Because it is unexpected.
The sweetest lessons come when we least expect them.
The greatest teachers enter our lives when we least expect them.
We learn the most when we are expecting the least (or nothing at all).
We grow the most when don't think we can grow anymore.
Of course, you have to go outside to feel the sunshine.
You have to keep studying to learn.
You have to keep practicing to encounter your teachers.
You have to keep planting seeds to have any seeds grow.
If you experience or receive a message from a messenger that you have already labeled harsh or critical, the message my seem harsh or critical. Know when to accept the message as a gift, instead of being stuck in your own critical mind.
Be thankful for each meal you "have" to cook, each floor you "have" to sweep, each essay you "have" to painfully grade, because you never know when it will be your last.
Be careful of the expectations you place on those around you and how you view their actions and words.
The themes of these last 11 months are percolating:
Lovingkindness, compassion, letting go, shedding, fearlessness, new beginnings, planting new seeds, nurturing new growth, opening, warriorship, balance, and equanimity.
They are all lenses into the heart. They are all practices to gain understanding and acceptance. They are all ways of understanding our Self.
Why?
So that we don't move through our days carrying the heaviness/guilt/sadness/elation/expectations of the past. So that we can live in freedom, in this moment, breath by breath. So that we can Be!
The "simple" practice of sitting, whether for 5 minutes, 15 minutes, or 20 hours a day is there as a tool to show us how to live each moment for what it is in that moment. To see each person before us for who they are in that moment. To experience each event in our lives, whether it is birth or death or everything in between with the same open hearted fearlessness.
No one is better than anyone else. No one can "help" you if you don't do the work. Yoga is the path of action. You must act to benefit. One thought at a time. One breath at a time. Do your own work. Continue to do the work. Be patient. Be receptive. Surrender all efforts to the Grace of the Divine within you that is within all of us. Connect to That!
