing and Acceptance has been crazy-powerful. Consequently, there’s all sorts of healing and acceptance going on without my having to put too much effort into it. Or so it seems.

Yet, I was still afraid that all of this good stuff wouldn’t/couldn’t last. That at some point, it was all going to go away again and/or fall apart. Weirdly, I was carrying this around as anxiety that wouldn’t quit. Kinda silly, huh?

Then, last Saturday brought with it another major milestone.

In late 2010, I started having regular kinesiology sessions when I realised I was still struggling with PTSD in some ways. Sure, I wasn’t a complete mess like I had been. But I couldn’t talk about it freely without falling apart. Even though I was once again a functional human being, I wasn’t really okay. Not in my heart of hearts, and it was compromising my ability to move forward in life.

Every single one of my kinesiology sessions delved into the past, purging some other aspect of trauma from my body and mind. I can only liken it to wringing a towel dry – you’ve gotta keep it up til you get all the moisture out… Sometimes dealing with the past was just about being assaulted, but more often than not it also included other traumas from my past.

Because, if you face up to real healing you have to face up to all of your un-dealt with stuff. All of it. It is VERY hard work.

THEN…

For the very first time last Saturday, I had a kinesiology session in which the past didn’t come up at all. Not once.

Instead, we were dealing with this transition time between what has been, where I’m at and what will be.

I can’t tell you how weird that was. There’s been so many false starts where I thought I was “healed”. Most of it was wishful thinking, however: I wanted to be better but I hadn’t really faced up to the whole truth.

Now I have.

Of course, I’m not saying that I’m 100% sure I’ve dealt with everything that needs dealing with. I mean, can anything ever be 100%?

However, for the first time since late 2005, there are no painful shackles imprisoning me to traumatic memories. I’m no longer just a small shift away from tears and falling apart. I’ve inhabited and owned those experiences instead of dissociating from them.

It’s such a powerful feeling because I’m in control. And free!

These are two things that trauma survivors can’t relate to very easily. For example, being assaulted wasn’t something I had any control over. Neither were the years where I didn’t know I had PTSD, or the flashbacks, anxiety, or depression. I didn’t have the tools or emotional wherewithal to do much about it for many years. I also didn’t have much control over the crash-landing of my adrenal system, resulting in an auto-immune condition.

But now I do have tools, control and wherewithal. I’m physically, emotionally and mentally stronger than ever. However, to become strong I had to expose my weaknesses.

So now you can’t even unintentionally hurt me by talking about assault or PTSD. You can’t accidentally kick over my carefully constructed defences and expose my raw underbelly: my wounds – deep gorges and hidden crevices that they were – have healed properly this time with all infections excised and treated.

Managing my health will be an ongoing balancing act for the rest of my life. But, I know what helps and what hurts. And I’ll do everything in my power to minimise the impact of Hashimoto’s on my body and mind.

Yep, I’ve only just noticed that all of this change – in the form of renewed and strengthened personal power – has arrived.

But then, I got my hair cut again last Friday. Even shorter than last time. Yep.

~ Svasti

If the world is closing in on you…

Tags

bare bones, Depression, filthy dirty lies, Freedom, harder to breathe, Intimacy, loving kindness, Mirror of Recrimination, own worst critic, personas, pigeon holes, post-it notes, private tropical beach, Samsara, strained, stressed, wicked misdirections, Yoga

–This post grew out of a comment on someone else’s blog but has since expanded quite a bit!–

If you’re unbelievably stressed and strained, or depressed, or sad or terrified or generally unhappy or numb… or if the world is closing in on you, weighing ever more heavily across your neck and shoulders, if the air around you is getting thicker or thinner and it’s getting harder and harder to breathe or if you’re not quite sure how you’re going to get to tomorrow, then this post is for you.

Because I’ve been most of these things, and more than once. And I’m likely to experience them again, too. So I get it, I’m coming from a place of solidarity, from love, from wanting to share what works. From the inside out because seeing from the outside in is never the same.

This is for you. For all of you out there dealing with the human condition of suffering, just like me.

With much love…

****************

Its times like this make me want to strip it all back, right down to the bare bones. Down to my own naked self, with no job titles or brand labels or clothing or hair styles or any other way for people to judge me. Especially not myself because like many people, I am my own worst and harshest critic.

And it’s these times too, when we should stay away from mirrors which in many respects only reflect back at us those things we tell ourselves are true, whether real or imagined, positive or negative. Most of those things are filthy dirty lies but we’ve convinced our Self they are true and usually these are soul destroying negatives and wicked misdirections that chip away at who we think we are until we feel like nothing more than a pock-marked old statue, all crumbly and not quite right anymore.

And when we feel like this, when we lose sight of what is really real and who we really are because we’ve been juggling and tap dancing and cart-wheeling for so long now, and singing so many different songs and to all kinds of audiences… I think what we really need is to just drop it all and right now already!

Okay, maybe not literally as in running off to a simple bamboo hut on a private tropical beach (although that does sound nice, doesn’t it?), but we do at the very least have to stop looking in the mirror for a while. Stop comparing. Stop analysing and stop trying to live up to what we think we should be. Or what we think others think we should be. Shed all our requirements and get back to just Being and Doing. A human-being. Being a human. Just being. Not projecting. Not jumping through hoops. Not doing things because “what will [insert name] think?”

Just being… because labels and roles and expectation lead to a loss of intimacy with our Self, specifically with our own breath and body. And by intimacy I mean closeness, sensitivity, loving kindness – for yourself. Respect – for yourself. Your self-worth levels must be replenished until they’re full to over-flowing with juicy sweetness, enjoyment and love for yourself first.

Because if you don’t let yourself have that and experience life in that way, then you’re running on empty and giving out to others becomes a constant strain and worse, it can make you sick.

You see, all of our requirements for living and our requirements for other people are just streaks of colour and light we once painted on a canvass we call our life. Once upon a time this is what we thought life should look like, but at some point or perhaps multiple points along the way, we forgot to update it. We forgot to say – hey, I no longer want to do this or be that person. And usually we forgot to update our view of the people we love, too.

But all of this stripping things down, becoming your own best friend and updating your world view… all these things are necessary and important if we’re to extract ourselves from the swamp of pigeon holes, post-it notes and baggage tags, addresses, and personas that we or other people have seen fit to bestow on us over the years.

We all deserve freedom, absolutely we do. And it is attainable. But the only way to start is with your Self. Stop looking in that Mirror of Recrimination and start getting in touch with who you are when you’re not calling yourself every name under the sun!

Who are you when you aren’t living in a world where everything has a name and a price? Who are you when it’s about nurturing, feeding, finding joy and happiness, and discovering the things you’re naturally attracted to and interested in?

We all have those answers in our heart, but first we have to get our ticker back in working order! It may need defrosting, or some other kind of return to room temperature. It may need a little excavation – taking down those brick walls or moats. It may need a little excitement, or de-numbifying and so on.

There’s so many ways that we cut out enjoyment, love and connection to ourselves and the world… and while it’s possible to function in that kind of space for the longest time, eventually some part of us, even if it’s the tiniest of seeds – it says ENOUGH! And if/when it does, then you’d better listen up and listen good, because it’s time to pay attention and make some changes before the changes come and re-make you.

And believe me, once we get back in touch with our ever-patient heart, everything changes. For me it’s yoga that helps me find those answers, both on and off the mat. Especially yoga that’s not about form and shape and everything being perfect. Especially yoga that’s inclusive of the breath-mind-body-heart connection, feeling the sensations of the body, allowing the mind to tune into the practice, the very here and now-ness of it all. Brooks has just written a gorgeous little post about exactly that (and you should read it to get more of a sense of what I mean).

I wish you well. I wish your loved ones well. I wish for love to reside in your heart and soul, in your loving relationship with yourself and if you have them, with your partner and children.

I wish you freedom to dance across glittering oceans of inspiration and joy. I wish that your cup overflows with beauty and love and that you find who you are amongst the maddening dreamscapes that pervade day to day existence and insist on calling themselves Reality.

~Svasti xo

A word to the world

Tags

Breathe, Freedom, Labels, No rules, Poem, Poetry, Relax, Truth

Take all your labels

Your ability to divide and decide

To make right and wrong

And feel so self-righteous

Try to put all that aside and see

I am not moved, not affected

I am not the things you say

Think what you will of me

But I just don’t see it that way

Breathe in and breathe out

Feel the spaces in between?

Yes, between your breaths

Is freedom if you pay close attention

Don’t you know all your issues mean nothing?

Don’t you get that being angry a thousand times a day

Takes you further from what you want most of all?

I am more than you can see

Eyes can’t be trusted with the truth

I’m playing a game that is no game

With rules that are no rules

Its a different playing field over there!

When you reach out in fear and anger

I’m saddened you think that’s all there is

This limited cartoon version of the world

With its extremes of light and shade

It never has to be one or the other, why not all?

Open, don’t close

Play it large, not small

Relax into accepting it all

~Svasti