The Beauty in Hidden Structures

We are so busy moving ourselves around in the world,  that, like buildings, we see mostly the facade in passing. One of the gifts of living in a transitional bustling neighborhood of a major city is that there is constant building and tearing down so that, along with facades, all the inner structures are revealed coming and going.

Walking to teach my morning vinyasa class, I was stopped in my tracks by this gorgeous metal support structure. Light pouring through parts of it, it's undulations, shapes, reflective nature and span was strikingly beautiful. Just half a block further on, there is another one of these -- so it isn't any one-of-a-kind marvel at all -- that is covered in all the next stages of building with no light in it, and few of its textures revealed. In a week's time, they will both be invisible above ceilings and below floors.

Class was all about this in a subtle way starting with slow rocking in the hip sockets to feel how the thigh bones seat and mindful rolling through the sitting bone supports, to reveal spinal support even as the weight shifts.  Eventually we moved into standing sequences, unfolding and refolding with the breath, and allowing the hidden structures to do their work deep in the interior of each asana (posture). Yet their presence could still be established, felt, and explored.

Walking to my next class I caught a glimpse of a building being demolished. It has stood for decades, though this demolition has been elongated over the last few years it is active once again. At the moment, the remaining structure is like a gem hiding in its case. I think of the breath, its textures, its stalwart nature, its foundational strength, its subtle delicacies.  How grateful I am to live in this moment in a human form that I can explore at so many levels, cultivating awareness of the details and technicalities and the grand scale of the overall plan!

Meditation: Hold the Railing in the Bottomless Pool

Right in the middle of dinner, a mood settles in, changing the textures of experience, tamping down on interactions and forming strange silences. There's a deep pool of possible feelings upon which to draw, yet like sipping through a straw, only one small part is sucked up, feeding the whole.  It wasn't like this just moments before, or perhaps yesterday was different. It feels as though a shift, like a tectonic plate, happened, and without knowing how it happened, or making up reasons why it happened, we feel as though standing in a place from which life looks different.  Right in the middle of life, someone we love  leaves us and we are lost in the bottomless pool.

It doesn't seem like a choice, since it is something we feel. Feelings surround us, like an immersion, and we cannot feel the bottom of the pool with our toes any more. Seems like either we drift with it, paddle in it, or drown in it. Is feeling really a matter of mind? a reaction to a condition? Does it help to know that the condition is impermanent, or is this feeling of the impermanence of everything like being in a bottomless pool, hopeless of finding our feet? Forever without the comfort of grounding? This is the wash of grief, the depth of loss, the fear of looking forward or letting go of what is past, unable to see the continuum of events as a constantly shifting mirage without feeling despair and agonizing incompleteness.

How do we live with equanimity if there is no bottom to the pool? Think of the shallow end of a swimming pool. There are stairs to give a gradual way into the water, where one can stay until more at ease with the depth and the shift from dry to wet. Even in the deepest end of the pool there are ladders for one to climb out, or to hold onto for a moment of rest. Understanding that the pool is bottomless does not mean giving up these supports, in fact it helps to see them as exactly that. There is little hope of understanding the sea simply from standing on the shore, we begin by wading in. We cannot know the deepest parts on our own, nor traverse the breadth of the sea as a fish might. Yet we can hold the concept of the mountain ridges beneath the surface, the universe of life and energy cycles playing out throughout. These are like the steps into the pool that we can use in approaching the ocean of our feelings and reactions, the seemingly boundary-less and overwhelming reactions we can have in a moment of loss, disappointment or fear.

Setting aside time from the viewing platform of meditation or a yoga practice can allow us to visualize the stairs, and the vastness of the bottomless pool, without reactivity. We can watch the whole scene play out without immersing ourselves in it. Notice the fear or grief arising, the avoidance or the urge to plunge beyond our depth. This moment of observation can be seen and even felt without being lost in it. We can learn to train our attention to hold the railing of the ladder while we let the mind follow the waves outward into the deep end. Let the breath itself be your railing.

Simplifying Even the Moon

I woke up this morning to a thick fog all around the house in upstate New York. Water droplets on the screens and windows full of white glare. The view held no trees, no hills, no valley, and gave no sense of what else might be out there. What is transformation if not new understanding? As in the discovery of sub-atomic and nuclear physics, the old ideas of Newtonian principles no longer applied to everything, yet had their sway over the mechanical world we can see. Beyond that, with high power microscopes and telescopes, the view of the world became so much larger and new "rules" seemed to make things work. And there is so much we cannot see if we must take everything as it appears. As with the clearing of the fog this morning, gradually the stone wall emerged, and a height of tree beyond, and eventually the valley with streaks of hill behind it. Now the sun shines bright and I can pretend that all is revealed to me. Let's not even begin to consider the insect life, or the microbes in the soil that are nurturing and attacking the roots of everything in the garden. Just that I know this is all going on out there is like the discovery of the atom!

It helps to simplify to the core of being. I watch my blind cat function in the world with remarkable stability and happiness, or what passes for that on the scale of human emotions. He doesn't see but can hunt, he doesn't see but can jump into the chair. He will run to the sound of my voice across an ocean of not knowing, and seems secure, purring and finding my leg to rub against. He is functioning in the deepest sense. It is this that I seek on my yoga mat as well. Can I approach the moon itself, or take in the energy of a star? Can I place my weight in my foot, feeling the energy align up through my leg into my pelvis, forces of gravity holding me securely while I extend in a most natural way through my spine, letting go of the weight of my head, and supporting a lifted arm and lifted leg for Ardha Chandrasana (Half Moon Pose)? It doesn't work if I start by taking my body in parts, aim for a shape, or present myself with the struggle of "balancing on one leg." I will not get there by pushing my leg into the air and reaching for an external shape. Yet by finding the root of my soft foot resting on the earth - deeply connected to the balance in my pelvis as the foundation - and then release the energy from in the core of my body - of my being - I feel the flying moon taking form in me. The moon does not balance in the sky, nor hang. Remember, it's visible presence is a reflection of light from the sun. Perhaps I'll use a block under my hand or place my hand on a wall to enable a natural extension in my spine, with energy connecting my heel to my fingers along both flying halves. Reducing fear helps my breath and my breathing helps reduce fear. Maybe I will elongate into this flying feeling on my way in and out of Trkonasana (Triangle Pose), playful, and without goals. Like the fog, the efforting and judging can easily obscure this shining moon from sight.

I think of the people around me with their heads full of ideas, goals, and desires. I love them and wish them well. May they find ways to release these desires and find joy in what they are actually doing (not wishing for summer when it is winter and wanting the sun when there is fog)! May they allow themselves the freedom from the external goals long enough to discover what they love to do (letting the passage or ride be as much for them as the getting where they are going)! May they see in the swirl of ideas an ocean of possibility in which they breathe each breath and explore their authentic self, coming, as they eventually will, into the brilliant light of the sun once the fog clears (just being their self). I cannot make this happen, nor will all my words or yogic teachings make this available to them. Only in their own explorations will their path emerge. As their foot steps in the fog the earth rises to meet it. I see my little cat leap onto the front step, my voice being the open door. People can also find that their breath and their foundation on the earth support their wildest adventures and the softest of moments. I would invite you all to fly as the moon itself.

A Foundation in the Breath

Sometimes we lean too hard where we think the support is and throw ourselves off balance entirely. This kind of interaction wastes energy, and ruins relationships. No one else can give you the map, but teachers (and fellow beings) can help you with your map reading skills. I believe the map actually begins to draw itself as we as make our own inquiries. It is convenient to begin with the body, since we each live in one through which we accumulate experiences. I have taken plenty of yoga classes that felt like they were all about the body.

When I started going to yoga classes, I had trouble communicating with my toes. I'd ask them to leave the floor and spread wide and they just looked back at me until I laughed. The same thing happened when I wanted to move my rib cage in small circles, or lift my legs in anything resembling Navasana (boat pose). I could make a long list of what wasn't happening and what was happening. The mind woke up to the shock that I was living in a body I really didn't know, even after all this time and all we'd been through together. There were flexibilities I never realized, and abilities to match the inabilities. There are ways of hearing that internal voice that wants to share who I really am, and allowing stillness, along with unifying movements helps develop the level of consciousness where the inner voice can speak.

In my own practice a shift began as I realized that it is not strength or will that lifts the body, but the ability to allow energy to rise from a foundation of support. It may seem hokey, but even holding oneself on hands and knees and lifting one hand will help inform the body about where the support is really coming from -- the core and the breath. As awareness turns the light on, the body can release and relax all the other clenching muscles and allow the core to use the breath. This lift makes the weight resting on the knees and hands actually lighter. Yes, lighter. So it is not always a matter of pressing down into the earth with one or another body part. I suggest softening the foot into the floor and drawing core energy up the body as you lift the other leg into Vrksasana (tree) or fly a bit in a elementary standing version of Balikakasana (crane) and you may find that balance is no longer a struggle.

There is a significant athletic aspect to yoga in this day and age, in this place, and among many students, but really in my view that is not even half the practice. I, too, admire strong, lithe bodies that can achieve amazing things, seem easy and fluid, and exude grace. I have not felt that I lived in one of those, but I am coming to find those attributes exist even in my aging, asymmetrical lived-in-half-century body. I attribute this to my explorations of yoga, which have definitely not been approached as any kind of physical training in any athletic sense, but truly is a methodical opening of the communication and energy channels inside me. The practice helps me learn theinner languages and more fully understand the messages.

Balance with Excitement and Reflect

As the year comes to a close, it is easy to lean forward into projections of what may come next. It is just as easy to turn and lean back into what has piled up as experiences in the past year. Either way it's easy to stir up lots of feelings, excitement, sadness, pride, wistfulness, determination, and hope. How do we find balance in the midst of the celebrations, the wash of feelings, the anticipation of a New Year?

Just as with an asana practice, we can find freedom when we find our foundation. Imagine a standing posture, feet resting on the earth, exploring the stability of the whole energy body! Lean forward in extended side angle (Utthita Parshvakonasana), turning upward (Parivrtta Parshvakonasana); lean back, arching in a peaceful warrior.

Let your foundation root you as you anticipate the new year and cherish your view of the past year. Whether it's your feet, your seat, or standing on your hands, there's support in every breath to give you the freedom you need as you welcome 2010.