GRADING A LIFE

Let me acknowledge right from the start that I realize this is the first post on the blog this month.   I guess I haven't felt I have much to say...writer's block maybe.   Or just life; feeling like I'm not very good at it this month.

I get overwhelmed by the world at times, don't you?  The Paris bombings focused our attention not only on France, but on the many terrorist activities around the globe.  It's painful to see people in such pain -- those perpetrators in the grip of evil and the innocent victimized by hate.  It's painful to see some turn away from the helpless and instead want to "hunker down" with a "keep 'em out" mentality because fear overrides compassion when we let it.  I've just been in a sad, confused, overwhelmed state of mind.

On a personal level, there has been a big upset in my life around recent events in my church community that took everyone by surprise over the past few months, resulting in a minister resigning, three board members resigning, me resigning from a leadership committee, others aiming pointed arrows at leaders they felt were in the wrong....Not at all the loving, compassionate, open-hearted community I thought it to be.  I've decided to step back from leadership involvement there for the foreseeable future and to basically take a break from all church activities.   I feel the loss.

And relief.  Talking with a friend over breakfast earlier this week, I told her that while I was sad over the church situation, I felt such a sense of spaciousness about my life with all the obligations and dramas surrounding that community now absent.   It's not just Sunday services -- it's all the mental and emotional energy that goes into organizing, leading, facilitating, planning, advertising, and supervising that can get overwhelming.  She had known me for 30 years and we traced my involvements in any number of organizations and causes and decided I've never had a break...it's been one thing after another and most often several things simultaneously.  I was able to trace back even further to being a young woman in her 20's and realized it's been more like 40 years of involvements of one type or another.  I've been pretty good at organizing and leading stuff.  But now I'm clearing the decks.  No more.

What does all this have to do with Yoga?  I came to class on Thursday and Karen asked me how I was doing.  I said "Oh...OK."

"Just OK?", she asked.  "Like a C, B-, B+?"

"Oh, I guess a B", I answered.  We both laughed.  B is really pretty good.

She jokingly said, "You must always want to have an A+ experience."  And then I knew....she was right.  I do.

I want to have, and create for others, an A+ experience.  No wonder I'm exhausted.  No wonder the world in general and my church thing in particular are such monumental events for me this month.  They are far, far from A+ experiences -- more like F.  And F stand for Failure.  Depending on how one looks at it.

Maybe we need the occasional F to wake us up to complacency.  Maybe the occasional F demands we find a creative way to move Forward, a way to find Fun and Fulfillment and a bright Future down roads not yet taken.  Maybe it demands Facing Facts and making a change.

Karen always advocates making a change when an asana causes us pain.  As in asana so in life.  There can be pain.  Make a change.  Find the edge where ease and challenge meet.  Work there for a bit, then back off and rest.   For too long, far too long, I've been working too often beyond challenge into pain...and staying there.

During savasana, Karen came by to push down on my shoulders, to create a more open-hearted posture as I rested, then she took just an extra moment to rub my shoulders and neck, placing hands on my scalp.  She didn't see the tears beneath the eye pillow -- tears of gratitude to be so nurtured with Yoga, with friendship, with gentle touch.

I'm taking a new road.  I'm going to back off and find ease.  I am going to allow myself to earn many, many C's -- Compassion, Contemplation, Courage, Creativity, Contentment.   I'm going to find my Center again. ©

Namaste,  donnajurene