Author: pmcrose

When you do not own your feelings, your feelings will somehow own you.

Own your fear and hesitation, your anger and humiliation, your sadness and grief as well as your courage and trust, your calm and respect, your joy and peace.

Uncomfortable feelings are just that–uncomfortable!

Despite the desire to avoid and flee from difficult feelings, in yoga and meditation I somehow find the stamina and even the patience to be with them more.

Accepting the discomfort somehow sets in motion the alchemy to transform it.

Like in a difficult yoga pose, I am more able to find the determination and strength to sustain a greater presence of mind and body.

Regular practice of yoga and meditation seems to gradually and inexplicably increase my capacity for acceptance and transformation.

 

What will come up today when I do yoga or meditate?

There’s really never any telling….

Some new insight or feeling, a different way to do a pose… a teacher assisting me that brings about a new understanding or sensation in a pose… maybe just the wisp of a word that somehow rings true, the smallest thing that makes such a big difference.

The tiniest adjustment of thought, or the body in a pose, of attitude or feeling…like a light ocean mist spray.

What is silence telling me?

She holds all sounds, all thoughts, all feelings and emotions….

Silence even holds all “noise” and the constant chatter of our minds.

Silence does not judge any of this.

She is the model of unconditional acceptance.

She holds everything equally.

I love listening to her!

I do yoga and meditation to be her student.

 

The following came during meditation today,  from feelings after a yin yoga class taken two nights ago, and during a visit to the San Francisco Modern Art Museum:

Accepting the crosscurrent of conflicting and/or varied feelings with a benevolent heart reduces anxiety and stress.

Quit denying, arguing with, fighting, or resisting them.

Welcome them as they arise.

Let them be with a smile, a nod, with your heart.

Like a modern cubist work, there is complexity and richness to these disparate feelings mutually existing.  There is a great peace and beauty, and maybe even an order, in their seeming disarray.

What is this uplifting energy that I feel when I do yoga and meditate?

I am attracted to it instinctively like a hummingbird to bright flowers.

Even with all of life’s challenges and pains, this attraction and the hunger for more of this sweet nectar has supported my discipline with both practices and earned my love.

This is the same energy I felt 40 years ago with my first asana.

I return to it again and again because I trust and love it so much.

What would happen if in this moment we didn’t feel life needed to be in one way or another different?

What is this dubious notion that somehow life right now is not as it should or could be?

What would it be like as an adult to love and giggle intoxicated with life like a child?

What would it be like to love and live life with more abandon like a discerning Evil Knievel of the moment, more willing to risk?

All of this, and more, in the scent of a rose….

 

Droplets of water can move mountains….

A regular practice

no matter how long

even 5 minutes a day…

can have big effects

like dripping water wears away stone.

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You cannot force significant changes.

Their fragrances arise

stimulating between the eyes

to see more clearly.

During unsettling, distressing, and/or upsetting times, I am especially thankful for the practices of yoga and meditation to try to get more centered and grounded.

They act like a tuning fork that filter through the tumult of chatter in the mind and of emotions and drop me into something deeper, more resonate and loving.

The practices allow me to become more aware of what I am feeling and what is causing this.  I start to settle into a less agitated space where I can draw back and determine if and how I’d like to respond rather than just be tossed about at the mercy of the tumult.

I not only do this to bring its strength into my life but hopefully to family, friends, and to you through this blog.

Through yoga and meditation, I have come to feel and see the same life and light is in all of us.

We are all children of the same life force.  We need to work at seeing and remembering this.

Respect implies compassion–for where everyone is (and is not) on their path as an evolving human.  Not excuses, but respect.

From knowing and feeling this, may my respect and love grow.  This will give me greater strength to to be me and to respect you.