Kindness

This week in the United States was the celebration of the Thanksgiving holiday, traditionally a feast featuring turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. At least, that's the tradition that my family had as we were growing up and it has evolved into a similar tradition with my husband's side of the family over the past 20 years. Some of the dishes and faces have changed, but its essence of connecting, savoring, and slowing down has pretty much remained the same. And given the events of the past couple of weeks as I wrote about in last weeks blog (click here if you missed it), with a mass shooting and tragic wildfires in California, it feels as though this Thanksgiving may offer some much-needed space to become radically present and deeply grateful.

Each Thanksgiving holiday I've been inspired to write about gratitude, and this year, I'm taking a slightly different approach to practice gratitude in action-- kindness. It feels like an infusion of global kindness could benefit so many people suffering worldwide and I know that any time I feel the tug of my own suffering, the first place I need to retreat is within my own heart.

As with many aspects of our yoga practice, kindness begins within. As we fill up our internal kindness well, we can then spill it out of ourselves and direct it towards others. As the saying goes, if we wish for peace in the world, we ourselves must be peaceful. So if we wish to see kindness in the world, we ourselves must be kind. It's a challenge, as dwelling within everyone lives our loudest and most obnoxious critic. Our self-talk can ring deafening decibels, so much so, that we wouldn't dare speak with a friend the way we speak to ourselves. Cleaning up our internal dialogue and offering loving-kindness is a necessary first step if we wish to expand it beyond our own hearts.

The meditation practice of loving-kindness has the process of offering affirming statements, beginning with "May I...". As Sharon Salzberg teaches, this practice of "May I be safe, happy, healthy, and live with ease" are phrases we repeat for several weeks before moving the statements away from ourselves and toward others. Once again, we begin within.

Related to this is the first Yama of the eight-faceted path of yoga as written in the Sutras of Patanjali is "Ahimsa", often translated as non-violence or compassion. As we study the sutra it relates to increasing our awareness of not only being non-violent to others, but also to ourselves. We examine what choices we make on a daily basis and see if they serve us in a positive way, supporting us in becoming the best version of who we are. The questions I've been asking people in class this week are: How do you treat your physical body with kindness? Are you nourishing, moving, and resting your body from a place of self-love? Is your self-talk coming from a place of compassion? Are you treating Mother Earth with kindness and what does that look like? 

We know that awareness is key to making any changes that align us with how we wish to be living, and I hope this week, you are treating yourself and others from the place of your kind heart. I am grateful to be of service to all of you and wish you a holiday season overfilled with kindness and compassion.

Find Calm

It's been an intense week here in Southern California. It began with yet another mass shooting, however, this one touched a nerve closer to home as it happened in my hometown of Thousand Oaks. Within hours not only were these lives senselessly taken too soon, but wildfires began to roar through the same area. Two tragedies within hours of each other, affecting people not only in the local community but reaching into far corners across the country. Growing up, Thousand Oaks was a quiet town where we knew our neighbors, walked in parades together, rode bikes through neighborhoods to the park and the mall. It has been one of the safest cities in the United States and yet, gun violence found its way to this enclave. It shook me at a place that I hadn't quite experienced before which provoked a sense of anxiety within me.

This past week, we also recognized the 100th anniversary of the Armistice and marked Veteran's Day by honoring those who've served, with many giving the greatest sacrifice - their lives. As I was thinking about returning veterans, many whom suffer from PTSD, I was also drawn to thinking about others who've experienced different types of trauma, I wanted to bring the topic of mental health and yoga to the forefront, in particular, the topic of anxiety. It is well documented that PTSD is common amongst returning veterans and how yoga is a safe place to heal. And it's not only vets who can benefit from learning to down-regulate anxiety but it applies to so many of us who have faced it in a variety of forms.

Anxiety is based on fear and triggers the part of our nervous system that is to fight, flight or freeze, the sympathetic side of our nervous system. It's an evolutionary response to our own survival and is paramount for our species to thrive and propagate. In our brains, there are six centers of activation for the sympathetic nervous system, so we are programmed to be ready to respond rapidly. The challenge for us living in today's society is that we have many perceived threats that go on chronically, much longer than what we are meant to tolerate. It's as though we have this sub-current of fear, slowly gnawing away at our feeling of being safe and secure.

The sympathetic nervous system sometimes gets a bad rap, as we need it to engage in the world...to read, write, interact, and get things done. And when we have an activation of the sympathetic nervous system we also have a very real physical response to it with cascading hormones being released, muscles ready to run, blood pressure and heart rates elevating. When the threat is over, we reverse many of these physical responses and head in the calmer direction of our parasympathetic nervous system, the place of restoring and healing.  It's a bit trickier getting into the parasympathetic side of our nervous system as it has only two centers of activation, thus the process is much slower. The upshot of this is that anxiety isn't something that simply lives in your head, but is intricately woven into your physical health.

The weekend of the fires and following the shooting, I had a few moments in public when I was at the movies and wondered if where we were sitting was the safest place should a gunman come into the theater. Yep...that's what was coursing through my inner thought pattern. I was feeling anxious in a public setting which in the short term isn't a surprising response given the horrible incidents befalling my hometown. The beauty of having a yoga practice in place was the awareness that these thoughts were present. I allowed myself to feel the fear being held in my body, the tension that arose from it, and recognition that I could take a deep breath and try to let go.

I also recognize that it's okay for me to want to find safety, to be alone, to find a place within myself that was like touching home. It's okay for me to feel the full sadness of loss and violence. It's okay for me to be outraged at the lack of change or action. And mostly, it's okay for me to hold my own heart softly.

We get so much from our yoga practice that is not related to the physical side of the practice. Asking students throughout the week what they received from the non-physical side of yoga they replied: relaxation, calm, centering, comfort, community, and slowing down. It offers people a chance to be fully present and to find their breath. As I heard these responses from my own students, I was yet again reminded to let those things happen for me as well. We know that if we breathe into our belly we calm down. If we slow down our exhale, we invite ease. If we can feel where calm resides within us, we can go there when needed. 

I am especially grateful for the growing conscious community that surrounds me. I know in the deepest essence of who I am that for us to enact any sort of shift, we must begin with ourselves, pay it forward, and grow the collective consciousness to one of love, compassion, and tolerance. Sometimes the most powerful lessons are the ones that kick us in the gut first. It's been a hard week and, at the same time, I am grateful to know that I am not a solo voyager. I am grateful for all that I have learned and for the enormous love that surrounds me. Inhale four counts...exhale six. Repeat.

Hear The Whisper

As I sat in the residue of our first weekend of the Advanced Studies program on Sunday evening, I needed to create my theme for the upcoming week. I felt inspired from the weekend's workshop, but less than creative. So as I often do, I just allowed myself to sit and feel into what it is that's on my own personal horizon. I thought to myself, "Wow...so it's November already. That means this week is the mid-term elections, about two weeks away is the Thanksgiving holiday, followed by "Black Friday", "Cyber Monday" and the launch into the holiday season...the horizon is looking rather hectic!"

Thankfully, the election has passed and the bombardment of ads has become quiet. Even if you were on a news fast, it was nearly impossible to escape the campaigning with candidate's posters splattered along the roadsides, and the endless mailers arriving in the post box every day.

About a month ago, I was in a hardware store and the holiday decorations were in full display. Yep...two months away from the big Christmas holiday and they were tempting us to get things done early. I mean, really? How much stuff do we need and how much time do we need to celebrate the holiday season? Unfortunately, many people try to "survive" the holidays partly as it seems challenging to get away from that kind of bombardment as well.

Then cometh the festival of shopping...Black Friday and Cyber Monday. We're being lured to get the best deals before they're all gone and it's been made easier for us through using our desktop computers and mobile devices. It's like a spending feeding frenzy, electrifying our nervous systems as it presses into our resources of energy, time, and money.

The barrage is in full flight, with people and companies trying to grab our attention, our votes, our wallets. It seems as though this time of year is more ramped-up than usual, perhaps due to the election cycle but regardless, it's beyond easy to see why we get so distracted from the deeper meaning of life.

So my thought this week is a simple reminder to Hear The Whisper, of our inner selves. The voice that sits at the heart of who we are is always present and always has been. At times such as this, it's easy to see how the voice gets covered up with other, external stimuli. We are pulled outward and in the Northern Hemisphere, nature is asking us to pull inward as we turn toward the Winter Solstice. It's time to drop our proverbial leaves, put on our jammies, and hibernate.

At the beginning of the week, in that state between sleep and waking, I asked myself "Is there anything I need to know? Is there anything I need to remember?". And up bubbled my answer...first, "You are loved", followed by "You are love." And I thought, "Wow...thanks for the reminder!" It was as though my inner voice wanted me to know that sitting beneath all of the surface noise, beyond the distraction, that love is at the heart of everything. Pure and simple, but sometimes overridden by other things. 

This listening begins within me and hopefully, seeps out through my actions in the world. If I get quiet enough to hear my true self speak, it is more powerful than anything on the surface and is the potent reminder that the truth of my soul is not outside of me, but seeded deeply within.

So as the festive season descends upon all of us, honor that quiet whisper by giving yourself a few moments of radical presence to listen. You might be truly inspired by what you hear.

What's Your Medicine?

The thought of the week is based around a simple question. What is your medicine? Perhaps the first thing that came to mind was what prescription medications do I currently take? One definition of medicine is:

"a compound or preparation used for the treatment or prevention of disease, especially a drug or drugs taken by mouth."

However, this week I'm asking what is it that you "ingest" on a daily basis that gives you connection to the harmonious balance between body-mind-spirit? The Global Wellness Day describes being well as:

"Wellness is an active process of becoming aware of and making choices towards a healthy and fulfilling life.  It is more than being free from illness, it is a dynamic process of change and growth. A good or satisfactory condition of existence; a state characterized by health, happiness, and prosperity; welfare."

"Wellness is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity." - The World Health Organization.

Finding the key to wellness is an active pursuit, not something that simply happens to us. And in asking the question this week, it helps to elevate into our awareness the many things that contribute to creating our individual state of well-being. For me, my daily dose for the past 12+ years has come in the form of my meditation practice, supplemented by trying to live from a broad yogic perspective. It's that one thing that is completely non-negotiable and feels the same as the daily brushing of teeth...it's simply part of good health hygiene.

So when you notice when you're feeling less than optimal, there are many things that people have said are good medicine for them:

• Nature- Get outside and feel the impact of the natural environment. The sun on your shoulders, the wind tossing your hair about, the grass under your feet, or plunging your hands in the dirt. Breathe in the aromas of a pine forest or a damp desert morning.
• Ocean - Open and moving bodies of water are great medicine. Give yourself time to sit and watch the waves coming and going, or the gentle flow of a meandering river.
• Moon and Star Gazing - Head out into the night and take notice of which phase the moon is in, or perhaps the first stars to appear in the night sky.
• Music - One of the most powerful tonics is that of sound. Classical music has been shown to improve childhood development. Communities have gathered for centuries using sound and music to celebrate, mourn, and transcend.
• Pets - It's been shown that simply petting your dog or cat lowers your blood pressure. That's furry good medicine!
• Exercise - We inherently know the benefits of exercise as it's not only for our bodies but our minds with feel-good hormones getting released through movement.
• Quiet time - meditation, contemplation, sitting in silence in nature and prayer all connect us to our deeper selves.
• Reading - diving into the words of others can completely transport us into other worlds.
• Quality time with loved ones - Sitting down with a long-time friend and having uninterrupted conversation = gold!
• Essential Oils - I have my own apothecary of essential oils that I use daily. They help to activate different areas of my brain that can feel stimulating, relaxing, and grounding.
• Nourishing Home Cooked Food - Recently on retreat, we all remarked how you could taste the love in the food that was being served to us. 
• Yoga - So many tools and practices exist within this ancient wisdom tradition, that the more experienced you become, the more you uncover its magic.
• Sleep - Nothing heals the soul, heart, and body more than a restful nights sleep. Get your eight hours to boost your health.
• Humor - Laughter, whether it's a giggle or bellyaching roar is good medicine. It releases feel-good hormones and automatically puts those smiling muscles to work.

These are just a few ideas that people have been sharing throughout classes this week. Find what nourishes you and actively pursue it. In doing so, you may realize that you're surrounded by a full medicine chest of personalized, good medicine!