The Path Between Ignorance and Certitude

Where I walk is a changing path.
Stones mix with roots,
sand with the dirt of decomposing leaves.
Imagining that I know where I'm going
I place one foot in front of the other,
finding purchase, or slipping until I do.
I seek the familiar in the landscape around me,
yet find no marks define that world.
Could it be that the shapes of leaves
are enough to comfort me with certitude?
The way my foot slips is proof enough
of what I do not know.
And I, on the path, one foot behind the other,
see that which finds my turning gaze.
The rustle of leaves draws my eyes
towards the underbrush,
yet the source I can not see.
The texture of the leaves cushions my footfalls.

My path is one that others have walked,
yet no visible footprints remain.
And perhaps I leave none.
So it is my being upon the path itself
that is my destiny,
my moment here is the whole story.
What I do not know is not ignorance,
what I think I know is not certainty.
Times are, when that is uncomfortable,
like a pebble in my shoe,
and yet I am never lost as I step one step,
and find that which turns my gaze.

Perhaps as I gain some ease with this way,
being between the known and unknown,
I will find my gaze dissolves into just being,
the way the leaf detritus disintegrates into earth.
And aren't I really the same as the leaf,
perhaps I am the rustling in the brush?
The path is one without boundaries
between the questions and the answers.

Grateful for the Wet Wind

Do you find yourself rushing into your day, rushing in the cold, the rain, rushing through lunch, rushing to meetings, to classes, even to yoga? What is it that pushes you towards that which you cannot yet see, the next place, the next task, your expectations of yourself? It is the mind reacting. Once I hold still for a moment, I can see the uncertainties, fears, hopes and cravings, the anxieties and judgments in my rushing. What is the hurry? Getting somewhere or doing something before what happens? Finishing, leaving, arriving, going, doing all in the frenzy of preventing disasters that my mind presents to me.

In the moment itself, there is nothing amiss. I can walk in the wild wet wind of the day, relishing the way the water clouds my glasses, feeling the strangeness of my own skin and the merging of my watery eyes with the rain itself. The wind has its reasons for its rushing past me, the warm air hurrying to replace the cooler air, the shifting pressures encouraging the movement of energy. It is my will that moves me, the mind in action. I have presented myself with a task, or a commitment, a responsibility or a choice and I am acting upon that in space and time. Being right where I am, I will still get to the train to wait for the next one or catch the one that happens to be pulling right in as I arrive. My rushing will not change the train that is already ahead or behind of its schedule. My mind can entangle me in the urgency of the moment such that I cannot even enjoy running for the station, should I choose to run. Yet even the running can feel exuberant, full of grace and gratitude.

Where are you right now? Rushing pushes us out of this moment. What do you lose? Can you allow yourself to be right there in the wet and wind, on your way to whatever is next but existing in this moment, discovering your own grace? Encourage yourself to be glad of the legs that carry you, your eyes that water, that runny nose, even the cheeks that feel the edge of cold. Experience the moment your feet make contact with the sidewalk, walking or running! Notice how your legs move in your hip joints or how beautifully your body balances, spine rising even as it sits in a wheelchair. Enjoy the way the water droplets find you, and relish your own reactions. This is the path to gratitude and awareness that brings freedom from those very fears, anxieties, pressures, expectations and judgments that push me out of my own life into a whirlwind of suffering.

There are moments when we move faster, moments when we move slower, but the mind can remain open, mindful, and grateful. I can detach from the story of rushing (missing something, losing something, risking something), and bring myself gratefully right into that wild wet wind. I am on my way, and being right here, right now.

Ordering Onions & Setting Intentions

Here I am again, re-reading the descriptions of the onions as I try to figure out which ones to order for the garden this year. Even remembering which ones went to seed too fast, or kept well in the cellar, or taste hot raw, or carmelize beautifully, doesn't really help me predict this next year's crop. The weather makes so much difference. Watering or not in combination with the weather can change everything. Harvesting at the right time, cooking or eating in a timely fashion, all this is roiling in my head as I think about which onions to order. Desire, fear of failure, hope and wishful thinking are also with me as I read "days to harvest" and "storage potential."

Clarifying all this means setting my intentions, and that helps me make the decision. What am I willing to do and what do I want from this crop? Am I willing to pull and use the ones that mature fast and do not keep well, and to attend to watering needs if this is a dry summer? Last summer we had so much rain that it was a veritable slug festival! Can I plan out the garden to give the storage onions enough space to really develop fully? Am I willing to take on the responsibility for the onions I plant, or just accept the vagaries of nature should my attention lapse over the course of the season? Am I really putting my little north country raised bed garden in competition with the farm stands and grocery stores that get those huge magnificent onions from specialized farms in Texas?

Sometimes when I show up on the yoga mat I may think I have no plan to follow. Yet even giving myself over to the breath is my true underlying intention, just like allowing myself to be responsive to the rain or dryness of the natural weather cycles. Perhaps I will establish a physical intention, to move from my core, or to raise awareness of the breath in the back body, or to establish a foundation from which to release into twists. This is a bit like planning out the garden plots, to allow the space for each type of onion, enabling ease of watering, or weeding, and segregating one variety from another so that harvesting clears the way for another crop. Or I might set a more philosophical, spiritual or metaphorical intention for my practice to send heart energy beyond myself, or to open myself to questions of wholeness, tolerance or judgment. This promotes a less global way of choosing onions, more specifically drawing deeply into my own garden, what can I nurture, seeking the nature of sweet and hot, providing for my family. I know that common onions can be bought at local farm stands all around me, and this deeper view leads me towards ordering cippolinis and red tropeas, a long storage deep red zeppelin and a slightly pungent yellow globe onion for sandwiches and soups. I am ready to pull one onion and use it, or to harvest the whole crop at that particular moment when the greens fold and begin turning brown, regardless of original harvesting projections.

I cannot know if it will rain a lot this summer, any more than I can tell whether my judgment will release as I center myself on the mat, but I can choose to keep my intention to water the garden if it is dry, just as I can keep my breath as a reminder to release my judgmental mind with every exhale.

Finding Drishti - A Good Seat With Obstructed View

Lately at times it feels as though I'm in a theater but my view is obstructed and I just can't get or take in the whole scene from where I am. Meanings escape me, understanding comes haltingly and the scene shifts before I've been able to catch all the words. The direct antidote for this feeling is my practice. First, being open to what is there; second, acknowledging that what I perceive is subject to constantly changing conditions; third, not judging my responses and letting them come and go; and four, focusing my Drishti (gaze), my attention, whether it's an inner focus or an external one. The resulting clarity and calm helps maintain a willingness to stay in the theater, a good thing since, according to Shakespeare all the world is a stage, and we are merely players upon it.

I just returned from a visit with my elder family members during this period of particularly wild political, national and global news. This includes the on-going natural and human phenomenon in Haiti, the political story in Massachusetts, the rocking boat of national health insurance discussions, and the court's authorization for corporate money to jump with both feet on our political processes. Meanwhile I am absorbing the details of life among those living in the later part of life. The slower but in some ways radical events, feelings, meanings, and relationships are visible and invisible. Seeing through nonjudgmental eyes I feel a deepening in my ability to be connected and close to fundamental truths I share with them and all beings. This helps enormously in the wide world, and the very intimate one as well, where my reactivity can lead to sorrow, frustration and disquieting fears for the future.

There is no boundary that protects anything I know from what I might forget or re-imagine differently. There is no law that states this one set of positions or opinions is the only correct one. I can change my seat, but my view will remain obstructed as long as I am attached to the idea that "truth" is a particular story, or that "right" is a specific way of doing or being. This does not serve my being in the world. It seems obvious that memory issues change the way a conversation unfolds, the way a day winds through itself, the way feelings wrap and unwrap events, comments, relationships and decisions. In some very real ways all of history is subject to issues of memory, interpretation, point of view, and what a friend of mine calls "politics of location." I feel this quite personally, sitting at the table, or on the side of a bed, in front of a newscast, or on my yoga mat.

I find that focusing my drishti helps me recognize myself in each of my relatives no matter how different our situation or stage of life. I can find them in me. My openness to the whole stage allows me to see myself in shadows and in light. If I can know the shape of the obstruction, it helps improve my view. Meditation and yoga on a regular basis unfolds the eyelids and allows me to see the shapes more and more as I go along.

Standing the World on Its Head – Mine

When I first started yoga, I had no idea that I would be finding myself upside down.

Headstand. Salamba Shirshasana. By its nature this asana offers endless ways for me to compete with my view of myself. I have tried to muscle my way, I can use preparations and props, I can read all about it, but when it comes down to it, I am standing the world on its head. And that world is my world, and that head is my head.

Headstand presents me with a very different way of interpreting the idea of carrying my weight. In fact, if I can actually relax in headstand it becomes breath in a state of weightlessness. And it changes my perspectives all day long: reminding me that illusion can seem quite serious, but things can easily be turned on their heads.

I work my way towards headstand in stages. First by strengthening my understanding of my shoulders and how they relate to my neck. I have learned how to release tension there when I discover it taking hold. This can be in a cross-legged Sukhasana (easy pose), or a simple sun breath as I start practice. I might play with eagle arms or focusing conscious attention in these muscles throughout my practice. It can’t hurt my explorations of bridge, or wheel either.

Core body awareness is another discrete area of development in preparation for headstand. This begins with drawing energy up through the core in every seated and standing posture. I especially enjoy moving from the first two chakras even in cat cow stretching.

Carefully exploring hand placements in Adho Mukha Svanasana (downward facing dog), I use dolphin (hands interlaced, elbows bent, forearms on the floor while in Adho Mukha Svanasana) to strengthen my upper back and keep my shoulder relationship easy. Adho Mukha Svanasana is an inverted posture, and drawing attention to the alignment of my head, neck, shoulders and back and core in this asana will build strength and accessibility for the future… who knows, maybe handstand, Adho Mukha Vrksasana!!

Finding balance in Tadasana (mountain) brings awareness to the way my body aligns over the foundation. Like the old song, the knee bone is really connected to the hip bone, and so it goes, with the breath actually helping to draw energy up and down the line of the spine. Feeling this in Tadasana is a huge step towards feeling this in Headstand.

Understanding fear is an ongoing part of this practice. It can come while making too much effort in Ustrasana (camel), or when feeling that tightrope and imbalance in warrior (Virabhadraasna) or Trkonasana,(triangle). There is an exploration of the fear of failure in so many of the asanas, noticing the way the inner critic measures and impedes the exploration is an important part of being in the moment. Allowing myself to be playful in situations that call for the unknown or the “impossible” has led me to arm balances and extensions I could not have imagined. My laughter when falling out of a posture in class prompts a wave of release and rising energy.

It reduces my fear when I provide safety for myself. This might mean attempting to invert only so far as to extend my spine, (a bit like dolphin with my head down) and keep my legs out of it, or play with lifting one leg at a time feeling open to that moment of weightlessness, If I feel shaky or am worried about attempting to hold the asana for a longer time, I sometimes position myself a foot or two away from a wall, so even though I am inverting fully on my own balance, that wall is there for my psyche.

Oddly enough, the image of trees helps me with Headstand. The network of deep roots and the arch of the reaching branches give me a symmetry in both directions without any hierarchy of importance. My feet are no more important than my foundational arms and head. My head no less rooted than my feet are free. It seems to integrate my mind into my body as I take my stand in the sky.

Limitations = Stories We Tell Ourselves

Sometimes when I teach yoga in a new place, I tell my students a little about myself. First of all, I explain that my yoga practice started late in 2001, and that I was never a dancer or an athlete. Many of my students see me in my role as yoga teacher and have already told themselves a story that explains me and the physical person they see. Needless to say, many are also surprised to learn that I'm in my mid fifties, already having definitions in their heads about age. I am amused by that, since my new line of work is giving me a healthier aspect than I even had when I was much younger!

I've chosen to take on a deeply physical job as I approach 60 years old. The work I am doing is changing my body, changing my way of life, changing my concepts. If I use the word "transformation" it sounds so new age, but in fact, yoga practice is a transformation. As my body ages, it is gaining strength, flexibility and ease. I can notice the muscle aches, the joint creaks, the dry skin, whatever it is that is naturally happening as I age, and at the same time feel so integrated, balanced, healthy, and sound. It's great to have work that makes me feel so whole, inside and out. The actual effort I make while teaching, the reading and research, the personal practice, the constant ongoing investigation, seminars and experiences, and increasing hours of work are all benefiting me, directly. This is definitely a case of loving what I do and doing what I love, but it is also an eye opener into the assumptions about aging and the "decline" I expected in myself. Of course my body has its limitations, the way a joint moves, the particulars of flexibilities and structure, and I am discovering this as I go, rather than expecting and assuming what I can and cannot do.

My students and peers are every age, and I love the open space in which we relate and connect. Each of us knows that every body has its limitations and structures. It is up to us how we allow our perceptions to define us. Perhaps surgery has altered something, or genetics gave me a certain set of conditions. These are as easily my strengths as they are my weaknesses. How I feel about it makes so much difference, and how I feel comes directly from what I perceive about it. As long as I remain trapped in definitions and judgments based on stories rather than direct experience, I will not realize the fullness of my being. I can remain stuck with being "old" or "not like I used to be" or I can stick with the open inquiry "what is this? what is this now?" Even previous experience can steer me out of my inquiry in this moment. Investigating a cranky knee can unlock the secrets to supporting the knee in motion, can eliminate the worst of the pain or joint degradation, can bring clarity to years of continued successful motion.

Each of us is unique in our questions and answers, but we are all on the same path, and the path is open. Learning to stay present in the inquiry is the transformation. Who imagined that a girl who could not do a cartwheel would be a middle-aged woman who can stand on her head?

Accepting Not Knowing

So much tension builds up in me when I am attached to an outcome and understand that I cannot know how anything will actually come out. Elections and disasters, or risking relationships or having children are good large scale examples of this type of tense and uncertain state of mind. This can make any of us uncomfortable until we think we have defined results, though it can take a very long time to know much about these results, and understand their effects. Any kind of planning can lead to the same condition, whether it's a plane reservation, baking a cake, or teaching a yoga class. In the context of my teaching this might manifest in my desire to teach a "good class" or to "meet the needs" of a particular student. Now I know every class is itself a shape shifter, merging with the breath in the room and the shapes of the bodies, taking on a life of its own that exists only in the moment. This natural flow is the gift my students and my own energy give me, it is not something I can create out of the desire for it to be so.

I don't think it's possible, or even desirable, to give up caring what happens. What really helps me, though, is to detach from the outcome and let my energy flow more freely into the process whatever it is. If I forget something or do something unpredictable, the moment will go on. There are usually steps that can be taken, or my attention can be turned to something else if other forces are at work.

Experiencing the moment is empowering. It removes the weights and ties, anxieties and attachments that bind me to inaction or repetitive cycles, to remoteness or rigidity. Each moment holds the key to itself and opens into itself moment into moment, forever in the present.

Doing new things, teaching, in my own practice, taking care of the mundane, whatever I do, I seem to be swimming in the sea of not knowing. Much as I might want certain things to happen, I am learning more and more deeply that what happens is exactly that which is produced by the momentary combination of actions, level of awareness and conditions. Letting go of the outcome gives me freedom, to experiment and explore, to experience and cherish what is happening. Even if it is a matter of clarifying a paperwork tangle, staying in the present takes away the bitterness of frustration, and enables me to attend to the matter in that moment. I accept not knowing until the next moment. Look at the menu, pick something, enjoy the wait, and savor not knowing until something delicious comes!