Yoga Sun Salutations

Jan 2, 2008, DIvine in 2009

Happy New Year.

Today I woke up to a Portland once again covered in snow. After the last storm, we had a day or two of heavy rain following a strange and magical day when the thick icy layer simply vanished in a matter of hours, leaving almost no trace of the winter wonderland that was. And now again, snow. And squawking, irritated chickens. They hate walking in it, and they actually frolicked, as if spring had sprung, in the recent days of temperatures reaching the mid 50's.

Yesterday a few of us enjoyed a last minute New Year's Day practice at the studio. We decided to do the ritual practice of 108 consecutive yoga sun salutations, sometimes called a yoga mala, after the Hindu prayer bead garland of 108 beads. 108 is one of yoga's holiest of numbers - it is twice the number of letters in the Sanskrit alphabet. Each letter is said to have a masculine and feminine aspect, so, 54 x 2 = 108. And there are 108 names for Shiva, for all the deities, I think. Or so I remember reading somewhere.

We came up with a wonderful format, which was that we divided the 108 amongst the four of us, each one leading 4 rounds of nine, and for each round the leader shared a personal intention for the new year, and then we practiced, as a group, using that intention as a focus, or dharana. Very powerful, very moving, very effective.

One of my intentions for this year is to slow down and really focus on alignment. After weeks exploring the cause of my recent neck pain, I finally reduced it to a misalignment in my right shoulder. It is slight, almost undetectable to the eye, but practicing as much as I do it was bound to eventually cause physical discomfort. I have been setting lots of asnana and strength related goals, and moving resolutely toward them, ever-expanding. But now appears to be the time to back up, pause, and pull my self together a little bit.

In the last 18 months I moved to a new city, bought my first house, opened a yoga studio, got married, and started a website. The interior aspects of these transformations I could hardly hope to articulate, but be assured that if i did, I would use the words faith, grace and expansion, as well as frantic pace, and veritable overwhelm, and oh-my-god-I'm-so-tired quite liberally.

Together with my body (through the state of my neck), my life is drawing attention to the need to slow down and get aligned through the state of my personal affairs. My stuff's all scattered. And, as proper order of the cervical vertebrae support clear functioning of the physical head, so the proper order of ones paperwork and possessions, one's personal infrastructure can support clear functioning of work, home, and even leisure time. Imagine.

I didn't do all the sun salutations yesterday, although I kept my focus with the group as I practiced shoulder opening twists and back bends in an attempt to remain true to my practice, and out of pain. Still, the pose of the week is not one, but 108. The quintessential vinyasa, sun salutes teach us to stay present with the truth of the moment we're in, and can help us prepare for whats coming, maybe not how we want them to but just the way they should.

P.S.

A high school classmate is shipping off to Iraq tomorrow. I would like to honor him here. And a young woman, newly engaged to her same sex partner in Ohio, wrote to me today about her joy and her anxiety as her life moves toward inevitable change. I wish all of you happiness and humor and safety and food in your fridge this year and every year.

om namah sivaya

namaste

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