Tag: Fear

Wobblyogi Wednesday – Book Club Notes #4

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Hello, Everyone!

Our adventure in self-study through reading Judith Lasater’s Living Your Yoga continues. How is reading going for you? What are you asking yourself? Finding any surprising answers?

If you’re not reading the book but just checking in with the blog….. perfect. That’s what this blog series is for. This effort is less about the book more about asking ourselves questions about what irks us and how can we limit those small and big irritations.

The first part of the book was about awareness within and addresses themes of discipline, letting go, faith, perspective and more. Part two is about how yoga helps with our relationships with others and the world. Judith Lasater talks about compassion, control, fear, and patience. One of the reasons I love her book is her constant reference to motherhood and stories related to her children. Using yoga principles to guide our role as moms, for me really resonates.

Compassion

As a parent, I have often wrestled with what it means to be compassionate toward my children…………..I have learned that the most compassionate response I can have is to be willing not to judge their behavior, but to try to see the situation from their point of view. This does not mean that I forfeit my opinion on the most effective course of action they might choose. Rather I have the intention to truly feel the situation from their narrow views, thus stepping back from my own narrow views.

What! Not judge the behavior of my children! Isn’t that my job? My interpretation of what she is saying is this: really listen to what they are saying, repeat back to make sure I understand their perspective, “so you are saying that you really need to go the party because all your other friends will be there and your the acceptance of your friends is very important to you”….or something like that and then I offer my opinion about why that request or feeling has multiple considerations attached like, “Did you do your homework?” “Do you need a ride”, “is it on a school night?” and maybe “why is the acceptance of this group of friends so important”, etc. Compassion may not alter my expectations as a mom, but it can help me see the issue from my kid’s perspective. I’ll try.

Do you judge yourself if a yoga pose doesn’t look “perfect”? Can I be compassionate with my own body and its abilities? Allow my left knee to crunch without judgment?

Control

Who among us hasn’t been accused of being controlling, particularly when it comes to our kids? Here is Lasater’s advice:

Dr. Rosenberg explained that if you coerce your child into doing something, you will pay a price. For example, even if you could exert enough control to make him take out the garbage, he would make you pay for getting your way…. If we try to control the behavior of others, we may get what we want but we won’t enjoy it. If we have the thought that we are making someone do what we want without eliciting their true cooperation, that control is the greatest of illusions.

What to do if the other’s behavior is self-destructive? If they are not invested in their own well-being, ultimately I, as a mom can’t sustain control over them. That is truly difficult to accept.  She later addresses this issue by writing,

But where does letting go of control end and taking responsibility for my life begin? We must understand (and accept) what it is exactly that we can control and what we cannot control. In the final analysis, we can control only ourselves. But we are often dismayed at our inability to master even this. What prevents us? When we feel out of control, it is usually when there is a conflict between what we think and what we feel. Our feelings may scream one thing while our minds demand something else.

I try to be realistic and honest about what I can do and what I can’t in relation to my kids and others. I feel, if I hear and try to understand my kids, they, in turn, hear me better too. They may not like my preferences as I may not like theirs, but being open about what we can do individually helps us in being compassionate with each other. My beautiful and talented dancer daughter understands that loud noise and big crowds are overwhelming for me and doesn’t insist on my presence throughout all her dance competitions (of course she wants me to see her dance, as I do but she understands if I don’t stick around). I let go of the fear that my daughter might see my limitation as a lack of care. If we scratch deeper we always find either love or fear. Laster appropriately continues the next section on the topic of fear.

On the yoga mat, when I am overthinking a pose, I know I’m trying to control. Alignment cues are directions, not destinations. Yoga is not a “follow the leader” kind of activity. My role as a teacher is to stand a guide and demonstration with my body, my abilities, and limitations. I also have to accept however a student interprets and acts on my guidance, as long as he or she doesn’t hurt themselves. What is the difference between correction and control?

Fear

The most interesting thing that Lasater says about fear for me was that if you are really living the present moment there is no fear. And, if you say “I am afraid,” admit and name the emotion, fear loosens its grip. I’ve tried this when afraid to drive on icy roads and found it helped me find ease. About being present and unafraid she writes,

If you are involved in actually fighting for your life, there is no time to be afraid. The sympathetic nervous system is mobilizing you to run or attack, and your bodily functions are working full blast. For example, the eyes open wider to see the danger better, blood is shunted to the muscles so that you can use them in the fight, and the mind becomes completely focused in the immediate need at hand. Your nervous system is not distracted by thinking in the abstract about what may happen. Rather, it is dealing with what is happening. It is only when you think about what may happen or what could have happened that you feel afraid.

Fear is, unfortunately, a standard and inevitable mom-emotion. It is challenging to find the balance between fear and love. I try not use my fears as an emotional weapon to limit the growth of my children. There is a difference between saying “please lock the front door” and “never go out.” Caution and fear. Instead of hoping that nothing bad ever happens to them, I hope they cultivate the strength to recover from anything. This takes practice and trust.

When I practice crow pose, I’ll bring a bolster or block in front of me to allow my head to come down. Somehow that eases the fear that I’ll come tumbling forward.

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Patience

Patience is another absolutely required parental skill. My favorite part was when she talked about our concept of “wasted time.” I am guilty of considering most of my day as “wasting time.” Lasater’s explanation struck a nerve for me when she talked about impatience arising out of a feeling of wasting time as associated with a fear of being devalued. The thought that – I could be doing better things than sitting in traffic, doing the laundry, waiting in line –  etc  is a symptom of feeling “I’m not doing enough.”  Lasater explains it better:

What is really wasted? Nothing. All gives me the opportunity to live in the present moment. When I do, I am patient. This realization supports even the most mundane events of my daily life. I can wait in lines, sit in traffic jams, and understand when someone is late for an appointment. All of these times – waiting, sitting, and understanding – are valuable. I can choose not to experience them as wasted time by choosing to be present and actually live these precious moments. After all to reject them is to reject life itself………..

Beneath my “time-wasting” thoughts was the most startling realization of all. I was afraid. You see, my self-worth was so tied to how much I accomplished. I thought that if I could speed up things around me, then I could get more done. If I did that, then I would be more valued, therefore more loved, therefore happier.

The next time I’m waiting in the school parking lot for my daughter to emerge, I’ll try to think of it as a practice in patience, and self-value. Waiting as mothering.

Maybe I can practice patience when in a forward fold, standing, seated and wide instead of judging my tight hamstrings.

For me, this section tugged at my mommy heart. What stood out for you? Was it teaching and control? Dealing with difficult people with compassion? Fear and anxiety about what we can’t control? How to accept control as an illusion?

I hope it was a good read for you. Looking forward to hearing your comments.

Happy reading Community Yoga Bookclub!

Yours,

Wobblyogi

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Wobblyogi Wednesday – Teaching Fears

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My adventures in yoga teaching has officially begun! I am horrified and thrilled. Horrified, that, I, anxious and awkward, dare to invite people to move meditatively. Thrilled, that I get to share my efforts to calm my frenetic mind and heart with others.

I suppose it is the same combination of joy and fear I felt when holding my baby girls, getting married, writing my dissertation, teaching my first philosophy class or eating something unknown. I am mindful of the novelty, the moment of joy and fear and the awareness of a new path. I don’t know where it will take me and for how long but it feels good to look ahead.

Despite my fears, forgetting a pose in a sequence, wrong breath cues, limited alignment direction and the infinite little things that I could’ve done better, it was a wonderful experience. I know this because I want to do better. As soon as I got home, I found myself looking through music, researching sequences, considering different themes and advise on alignment cues. I found myself thumbing through my yoga teacher training notebooks and other books for direction.

I assume that anything or anybody that makes me want to be better is,  despite fear,  good for me. My kids make me want to be a better mom, my beloved makes me want to be a better partner, my philosophy students make me want to be a better teacher, my blog readers make me want to be a better blogger and so now my fellow yogis make me want to be a better yogi. Sharing, amplifies both good and bad, like cooking for others. It is a risk.

Yes, it was a good morning. A good beginning. I am so thankful for the graciousness of my sunrise vinyasa yogis. They have certainly helped me connect to my gratitude.

I was looking online for an appropriate quote that summarizes the crazy complexity of “first” experiences. Didn’t find one yet. I did find two about fear on goodreads that spoke to me. The first, short and sweet, is attributed to artist Salvador Dali.

“Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.”

There is something comforting in accepting imperfection as  evidence of continuous growth and striving, instead of failure and inadequacy.

The second quote is much longer from Herman Hesse about his admiration of trees.

“For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfil themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest, the ideal trees grow.

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.

A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail.

A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end, and I care for nothing else. I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live.

When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.

A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one’s suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother.

So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own childish thoughts: Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives than ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them. But when we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy. Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness.”

All this, blogging and yoga, helps me share, helps me survive in suburbia, through the pick up and drop offs, the left behind water bottles, the grocery, summertime lunch, dinner planning for 10 hungry dance team girls, an article to write about Indiana woodware, another on an artist, a tagine and coffee pot to wash, a dog to let out, weeds to address and so on and so on.  I can embrace and enjoy it all because I took a full breath with others this morning. Gratitude, indeed.
Wishing all of you many new “firsts” ahead,
Wobblyogi