This Moment To Be Free

om great mother, you live in my heart, as my heart…

without you we would have nothing,

we live in you, we breath you, we eat of you, and you sustain us

dwell in me, lead me, sit within me and feel my gratitude to you

fill my heart, my body, my soul with your love and let it overflow

let me help you heal our world, our one body, our one soul.

amen.

i had a dream where i had somehow gotten, or was staying, at a high-rise apartment and had a pass to the pool – i thought the pool was in the basement and r and i took the elevator down to the lobby level to see about going to the pool. once we were down there, however, r disappeared and when i looked i saw him way on the other side of a huge outdoor pool area sitting on a roof waving at me to come over — and the pool — it was huge — outdoors, not in the basement — with a view of the ocean or a wide river beyond and it was crowded, but i thought that it was evening and people were partying, but maybe during the day it would not be so crowded. so i went to this food stand first and got r and i some sandwiches – steak sandwiches, which is odd b/c i do not eat meat — and then i spoke with the lady at the concierge desk and this other woman kept interrupting, so i walked away and came back – and then the other lady was still interrupting, do i told her to go away – and the concierge was very nice and friendly and implied that it would be fine for us to use the pool b/c she would arrange it, she would comp us even though our pass was not officially for that pool…

and then i woke up from all that luxury in my dream and said to myself “I have nothing” and i felt sad…and reminded myself of all the things i do have – that i have so much etc…that in the scheme of things on this planet i am rolling in riches all the time…but that did not make me feel any better…

but then as I was brushing my teeth i said to myself – well, from a yogic point of view, i really do have nothing — it is the truth – nothing is mine, everything is god’s – nothing really belongs to me – i do not own this body or any of “my” possessions and even the breath i take in, the prana, is at the will of god, or the universe, or nature…and that thought made my whole body relax…i do have nothing it is all god’s and i cannot control that essential state…so feeling that brings peace…

but also, since in essence i am spirit, and part of the universe – i am Self, part of the Self — in that sense I have everything – all of it is mine and all of it is one…One…

i still have this feeling, that i felt the other day, that we are all sort of holograms – there is a book about this — that we are holograms arising, emerging out of the fabric of the universe, the material that is all things, and each individual person or animal or thing arises out of the material of the universe, which is made of energy, of light, and we live and interact as this individual being — and the point is to realize that. We are playing a role to have a certain experience. I have been cutting in and out of that consciousness — sometimes I know that it is all not real, and that we are all part of the Light and sometimes i get lost and caught up in the drama and the passion and the pain…

and feelings are real – they are waves that pass through and we need to feel them and learn from the feelings…but i can, like most of us, get caught up and lost in the dream of what i feel…

so i do have everything, and i do have nothing…in every sense and on every level. Painful, amazing, beautiful…all of it.

peace.

this morning in meditation – as meditation – i paid attention to the breath and repeated the mantra “so hum” — so for the in breath, hum for the out breath — the sound of the breath.

i am not so mellow this morning, i am trying to figure out my day…

and just following my breath felt so good — then i realized that this is really all we do — we are these animals that breath. we are always breathing – so hum, so hum…

we do everything else we do and have our thoughts and activities and plans and goals and worries…and we breath — somethimes we breath calmly, sometimes agitatedly – sometimes deeply and sometimes shallow…we can control the breath, though by constant attention…

so we are in bodies and we breath. that is about it. and then what? i don’t know…we have dharma – purpose to be here, somethings to do here…meaning, mission…

but really we are breathing all the time – that is the baseline. breathing.

let me see if I can focus on that — i wonder how much of the day i will be able to be aware that i am breathing, aware of my breath, of so hum?

hmm….

peace.

i am starting to become aware that the feelings i pull back from, or pull back when in, are feelings which are just natural parts of the process of living – especially during times of change and expansion — especially when I am doing soemthing challenging or new…

so fear goes along with change  – so, not to wait for the fear to subside, but to realize that it is part of the experience…

we all need to learn this…i need to learn this…

peace

When breathing (nadi suddhi, the alternate nostril breathing) yesterday during pranayama class at the institute, i felt that my core, the center of my body is hollow, empty, and was being filled with air, which is a gas, not a solid – so the center of me was not solid, and then I felt out from the center – that as my body goes outward from the center it becomes progressively more solid — my consciousness traveled through the layers – center core of light and air and energy out to the organs which are watery and wet and yet also some solid matter, out to the skin layer which feel solid to me, feel like a solid boundary of my body.

I have not liked alternate nostril breathing very much in the past – the counting makes me feel tense – so lately I have been breathing to the ganesh mantra instead – but today, instucted by our teacher, I did fall into the counting process in a comfortable way and relaxed into the process and what I discovered felt magical, and really good; nourishing…

so I told our teacher and she said it sounded to her like I was feeling the koshas — the layers of body that we all have, and that I was feeling from anandamayakosha, the bliss/peace within all the way outward through the layers of bodies — through the breath-body pranamayakosha, and out to the annamayakosha, literally the food-body, the physical body that is made of the food we eat.

I began to cry as she said this to me – I felt humble and happy and joyful that I am evolving in this practice and am beginning to be able to feel on a deeper level than i have, due to a regular practice of breathing and meditation – and of course due to being led by a good teacher who is strong in her own practice.

How nice it is to have teachers who are practicing and working on being conscious, aware and loving…it make so much difference in being able to relax into the process and blossom within it and let it blossom in and through me as a lotus blossoms up through the mud…

I feel happy today, and grateful.

I am feeling the teacher energy become alive and autonomous within me, arising from my own practice…

may peace and peace and peace be everywhere – om shanti, om peace.

On Wednesday, I was practice-teaching a fellow classmate. I taught her for an hour (well-received by her) and as i was walking out to go to class, I met an older gentleman in the staircase – looked at his shoes and then his face, and he looked at me and asked “are you teaching now?” I was startled and said “no, i am not a teacher – yet – why?”and he replied “your energy – it felt like you were a teacher”.

So now I have gotten “you are a healer” from people, plural, over the past few months and just now that I have teacher energy in the staircase of the yoga institute.

And meanwhile, I am also feeling an amping up of discomfort as the year, and my teacher training program near an end…i need to build something professionally, but what? and how? and with what money? and would anyone come? and the concern that I am being incredibly hubristic to think I know enough yet to teach anyone… and i also have been feeling that my life is a string of wasted opportunities and I want to end that trend…and what about writing a book? would anyone want to read any of this? etc.

So there are two voices — the encouragement I am receiving from outside me, and at times from inside me — the joy I feel in my growing personal practice and slowly growing strength, the enjoyment of beautifully written words, the desire to teach and the ideas I have about the population I feel would be my students…and the other voice, the voice of fear…

I do not actually believe that there is either love or fear — I believe there is fear when opening to love — always have felt this… fear when opening to a path of love…and the closer I come to moving in this place, to moving toward expressing myself int he world in a real way – who I really am – to taking the risk to go “out there” and be me and be exposed for what I do not yet know and seen also for what I do know and can do — the more the past rages from within me and the future looms full of fearful questions — better to stay in bed but then I have dreams about the same subjects…

breathe.

breathe.

I can only try to stay in the now, connected to being in my body, doing what i enjoy, love and need…

and keep breathing. and see what comes next.

peace.

I’m struggling with two parts of myself — the one who looks toward the future and gets really scared and the one who can sit with the present and enjoy the unfolding — maybe three parts, because there is also the part of me that looks at the past and gets angry…so between the fear and the anger is a place of exploration and love and enjoyment and it is hard for me to let go and start really living in and going deeper into that place.

When I was meditating this morning, I heard my Self, my Satguru suggest that I not try to know what I will do next, but rather fully embrace what I am doing now — the teacher training course and all that goes with it. I will try – this would be entirely new for me — i was raised sucking at the tit of this culture that always asks — so, what are you doing — and then precedes to discuss that and evaluate it and rip it apart to find why it might be hard, and might not work and is competitive and so forth…”oh, you are studying to teach yoga? my friend does that – she is exhausted from traveling around all day and it is hard for her to make money” or “I do not understand what you are doing – how does this relate to your graduate degree” or “what will I do next? how am I going to do this next thing?” etc. etc.

Meanwhile, I am wearing myself out with fear about an imagined future, and I am not sinking deeply and luxuriously into my practice now…

I can feel how the planning and worrying and wondering and projecting is leaching energy form me to use now — how I am not sinking into the present and enjoying it fully — why not go to class every day at least once or twice? I could – it is free since I am in teacher training and work there – free – I can revel to my heart’s content in all the yoga classes I want and…I don’t…because I am too tired and worn out from processing the past and worrying about the future –

So today I am making a sankalpa — a commitment — to let that processing and worry go for now — for now… and enjoy the moment I have created for myself –

I vow to sink deeply into the fertile soil of the now — I began this blog with the declaration that I would lie fallow for a season – and I did — and out of that fallow field grew this practice – and now it is time to reap the harvest! I do not need to  lie fallow any more, and I do not need to plant next year’s crops yet — now I can let go and go deeper into this teacher training experience – and my job now is to stay in the now, to stay focused and go deeper and squish my toes in the mud of it all and let myself grow roots and fruits and harvest those fruits and eat them with juice dripping down my chin.

amen. svaha.