Our Stories

Thank you for posting the touching video, Sandee.  This is perfect for February's topic of compassion. In fact I believe we make reference to "stories" in one of our blasts in the next two weeks. Knowing that everyone has a story can elicit compassion in us. We soften to the humanity we all share. The veils of separation dissolve.
This is very different from Baron Baptiste's suggestion to drop your stories and the stories you make up about others. These "stories" are related to the habitual way(s) we view ourselves and other. It's the patterns of ego that keep us separate from our essential self and from seeing others without distortion. If I have a particular view of myself and others, I've made up my mind, I'm closed to possibility. Our stories are self-imposed limits from this point of view and we use our stories to stay stuck. It's the opposite of Beginner's Mind.
Elena

Coming Up!

Tomorrow begins our discussion on Compassion. Letting go is an entry point to Compassion. We will introduce a meditation practice called Tonglen soon. If you have any questions, please contact Elena directly. It is a challenging practice. Stay with the right effort. Not too tight, not too loose. Sit with it. If it gets too heavy, drop it. Go back to Beginner's Mind, LovingKindness, and Letting Go practices. Be patient. Be receptive to what physically arises.

Have a great January day!--Charry

Posting video

I saw Bruce's question about posting videos, I just discovered the post video option for Blogger.

1. Select add video icon (far right above)
2. Chhose file to upload
3. Upload video

If video is from YouTube. Go to clip, select share under video window and then embed. When you click embed, it will show you the HTML code and you can paste this into blogger.

Good luck!

Best
Sandee

I enjoyed Sandee's video, thank you.

and thanks to Charry for her advice on creating home practice.
I figure...just make a start, it can be small, it doesn't matter.

PS Sandee, how do you post a YouTube video?

Cheers

Bruce

Home Practice

What does doing yoga at home do for you?

Allows you to listen and move at your own pace and rhythm.
Helps you turn inward.
Builds your trust in yourself and your intuition.

How do you start a "home" practice?

Clear a space in your house for your mat.
Get into Down Dog, Child's Pose, or Mountain Pose.
Breathe.
Move into another pose.
Breathe.
Move into another pose.
Continue to breathe and move when inspired.
Finish with Savasana.
Feel free to fall asleep if you need it.
Make it enjoyable.

Please blog if you have any other helpful "home" practice tips.

--Charry

"Every Life Has a Story"

This week, I was working with a consultant on a project and she shared a Chick-fil-A video clip. The message of the clip reinforces the idea that everyone we interact with is a chance to create a remarkable experience.



When I read the LY365 "work in progress" email to let go that we are different, I thought about this video clip.

Every life has a story...if we only bother to read it.

Best
Sandee

Working too much?

There is a saying that goes something like this, "If you do what you love, you will never work a day in your life."

Whoever said this was not in the modern age.

But, if you consider the teachings of the Bhagavad Gita, this saying is acurate and could, I repeat, could hold true.

If we find a career that fulfills our dharma, or our destiny, or that helps us to serve and work toward ending suffering, then what we do is our yoga practice. Our job/career becomes our path to self-realization/enlightenment. What we do on the mat or cushion brings us back to ourselves and reconnects us to the commitment to our path, but it is actually not the bulk of our "practice". How can it be? We only do "yoga" on our mats, a few times a week if we are lucky. We only sit a few minutes each day if we are commited and lucky. So, our real practice, our real yoga has to be worked out in the mine field, or mind field, of our work.

If the work we do is mundane or inane, we need to make a shift. We need to find work that serves a greater purpose in our lives.

If we have found amazing work, then we must use the bulk of our day to practice the true yoga, which is letting go, finding compassion, sharing in a tender hearted and determined way to improve the lives of those around us.

That is not to say that working 14 hour days at anything will not physically and emotionally exhaust you. That's when you create the moments to come back home, in other words, meditate. 5 minutes in your car before going into the office. 5 minutes, door closed at work to sit quietly. 5 minutes right before bed.

Shift your perspective. The time on your mat/cushion is truly a gift, so enjoy it when and if it comes. The time "working" is where you need all the skills of the warrior. Tender hearted. Compassionate. Honest. Kind.

There is no end to the abundance of kindness within you. Stay patient. Make kindness at work your practice.

On your cushion, breathe, relax, be grateful for the time to go inward and be receptive.

Enjoy your Fridays! TGIF!--Charry

friendship opprtunities

While attending a preschool meeting years ago I noticed a guy that I went to high school with.  I remembered thinking he was really cute in high school.  We both ran with sort of the same crowd but  we never really talked or  became "friends".  He came up to me after the meeting and said hello and that he recognized me from school. ( OMG!  He was talking to me.)  Feeling 17 again I rushed home to call my girlfriend to tell her all about it.  I told her I talked to him more that night than I had in our all of our years of school.  She responded that she remembered that he was really shy.  Shy?  I thought he didn't talk to me because he didn't like me or he didn't think that I was pretty.  (haha...all the typical teenage girl stuff).  I do wonder what type of friendships I have missed out on due to my misconceptions  of people or someone else's misconceptions about me??

On a lighter note I just want to say to Charry that if I was a teammate of hers in Japan I bet we would both be friends with Sting because I would have yelled out something immature like " Charry thinks your cute!! "  And then Sting would have invited us to sit with him and he would have wanted to kick around the soccer ball with us.  The question is if you were friends with Sting how would have that changed your yoga practice and all that you have taught to us. Hee hee!!  ;-)

Midnight musing...well, almost midnight.

Time and teachers.  Both instruct.

While time heals, teachers and their words live in our hearts and memories.

In time, we become the teachers sharing the lessons of time passed and teachers from our past.



To all the recent graduates of the YL's teacher training, congratulations!

Summer of 2008, I remember graduating from my masters program in English after five rigorous summers of reading and writing, and thinking the morning after graduation, "Oh. Now what?"

So I started a list of what's next - the possibilities... another masters degree? an MFA? Need a new goal.  So many plans...

Then life surprises you.  And we make it good.



But as we fight the impulse to rush off to the next thing on the to do list.

We pause.

We sit down and breathe.

We enjoy this moment, and the next moment.

In this moment, honor the teachers, honor the time.  

Let go of the fear.  

Whether it be fear of growing old, or not stacking up to the teachers that we aspire to be.  

We let go of not being good enough.  

We let it evolve.  We have faith.  We let it be.

These are my mantras that I needed to hear tonight.  

Thank you for listening.  And thank you for sharing your words and teachings!

Namaste,

Kevin

Our teachers

My favorite teachers, most of whom were my coaches, and my main teacher who was my mom, gave selflessly and often. Their lessons transcended the moment and I still feel their effects. They were a catalyst for so many life altering decisions. They remain deeply rooted in how I live my life today. It takes our daily practice of descrimination to use the tools that were passed on to us wisely. The flip side of good is bad. A lesson learned in one context does not necessarily relate in another. Ice cream today might be just what the doctor ordered, but tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next, might be more than destructive. Take what we are given. Be thankful. Use wisely. Let go of lessons learned that no longer serve. We are evolving. We are practicing. Let go of that which was great in the past, but might not be now. Be patient. --Charry

Life Knows....

"Life knows what to do better than we do. Our task is simply to let go and receive each moment with an open heart, and then dance skillfully with it."

I found the Living Yoga 365 “Life Knows” post to be particularly applicable.

The New Year has been quite busy for me professionally. I have frequently found the pace to be unsettling. I had grown accustomed to balancing life's challenges with a regular yoga practice. Last week, with a very full schedule of meetings and visitors, my days started very early and ended very late. There was not time available for me.

As the week came to a close, I anxiously looked forward to one of my usual respites--Charry's Friday AM Yoga Stretch class. But this day, I found the comfort and feeling of letting go that time on my mat typically brought me was absent. My heart felt heavy with the burden of my active mind that would not stop racing through the things on my open list.

At one point in the class Charry had us go to the wall and when she said to move into Warrior II pose, I felt very unusually uncoordinated. I moved into the pose, but I found myself with a feeling that I was unable to move forward or backwards to release from the pose. I had anxiety that my legs were slipping and I would soon be in a very uncomfortable position. A bit panicked, I called for Charry to help me get out of the pose. I was perplexed about what had just occurred.

The class ended, I went to work and juggled the demands of the day. Finally, I headed home for some much needed R&R. As the weekend went on, I felt called back to my yoga mat on a number of occasions. With each visit, I found myself feeling more at peace.

This week, I traveled to Chicago for business. While having dinner one night with a friend, I shared my story. She said. "Wow…you were on overload. You could not go forward, or backwards....you were stuck!"

I thought about it and agreed she was right...I was stuck....life knows!

Namaste,
Sandee

"May the sun bring you new energy by day, may the moon softly restore you by night, may the rain wash away your worries, may the breeze blow new strength into your being, may you walk through the world, and know its beauty all the days of your life."

Inner Voice: "I heard it once and it said a bad word"

I'm trying to teach my boys (both are almost 5) about listening to their inner voice. I wish I had been made aware of this earlier in life....I may have made different choices and felt more true to myself.

Harrison kept asking "what does it sound like?" so I told him it's kind and loving, sometimes it's more of a feeling than a voice, and it's all HIS and he's the only one to hear it.

He paused for a long time.

Then he said "I heard mine once. And it said a bad word."

And I said "I can totally relate."

:)

Dear Blog,

I have a confession. 
I am not only seeing another blog - I am writing my own.  
However, Living Yoga 365 will always be my first... blog experience.  And I will continue to post, of course! 
You can check out my blog at http://obrienk.blogspot.com/  
(Simply musings I wish to share with the WRA community.)




For what it's worth, I think you would like to meet my dear friend and yogi! 
Here's an excerpt of a post I wrote about her: 


I first met Soiya Gecaga in the first few days of our four year experience at Phillips Academy in Andover, MA.  We were both fourteen and far from home; I missed Cleveland, she missed Kenya.  Yet we were all in the same boat at boarding school. As a class, in no time, we became like a family, relying on one another like siblings.  Her outgoing personality and kindness made her an instant friend to me.  As we approach our 20th Andover Reunion this June, I am proud to count her as one of my many life-long boarding school friends.

After we graduated in 1992,  Soiya studied at St. Andrew's in Scotland while I headed to Penn.  We lost touch; however, the summer of 2008, we reconnected in London.  My original plan was to visit my brother Sean while he was studying at Oxford.  Through Facebook, Soiya offered a night's stay before I headed out to see my brother.  After a weekend in Ireland together, Sean had serious work to do for school. 

So Soiya offered I stay at her house plus a week's worth of yoga at her local studio, Jivamukti Yoga School in London.  Frankly, if you were to guess, the least likely to practice yoga from the class of PA '92... we might have of been tied.  Yet here we were strolling to classes daily and sharing old stories of what we both remembered - or what we chose to remember in the stories that we each created.  We were more than surprised by our differing stories on the same boarding school experience. 

During that week, she also shared with me many books, each profound, but The Four Agreements changed my life.  It had been recommended to me before - but now I had some time to read and discuss it with an old friend.  With perspective, we could see how our memories were filled with assumptions that we had made when we were young.  At the time, we thought we knew one another so well, but in reality, we had no clue of the heavy stories that we carried silently.  We were judging, pretending, and trying - desperately - to be cool, to fit in, to be the best. 

In our thirties, we could laugh at how high school drama was riddled with failure to be impeccable with one's word.  We recognized how personally we took every slight or rumor.  With anxiety at a school full of the best and brightest, we struggled with expectations, especially always do your best. We neglected the pronoun "your" and obsessed on being "the best."

Since Andover, our paths shared parallels as all lives do - high and lows, twists and turns as well as loss and redemption. Our conversations, both healing and inspiring, will be cherished forever. 

Cut to today: scanning Facebook, I read Soiya's story.  She embodies "act with compassion."  Theaction she has taken inspires me to be the change that I wish to see in the world. Please read her essay published in today's Huffington Post. 

Being the Change That I Wish To See In the World

by Soiya Gecaga

           As I think about the year that has just gone by, I am filled with immense gratitude for all that I experienced in 2011. In many ways, 2011 was a life changing year for me. Most importantly, it was the year that my work with "We the Change" Foundation (in the field of early childhood education and care) started in earnest. Mahatma" Gandhi once said that "we must be the change that we wish to see in the world" and ever since I first heard these words quoted, they have strongly influenced me and the choices that I have made in my life. So much so, that I named the foundation with Gandhi's quote in mind.
             Starting in January, my work really took off. It was the culmination of a long personal voyage of discovery, of transformation and of deep introspection. In the wake of the post-election violence that rocked Kenya in 2007-2008, I quit my job as a lawyer working in London and travelled to Kenya, where I was born. My goal was two-fold. Firstly, to get to know and to reacquaint myself with the country that I called 'home;' secondly, I was determined to find a meaningful way in which to give back to communities in my country that lacked opportunity.
            I had sat at my desk in London, watching the devastation unfold on my computer screen and could not believe what I was witnessing. My fellow countrymen were killing and harming each other in ways that I previously could not have fathomed. Like many other Kenyans at the time, I found myself confused and perplexed at just how something this terrible could have happened. Question after question flooded my mind. Where was the hatred coming from? Why were communities that had previously lived in harmony now killing each other? Why were those in power not doing anything to stop the violence? I found myself looking to those in authority for answers. However, it was ordinary Kenyans who provided inspiration....Continued. 

To Read Soiya's entire essay, Click here.  She shares one of my favorite RFK quotes in her conclusion.

Thank you for reading.  No hard feelings, eh?

What happens...?

When you sit, what happens?

Nothing magical and yet, everything magical.

As Elena has said before, it is too serious to be taken seriously.

It gives me time when I think I have none. It gives me space when I don't think I deserve it.

Do I still find my buttons being push and reacting like a crazy woman? Yes.

It is a practice. I am trying to evolve. The hardest situations I find myself in are with those that I love the most. They seem to be the best gauge of my practice. All I can do, is keep coming back to it, keep trying. Sometimes it feels good, sometimes it doesn't.

Send Elena and I your questions. Especially, Elena. She is such an amazing resource for all of us. Let's use our resources and grow.

Root down to rise up! Practice letting go and let us all know, on the blog, how you are doing!!!!

--Charry

From Deb to group...

 I just wanted to share with you that today I meditated for thirteen and a half minutes. That is my personal record. Something about today's post made it easier for me to be able to sit still and meditate more comfortably.

--Deb

From Bruce to group...

My practice is pretty simple..."be here now"...
Still working on it.
I guess I have some favourite quotes like:
"The easy road becomes hard and the hard road becomes easy"
“Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” — Goethe, by attribution
Although I also tend to be very aware that "words are cheap".

My Yoga practice can be put aside somewhat, when things get hectic and
it's great to get back to it after that...although maintaining awareness throughout the
day and doing "bed Yoga" are my way of continuing my practice.

-- Bruce

On letting go

I have been doing some reading about the concept of letting go and came across this poem by Tao te Ching:

If you want to become whole,
   let yourself be partial.
If you want to become straight,
   let yourself be crooked.
If you want to become full,
   let yourself become empty.
If you want to be reborn,
   let yourself die.
If you want to be given everything,
   give everything up.

At the beginning of my meditation practice, I had no clue as to how to go about doing this.  The first step was learning to let go more on the mat, in yoga. Learning to let go during meditation has been a bit harder, but I am working on it.

Debra

Sunday

Bring yourself to your mat today. Make it an experiment in going inside.

Drop all the outter labels you get stuck with Monday through Friday (sometimes even Saturday if you work then!)

Notice what would happen if you were not all the things that you were tagged as:

Mother
Partner
Best Friend
Business Owner
Writer
Teacher
Executive
Boss
Neighbor
Daughter
Sister
Son
Brother
Uncle
Aunt

What if you could just be. Sitting in your deepest, innermost essence of you, which is connected to the boundless and vastness of the ocean.

What if you knew that at the core of it, you were limitless and did not need a lable to "define" you.

What if you reached beyond defining?

Who would you be then?

Experiment with That!

--Charry

From Emy who wasn't able to post...

Here is Emy's comment on a previous eblast. Due to technical difficulties, I am sending it out for her. Thanks Emy!

re yesterdays post ---  I think it's fine to 'imagine' a story regarding a stranger who has crossed your path
in some irritating way.  But with people we know, I think we get into trouble thinking we 'know' the story
behind what they do, and we rarely (certainly me included) try to find out what's behind the behavior we don't like.
It's easier said than done.
emy

Rain today

My husband seems to be more into the weather since we moved to Ohio than any powder report he received when we lived in Vail. I think that is hilarious.

I like to look out the window and report the weather.

I like to sit and report on the weather of the mind.

Ugh. Storm clouds rolling in.

Yeah! Sunny, blue bird skies!

Hmm, gray and cold.

Mostly sunny skies with some chance of rain.

Partly cloudy.

Clearing.

If we can sit still for just long enough, we can ride out the storms and bad weather and we don't even need to check the weather report.

--Charry

Tinkering

I love that idea! Just tinkering and playing, beging inquisitive and open- even letting go of the notion that every class needs to be "perfect". If we open up to what is and the energy that is in the room and all around us, how could it be anything but what it should be?

If we can let down our guard and shed the armor, we might actually find perfection in the art of "being".

Let go of the "doing". "Be".

Jackie brought in a snake skin Monday to teacher training. It was so exquisite in that the snake shed its skin from the tip of its nose to the tip of its tail. You could literally see the individual scales and even the eyes! It was amazing. Imagine if you could let go that much!

It is the same with children's bone and skin! Think of the regeneration and shedding that takes place! It is truly miraculous.

How do we live so fully and openly that we embrace change to the point of that kind of shedding?

--Charry

"The Love of Embracing Change"

"How do you get kids that have curiosity and a questing disposition?"

Taking inspiration from John Seely Brown, I am letting go of the fear of making mistakes - getting back on the surfboard and riding the next wave.

For me, words that resonate from this video connote more gerunds...

Tinkering, playing, absorbing,
integrating subconsciously, 

assimilating, experimenting, gelling, 

living, learning, breathing, 

letting go,

sharing more, judging less,

loving, remembering, honoring
forgiving, embracing,

evolving, breathing,

living.

Brown concludes:

Not everything works.

In fact, most things don't work.
And the first thing that happens [when] something doesn't work
is that it frightens you...

then, you're not going to be very willing to embrace change.


But if you realize that when things don't work,
which is almost always,
you can get in there and figure out how to tinker with these things
and just absorb what happens.


Very often when you're tinkering,
it doesn't make pure logic sense.
It's something that you begin to feel in your hands
as much as your mind.


Tinkering brings thought and action
together in some very powerful, magical ways.

I manipulated his words, using enjambment to allow his words to linger
and absorb
with the white space after the line.

He's as much a poet as an "Innovation Expert."
I consider this an extended metaphor for you practice of meditation, yoga, life.

So today I am...
Letting go of pressure to be right,
and tinkering.

When we do so,

We realize

that we are more than our ego and mind.


When we let go,

we breathe

and we are open to embracing change.


Have a wonderful day. Sit for 15. Then, go play.

Tinkering, and questing,

Kevin

Our Light

After working with the So Hum mantra this morning, I became mesmerized by the burning of some incense and it helped me to visualize the topic of letting go. As the orange glow of the ember moved, the smoke rose and danced in a playful manner. While this was happening, the ashes fell softly and gracefully towards the sand, creating a calm and peaceful state. In that moment, the idea of letting go and rising up became full circle ... due to the light of the ember. I was amazed at how something so simple was such a great reminder to let my light shine!

To all of you, thank you for all of the wonderful posts! I hope the new year is treating everyone kindly and may you continue to let your light shine!

Your Bucket List

Letting go of...

Expectations
Things I no longer need
Bad habits
Anger

Shedding...

My old skin
My unhealthy way of looking at myself and the world around me
Tendencies of self-criticism

What will the new year bring?

In order to grow, we need to let go. What is on your bucket list? Let us know!

Have a great day!--Charry

Memories of Free Falling

Today's e-mail revived a memory from my childhood of a time before I literally had the fear of falling...

When I was about eight years old, we lived two doors away from the elementary school. My siblings and I used the playground like it was our backyard. A fence enclosed the swing area, and unlike today, the surface of the playground was made of concrete.

The fence, four feet high at best, had a large hole in it, leaving a rusty, exposed bar of steel transversing over it. I used to sit on top of that strip of the fence, letting my legs dangle freely. One day, I thought of how fun it would be simply to let go of the bar and let myself fall backwards, really fast, with so much momentum that I would make a full reverse circle and end up in my original position. I gave no thought to the concrete less than four feet below. My heart beat incredibly fast, but my desire to have that feeling of freedom, of falling and having blood rush into my head and just as quickly rush out, prevailed and I let go. What pure exhilaration!

That was the first of an uncountable number of times of doing the "backwards reverse circle," as we came to call it. I returned to the playground a few years later. The fence still had the gaping hole, but I had no desire to do the backwards reverse circle. In fact, I looked at how low to the ground that shaky, rusty bar actually was and wondered how I ever had had the desire, let alone courage, to do the backwards reverse circle. I had come to learn danger, and thus, to know fear ...

Debra

Letting the typos and mispellings go... or at least some of the fear.

And as I reread my comment to Deb's wonderful post, I realize I have a profound fear... of how I may be judged if I use improper punctuation, forget capitalization at times, and likely make a couple spelling mitakes, typos etc.

Not to mention my overuse of "etc." - and my love of dashes... and my addiction to ellipsis...

(And I just had to rework that previous line to preserve the parallel structure... it's an affliction).

Yet I realize that my FEAR - is of embarrassment - that as an English teacher - I SHOULD be perfect, at least, grammatically speaking ;)

(Now, I am not proposing turning spell check off and blogging in text-speak and twitter shorthand - and I do fear for how texting and twitter will transform the English language...)

But being perfect - especially when it comes to blogging, can be paralyzing - I will never post.

Or debilitating - I will never sleep - I quell the impulse to revise and edit. I teach the 6 am... in less than 6 hours now - and need sleep!

So here's to 2012:  Posting without fear - and with a few typos - many dashes -

and letting go of the THINKING I SHOULD BE PERFECT.

Or always profound.  Just sharing thoughts, ideas, fears, comments, inspirations...

Deb, please, keep sharing.  We all have issues posting :)  Let's not be shy.

Cheers to letting it go!  And posting more in 2012.

Bamaste,

Kevin

Getting out of your own way

I was doing some reading on the subject of "letting go" and came across this very poignant 1974 Inaugural Speech,  given by Nelson Mandela, but originally written by Marianne Williamson. It really resonated with me, so I thought I'd share it with the group.   --- Debra

Our deepest fear is NOT that
we are inadequate,
our deepest fear is
that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light not our darkness
that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be
brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?

Actually. who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.
Your playing small doesn’t serve the World.
There is nothing enlightened about
shrinking so that other people
won’t feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest
the glory of God that is within us.
Its not just in some of us, it’s in everyone;
and as we let our light shine,
we unconsciously give other people
permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.

"The Joy of Quiet"

Welcome 2012!

I wanted to share the "The Joy of Quiet" op-ed piece from The New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/opinion/sunday/the-joy-of-quiet.html?_r=2&sq=The Joy of Quiet&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=all

Find your time and space to think.

Best
Sandee