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Quote overload

Posted on by Emily
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Though I think all writing is really for ourselves, there is some writing that is good for sharing and some writing that is best for a closed notebook. I have articles and blog posts outlined, but the sentences have not been ready. Most of my writing lately has been for myself.

This was sparked about two months ago when I felt overwhelmed with quotes. On my Facebook feed, tagged in Instagram, tweeted and everywhere else. Believe me, I love a good sentence. I’ve been collecting quotes that inspire me since I was a kid the way some people collect cats or plastic tubs that can be reused so they never have to use Tupperware again.

I fell in love with a shirt that said “The Beloved is Everywhere ~Rumi” Since that is what I believe, I googled the quote to find the whole poem. Here is what I found:

 If the Beloved is everywhere, the lover is a veil,
But when living itself becomes the Friend, lovers disappear.
~Rumi

Wow. There is so much more there than I thought I was going to find. However, the nerd in my soul nagged me, “Why did they leave out the “if?”

Soon after that, for whatever reason, I saw a few people posting Machiavelli quotes in the context of yoga. In all honesty, it has been almost twenty years since I read The Prince, but I don’t remember it being a very yogic text. I could be wrong. What I do know is that Machiavellianism is defined as “the employment of cunning and duplicity in statecraft or in general conduct.”

This is the one that brought it to a head:

 ship

Yes, this is great! Love the sea! Be inspired! However, if you want to build a ship, someone is eventually going to have to collect the wood, assign tasks, build the ship and then sail it.

I spent a week stewing about this and the realized what was happening. These little snippets of language were sparking my curiosity and creating conversations. I was researching and searching for the original context, comparing it to the appropriated context and, ultimately, to my own life.

In short, I was learning. I was learning new poems, dusting off philosophical theories and becoming so mindful of what I was willing to quote or put out in the world.

Let the quotes lead your curiosity beyond the surface. Find the contexts. Be open to finding something deeper or that the quote had absolutely nothing to do with what you thought it did.

Be curious and act on that curiosity. And if you’re going to post something on the internets, know what you’re posting.

Look at it this way: George W. Bush said, “I am Mindful.”  and Donald Rumsfeld said “Don’t divide the world into “them” and “us.” Could you imagine those quotes written in cursive on a photo of a person mediating on a mountain?

Responsibility

Posted on by Emily
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Why does God let bad things happen?

How many times have we heard, even uttered this question?

There are so many teachings about God not being somewhere remote and far away but right in our hearts. There are teachings that each person we meet is God.

If we acknowledge that there is Divine Love in our hearts, then the question is not why does God let things happen, the question is why do WE let things happen.

I think this is relevant if you believe in a big guy sitting on a throne in the sky, three billion Gods and Goddesses each with many limbs influencing daily life, no God at all, or whatever.

Gun violence. Any violence. Unsafe food. Warzones. Environmental collapse. Weak education systems. You know the rest of the list….

Why do WE let it happen?

Then, most importantly:

What can WE do together to keep it from happening again?

Taken at Yoga Shala Sacramento, edited with Mirrorgram

Taken at Yoga Shala Sacramento, edited with Mirrorgram

Inspiration: Learning to Live with Stephanie Snyder

Posted on by Emily
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A new category on this blog, Inspiration, where I’ll post interviews and lectures that I think you will enjoy and find interesting. Here’s the first one….

These days, a majority of my mat time is spent in my living room with YogaGlo. One of the teachers I spend the most time with (again, in my living room) these days is Stephanie Snyder. I love her clear, down-to-earth, no frills style and my body always feels great after a practice with her.

A friend told me about her Ted Talk – wow, thanks friend!

The Efficient Practice

Posted on by Emily
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It is a challenge to get good mat time these days. I pine for the days when I would have back-to-back teaching/practices or when I could look at studio schedules and think, “Well, if I miss the 4:30 I can always just hit up the 6:15. No big deal..”

Time is a precious commodity, managed and coordinated in ways I never thought I would have to manage and coordinate. When my baby is awake, I am chasing after her. When she is asleep, I have a long list of things that I need to do for my home, work and family. I also have to balance time for my husband – time for us to be together and give him space.

When I do throw my mat down in the house, I am often interrupted by either the baby waking up, the dog wanting my attention or the cat knocking something off the kitchen counter. Somewhere on these lists of priorities, there can be the briefest moments that are truly to myself that don’t include working on teaching/festival/writing or cleaning/cooking. (Cooking, ha! that’s funny!) Those moments are like gold.

I have become incredibly efficient with my home practice.

One of the best things I learned as a classical musician was how to practice. I was taught how to practice efficiently with consistency – that it was not about how many hours I spent in the practice room but how I used the hours spent in the practice room. Sometimes, the most effective practice technique was to simply sit in front of the piece of music, internalize/visualize, sing it and then pick up the horn to play.

I have brought this practice into yoga. I think about sequencing and poses all the time. For example, whenever my baby gets a bottle, I am usually thinking through a sequence (how could I open the body up to get to this pose? What happens on the way to the pose?) while kissing her sweet little head. Sometimes, while she is crawling around, I take a moment to explore a pose with a long hold to target a specific area.

When I have my asana practice, I am usually figuring out how a series I envision is going to really feel on the body and working out the kinks I feel from carrying around a little 15 pound wiggle worm. A lot of times I am practicing with YogaGlo. (Thank god for YogaGlo!)

Right now, the magic number is 45 minutes. More often than not, when I plan it just right and allow myself to really explore the possibility of movement and opening in asana, my efficient practice brings more opening than I used to get in longer, open-ended practices.

Seal Pose - Nicholas Wray Photography

Seal Pose – Nicholas Wray Photography, Yoga Shala Sacramento photoshoot

“Planning it just right” doesn’t mean that each moment is clearly planned. It is the opposite of restrictive. With a destination in mind, I explore different ways to arrive. If something comes up on the way to the pose that seems interesting, I follow it. I prepare my body for what comes next and stay open to the question: what comes next? Knowing I don’t have time for a lot of repetition that defines some vinyasa styles, I play with the balance of long holds and movement.

I play. I create. I feel great.

Then I show up four times a week and share, knowing full well that time is a precious commodity to the people who have come to class. They have likely had to manage and coordinate time in ways they never thought they would have to manage and coordinate.  Time to themselves that does not involved cleaning, cooking, working or putting someone else first is like gold. I understand this and am constantly humbled and inspired by people who are able to come to a studio class.

Yes, I wish I could go to class every day and have unlimited time to play. For now, that is not my reality. From this, I have found a gift. I am grateful for all I am learning from the efficient practice.

May All Beings Be Happy and Free – All of Them? Are You Sure?

Posted on by Emily
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For the past five days, I’ve been thinking a lot about “may all beings be happy and free.” Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu. I don’t even know how many songs I have on my iPod with this mantra. I’ve seen it engraved on jewelry, printed on t-shirts and tattooed on forearms. In other words: we say it a lot. More and more, I’ve been asking “Why?” and “What does that really mean?” in my practice.

lokah

I’ve been ending my classes this week with this mantra followed up with an om shanti shanti shanti. I planned this for Sunday and pondered the mantra during savasana. What happened was completely unexpected – I had to get a tissue from the altar behind me and wondered if I would be able to get the words out.

This mantra is so sweet when you’re in a studio, where everyone is usually very nice to each other, but it is very difficult and complicated when you really get to the “all.” All is all – everywhere and everyone.

On the surface, it is about being kinder – not flipping people off on the highway, being kind to others, donating to charity, etc.

Going a little deeper, it is a really, really humbling mantra. It is selfish to wish our personal definition of happy and free on others, so there is a call to offer up some of our most fundamental beliefs for review and be open to accept things that, on the surface, we don’t want to accept. We must have the humility and patience to truly listen to others. We must consider the contexts of the collection of opinions that make up our communities.

To really accept and live by this mantra, we must also be open to the very difficult reality that those who need love the most are often the ones who seem to deserve it the least.

Turn Up the Frequency

Posted on by Emily
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Turn up the frequency of love

This line from the song “Flavor” has been resonating for a long time in me. Resonating like a gong – Strong and exciting on the first strike, feeling it all the way to my bones as the vibrations change, subtly and strongly, into a deeper resonance.

The day after the last awful shooting, which happened in a movie theatre, I was in a class in South Carolina. The teacher spoke about connection – that all the people who perpetrate these horrific acts of violence have something in common: they are completely separated from their community and, thus, humanity.

I can barely think about the possibility of someone taking away my child or any loved one in an act of violence. I also cannot imagine how someone can start out as a little baby and grow up so damaged, so disconnected from their own humanity, to do something so horrible. That makes me just as sad.

We all have a choice: we can choose fear or we can choose love. When we choose love, it is up to us to turn up that frequency – and it’s not always easy. It’s hard to try to find compassion in moments when it would be easier to just be angry and bitter.

We have to keep lifting each other up. That weird kid in the class? Lift him up. That beautiful child? lift them up. The person you pass on the sidewalk? Lift them up.

Lifting up can be a smile, a call for gun control, getting someone mental health or even looking someone in the eye and saying hello.

So what’s is going to be, America? Fear or love? Are we going to pray to the jealous god who spreads fear or the benevolent god who spreads love?

I’m choosing love and finding that in cases like this, it’s the harder choice.

My prayers have been constant. They go something like this:

Beloved, please help me keep walking a path of love – it is so hard and I need your help. Help us all through this dark period as we struggle to move as a global community towards the light on the other side of this grief and confusion. That light seems so dim sometimes, just a teeny spark so far away, and we need help to stay focused. Dear Friend, please comfort all who are experiencing unspeakable loss and shock. Beloved, please help us all see those who are disconnected from the love that is at the core of our humanity and help us lift them up. Help us all shine our light and comfort those who are hurting and heal those who are so damaged. Let me be an instrument of peace, a transmitter of love. Help me see that peace and love reflected in every single person I meet.

here is another version of kids singing the song – Oh. My. Goodness. Sweetness overload……….