PUSHING BACK THE WAVES

I confess.  I'm being slothful.  I've been on vacation and I have not been practicing yoga with any regularity or duration.  A few twists here and there; a few downward dogs; a couple of tree poses and that's about it.  Still meditating though, so I comfort my guilty conscience with that bit of back-patting.

What I have been doing is qigong.  I'm no expert.  Neither is my husband.  But one of his guides on an Alaskan kayak/meditation retreat last summer also introduced the group to a qigong practice which they did every early morning.  He loved it and brought it home to me.

I'm sure its a very elementary practice and is brief in duration (15 minutes), which makes it a perfect beginner's practice.  I was unable to attend the Qigong Sunday Workshop at Yoga Circle recently; I'm sure that included much more instruction and explanation than I can offer here.

Let me just say....whatever it is I've learned from my husband, I love.  It's a slow moving meditation with the various flowing moves mimicking events from nature:  Mist Rising from the Lake, Parting the Clouds, Pushing Back the Waves, Casting the Rainbow, etc.

Standing together on the beach, the waves lapping the shore, we move in a synchronized meditation that feels renewing, refreshing, and connecting.

In addition to yoga, there are a beautiful array of other practices that we can explore and embrace that further our spiritual and physical growth.  Qigong is one, as is Tai Chi -- also offered at Yoga Circle.   Give them a try. ©

Namaste,
   donnajurene

SEEKING SYMMETRY

OK.  Fine.  I admit it.  Maybe I'm a teensy bit OCD.  I do like symmetry.  Come to my house; it's not super obvious, but I do try to keep my decor "balanced".   Things off-center bug me, which makes my new Yoga mat a source of constant irritation.

I lost my old and favorite mat at a kirtan/yoga retreat last summer.  We all kept our mats in the big gathering space and on the last day I was so caught up in the hugs and goodbyes and packing my bags, etc, I forgot to go back and fetch my yoga bag.  No problem, I thought, the friendly folks at the retreat center will just box it up and mail it to me.  Nope.  Many, many calls and emails later they said they couldn't find it.  Come on!  Seriously?  I guess someone could have walked off with it -- but these are YOGA PEOPLE!  No one would do such a thing!  Bottom line is I never got it back -- mat, eye pillow, bag all gone.  Sad.

So I went to East-West Books one day and as I was browsing about, I decided to get a new, cushy, pricey mat.  I was excited to try it out; it's a pretty deep blue on one side and lighter blue on the other -- reversible!!!

Here's the OCD part:  See in the photos how the linoleum floor tiles at the studio line up?  I always tried to get my mat to be parallel to the tile seams.  I rarely decide to unfurl my mat on the diagonal, as some prefer.   I unrolled my mat, lined it up with the seam in the floor and was ready to go!  But as I moved through the asanas I noticed that the imprinted pattern on my mat was off-kilter.  It ran slightly on the diagonal.  If I moved the mat to keep the pattern parallel to the floor seams then the top of the mat suddenly was off.  OMG!  The manufacturer cut the mat incorrectly!  What was  I going to do?

I was all set to return the mat, when I decided this was the perfect life lesson in imperfection for me!  A-ha!  Yoga is life, right?  Even my mat was teaching me to go with the flow, deal with unmet expectations, find beauty in asymmetry, breathe through the discomfort.

That was 8 months ago.  I wish I could tell you I don't even notice the defect anymore.  But that would not be accurate.  EVERY SINGLE TIME I UNFURL THAT MAT I HAVE TO DEAL WITH THE DISCOMFORT OF NOT GETTING THE THING LINED UP ON THE FLOOR!  ARRRGGGHHHH....  

It's a bit embarrassing to admit all of this.  Also, pretty funny, right?  Of all the things to occupy my thoughts, this should be an easy one to ignore.  It's not.  But I'm working on it.  Before I step on my mat for a class I stand quietly and say a prayer to Shiva, the God of Transformation, that I be present, accepting, focused, alive to my practice, embracing the transformation I'm about to undertake.  It had become an easy, mindless prayer until Shiva threw me the mat issue to deal with.  That Trickster!  Something so mundane and commonplace as a yoga mat has become a focal point of change and acceptance for me; not without some discomfort and struggle, not without some self-berating, but always with the knowledge that lessons abound and can be found in the most unusual places.

Om Namah Shivaya!

Namaste,
    donnajurene