A friend of mine recently wrote an article with the above title, so I thought I'd steal that idea from her, I'm sure she won't mind and if she does she can send me a personal Facebook message about it lol.
So, in Mysore many talk about the magic there and many mean it within the shala, in their asana practice, but many mean other things as well. To me it mostly has to do with the place itself, India itself. In the shala my practice is no more easy than at home even though this time I got further but I think that had to do more with the daily schedule being kept and the heat in the room from so many being in there expending their energy. But in Gokulam I found a level of peace that I'm never able to find, a level of dedication to my practice, not just my asana practice, but to my yoga practice (living and breathing it all day long) that is not easy to find and a new level of awareness just in general, about myself and everything around me. Now part of this is because there I'm not working so my work is to practice, be aware while I practice, and take that consciousness out into my day and follow how it shifts and changes throughout my day, within and without. Also using that to tell how others are feeling and be sensitive to that as well. I also because of this depth of practice during the day built a great fire inside, called agni in Sanskrit, that fire of transformation. Inner transformation but also outer because as a result of my new level of cosciousness I lost 22 pounds in India and have since lost 5 more.
Is this maintainable? Yes, I think it is. When I got home I was maintaining my chanting that I'd learned with Ranjini, I was maintaining the same level of asana practice, maybe as time moved on it got to be a little bit more work, but not too bad. I was still able to wake up super early to practice and was doing so naturally without my alarm, which here to for had been unheard of and I'm still waking up before my alarm goes off most days, even though I am setting it now. I also have been keeping my studies of the texts and culture up which I believe is adding to that fire. So on a certain level, yes it is maintainable.
But in her article she wrote about the bubble bursting at a certain point, and I will say that yes, after my last trip I had that happen but his time it was completely different. Last time I did notice a lull in my eagerness to wake up early and practice hard at my asanas, but also lost the ability to control my diet as I had when I was in India and had lost about 17 pounds and gained most of it back because I was tending to eat a lot heavier at night. This trip coming home I had the bubble burst in a whole different way.
I had moved in with someone that I thought was a friend and who had helped me out a lot by allowing me to move my stuff into a finished room in his basement and leave it there while I was gone, having that bedroom set up and ready upon my return. Which I have to say is a lovely thing because you feel so out of sorts coming home after being over there and living there for a full three months that coming home and having to move or staying on someones couch or something like that would have to be awful. It's nice to feel at home. That feeling was there but after about two weeks started to go south, although I was not quite aware of it at the level I maybe should have been. At first the person I was staying with was practicing with me in the morning, at his behest and then that quickly stopped, when then made my schedule of getting up early annoying to him and I would frequently get texts about the things that bothered him about what I was doing that morning, or walking across his lawn or other things. But I also assume he had other personal things going on that he wasn't telling me about that were getting him agitated as well because he would frequently drop out of yoga at times when things were happening, but this time when he was dropping out I was living with him so it wasn't so easy to get away from it and I believe that also was a factor in why I kept annoying him. During this time our friendship had completely melted away and we'd quit speaking unless it was absolutely necessary. So when he asked me to move out to allow his son to move in it was via email, not even in person, which was odd to me. Remember, I'd just been back from a whole different culture on the opposite side of the planet and trying to reassimilate back into a society that I wasn't even sure I belonged in anymore, so wasn't completely able to be present with all that was going on, which is how I let it get so far out of hand without talking to him about it. We had been friends so his distress was upsetting to me but I wasn't able to handle it as I had in the past because of my displacement, not that that's a good excuse, but it's the only one I've got.
But this was supposed to be about my bubble bursting, not getting into personal relations with former friends. So this was a big burst in my bubble, having to move all of a sudden. But along with this I'd let go of my classes at all the studios I was teaching at before I left and wasn't teaching anything other than private lessons and my Mysore club that meets once or twice a week (a private group I facilitate that practices Mysore style) so was having much the same kind of time as in India to just do my practice and chanting and pranayama and allow all the things to come up to come up and was able to deal with it, so was much living the same life as I had been in India. Also I was feeling so quiet and peaceful that any upheaval from that quiet inner space really threw me for a loop. And this was one of those times.
A good friend has put me up for now and I'm feeling back to my old self and keeping up my asana practice, my chanting and pranayama (even though that week I decided I had to get out more quickly that I originally thought, my practices suffered a lot, they are back on track) and able to do the inner work again at the same level I was in India.
But also I've got a new Mysore program starting up on March 23rd and I'm quite excited about that and a lot of my students are as well, so that is really feeding into that inner fire. Hosting a full program on my own is making me step up to the plate in a new way that is forcing me to be on top of my game and calling forth all this energy that I'd not known I was able to produce before. It's at a new studio owned by a friend who I'm excited to work with again, but this time in a whole new way, and will include morning Mysore sessions, a chanting class on Sunday afternoons and an Intro series one evening in the week to feed into the Mysore program. I'll also still do Intro series at Puravegan as well throughout the year to feed into the program. I've also heard from many who are as excited to give this new way of learning a try, so that feeds into it even more.
In short, or maybe not so short by now, I think it is possible to keep the magic going. Although it will for sure feel differently than it does in Mysore. How could it not? It can still feel fulfilling and exciting and keep that inner fire going. For me manifesting it through many changes in all areas of my life seem to be how it is able to be maintained this time around, but that's okay. Change is the only constant, right?
So, how long has it been since you've incited change in your life? Maybe this sort of shake up is just what you need as well, maybe not, but look at things and see how they feel. Maybe its needed. I didn't think I was bringing this about of my own will, but hen isn't everything in your life a reflection of what's going on inside, making our life our creation? Everything that shows up is upon an invitation from you, so embrace that, but also pay attention so you're not knocked off your feet when it shows up. But even if you are knocked over get back up and bull up your bootstraps and keeping leaning into it, growing, expanding, moving forward and even try to enjoy the process for on the other side of it will be some amazing stuff and even an amazing new life!
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