Om Namah Shivaya

Practicing Yoga with a Broken Heart

Om Namah Shivaya - I bow to the spirit of universal truth that pulses in and as all beings -

We learn actions in the yoga poses that build spaciousness right into our physical structures, and we cultivate awareness of the breath moving within that spaciousness, and what we see is a reliable, consistent pattern - there is emptiness, and then there is fullness. It is simply so. Dark is followed by light, fear by comfort, over and over again. We learn to rest in knowing that this rhythm doesn't cease, even when the poses are challenging. Then we have this knowing to return to when challenges come up in our life off the mat. It's a powerful skill to have.

So I had been talking about this cultivation of faith, and about developing the skill to trust that life is moving along as it should even when it hurts or seems all wrong. And then, with stunning timing I received news of a tragedy that has taken the life of a bright and beautiful young woman who was my student and friend.

She had sent me beautiful emails about her experiences in my yoga classes and workshops - insightful, intelligent, provocative. And I was writing to ask her if she would be interested in collaborating with me on some kind of writing project. When my email was returned I did a search, and uncovered the shocking news.

I will tell you that it stopped me in my tracks. It unraveled me, turning every incidental task of my day into an overwhelming obstacle. I couldn't write about it. I could hardly practice.

But I did, practice. And I taught, too, and eventually, it helped.

Now, brace yourself for this truth: Yoga practice doesn't eliminate pain and suffering. No spiritual practice does that. And the thing is is that it shouldn't. It isn't meant to. Yoga practice is the practice of skillfully living in this, our worldly expression - this body, this personality, this set of circumstances. Without the challenges presented by these things, we would be something other than human. Something more, perhaps, or maybe something less.

...

I should probably tell you at this juncture that I came to the practice of yoga with a broken heart. It was a few days following the unexpected death of another bright and beautiful young person, this one a young man. He had been my friend, and then my close friend, and then my closest friend, and for a brief shining moment, my beloved. I was young, too, and living a life of adventure. I had learned many lessons and lived many wonderful joys, but also suffered many blows along the way. At the time of this first yoga class I was holding this new grief along with other old, unprocessed griefs.

Yoga became a lifeline for me. Just days after this immense loss I found myself in my first yoga class, being healed and transformed by the simple practice of paying attention, of noticing and experiencing the sensations of having a body. Not the kind that scream to be heard, like pain, although I did limp into that first class with a seized-up hip. But I mean the simple sensations that are always present, day after same old day, such that we inevitably forget to notice them. Breathing, contracting our muscles, interacting with gravity, moving through space.

You could say this is the practice, in a nutshell - a process of distinguishing what is fundamental from what isn't, and staying in touch with what is fundamental. One of the ways we do it is by repeating certain actions at every practice session, to feel the contrast between what's changing - the weather, our energy level, the events surrounding and creating our lives, and what's the same. One thing we always do in Anusara yoga is sing the invocation, which contains as its first stanza the words, om namah shivaya.

Om Namah Shivaya is an ancient Sanskrit mantra, meant to be repeated over and over as a focal point for meditation. You can read their meaning this way, "I bow in deep reverence to the presence of God as everything" - or this way, "I am simply blown away by the fact that the fundamental sweetness of life goes on and and on regardless of the craziness around me." Or, "this, too, this terrible grief, this anger, this senselessness, this, too is a manifestation of pure consciousness."

...

John Friend describes the philosophy of Anusara Yoga as one of "intrinsic goodness." He posits that life, and each of us living it, is fundamentally good. And I can venture, with some confidence, that he did not come up with this concept out of thin air, or from something he read. I believe John tells us that goodness is the foundation of life because he has felt it and known it, in his body and in his heart. If he has, he has seen his experience reflected in the experience of thousands of students, as well as a vast lineage of teachers and masters. At the dawn of my own practice, that was what happened to me. By moving and breathing and paying attention to the ongoing truth of what I am, I moved from the temporal experience of my life - which at the time, was steeped in suffering - to the very ground of my being. Whenever we do the practice this is what happens. And the ground of our being is goodness. It is peace, it is freedom. Fearlessness, joy - even bliss.

om namah shivaya - I bow to the light of consciousness, to the universal pulsation of life force that I am made of.

These words always carry power. But the painful events, the horrific happenings, the deaths and cruelties, the experiences, embedded within the full spectrum of possible experiences, that are most unlike what we would think of as blessed - these are the events that throw the meaning of these words into stark relief, and help us to fully glean their gift.

om namah shivaya

om namah shivaya

om namah shivaya

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