You Have to be Able to Trust in the Possibility of Something New

"You have to be able to trust in the possibility of something new" was a quote my teacher said the other day in class. I don't know if she had gotten this quote from somewhere else or if she made it up herself, but really it wouldn't have matter either way.  A dog could have said these words, and the wisdom would have been just as great.  This quote's brilliance lies in what it advises, in what it supposes, and its cue for a successful practice (for life and for yoga). So lets break it down shall we.

First: Trust. Its what you have to do, according to this quote. So whats trust?

TRUST

 [truhst] Show IPA

noun

1.

reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing; confidence.

2.

confident expectation of something; hope.

3.

confidence in the certainty of future payment for property or goods received; credit: to sell merchandise on trust.

4.

a person on whom or thing on which one relies: God is my trust.

5.

the condition of one to whom something has been entrusted.

And thats called copy and pasting from Dictionary.com.  Bam.

To trust  means that you have to be able to have confidence in the weight of your belief. So, to make this concept something we can all relate to, have you ever felt that you trusted someone? Something? Somewhere? Some belief?  And how exactly does that trust feel? Sometimes scary, sometimes reassuring....but almost always heavy in credence.  Heavy in faith.  Heavy in "know how"... almost to the point of predictability. This is a very good thing to have in your life. This is also something we can expand into many different aspects of our lives...just takes a little bit of mindfulness. Trust that your practice will grow, that you will feel things that you've never felt before.  Trust that you can return to your breath and trust that your breath enhances your life force and consequently enhances a fuller awareness of yourself. This can be intense, but many things in life can be intense.  The scintillating thing about practicing yoga is that we learn how to choose to respond to life's intensity vs letting it take over our everything  (mind, action, perspective).  TRUST: Let the magnitude of the word set in, and once it does apply it to things you know about and to things you don't. Consider the range of this word too; conversely you can trust that you don't trust some or something a great deal. But know what you trust and have a strong constitution to back up the way you feel. Finally, take a moment to appreciate that by simply thinking about the things you trust, you've just practiced mind expansion, creativity, and confidence.  Good JOB!

So lets relate how trust is inwoven into the Yoga Sutras. (just for nerding out sake).  We can start with the fifth niyama, Ishvarapranidhana. (yamas and niyamas being the ethical codes in Ashtanga Yoga). In English, ishvarapranidhana means self surrender, or devotion a higher power.  Do you agree there is a higher power? When you see natural changes in weather, seasons, and disasters...would you not agree that it is not you controlling these things but another power? If not, comment below and we'll talk. But I'll go ahead and assume we're all on the same page that there is a larger spirit that plays a huge role in our lives. Try to accept the fact that a higher power presents us with new opportunities, new thoughts, new inspirations..etc. When faced with the "newness of life," see if you can trust that these new things will serve us.  Maybe we receive a positive opinion about this new thing, maybe its negative..but ultimately its mental growth.  Trust that the higher power is not working against you, but with you. To make you more whole. The more you trust in that belief, the more you'll be able to recognize the influence of the higher power in your life.  

Ok...we got the niyama down, so I think we can start working on the "something new" part of the quote.   Can we agree that change is inevitable? Yes, good that was easy.  How do you feel about embracing the changes of life verses fighting them? For me, I naturally fight changes. I fight, I coerce, I adapt, and I settle just to avoid change. When change comes knocking on the door, fear is usually not too far behind.  We don't know what change can bring; you roll the dice and sometimes you hit sevens and sometimes your roll snake eyes.  Either way the dice are going to get thrown. So why not be aware of this? Accepting everyday that change could very well be right around the corner will actually emancipate us from fear and we can grow to learn so many fun new things when fear isn't in the way!  So what I took from this quote, is that change is inevitable so don't be surprised or thrown off when its finally does come.  Instead accept the situation for what it is and do your best to do whats right for you. 

Lastly, I'd like to expand on the first part of the quote, :"you need to."  For the longest time I have hated this statement. How you gonna tell me what "I need to?" (insert ghetto head whip and finger snap).  But over time, with a lot of practice with patience, I have come to understand that yes sometimes we do "need to" do things. It kinda falls in line with the whole Higher Power, Smaller Power calculation. Me and my ego being the smaller power. So I've decided that I'm going to just up and do what I'm told.  Sometimes that's the right thing to do. (sometimes) 

So there you have it, a little piece of inspiration that I found to be valuable and I hope you do too. "you need to trust in the possibility of something new."  Let go of the anxiety of the unknown future, and instead replace with your confidence of your stable presence.  Trust in yourself and your years of experience to prevail over any obstacle that may come your way, or to appreciate any gift you may receive.

Peace

Roxy

You Don't Have to Like the Medicine, You Just Have to Take it

The title of this blog was once said by a man that works at the gym that I work at. He's a really sweet guy that works at the food counter, and every time I walk out of class he asks me "How did it go?" To which I answer depending on how it went. One day I said, "I gave them a lot of core work and I think they got a little mad at me." And then he said compassionately, "Well, you don't have to like the medicine, you just have to take it."

The other day I took a huge dose of my own medicine, and it was quite bitter. 

The other day I was driving home and on the off ramp of the freeway to my exit there is a merge lane that merges over to the right. As I got off, I was in the merge lane and the lady to my right wouldn't let me over.  More realistically she didn't see me. So being the little Californian brat that I am, I sped up to beat her, but couldn't and alas had to honk my horn so that she wouldn't hit me. All in all...we were both pissed off at each other via road rage. We got to a stop light, she was behind me, and in the review mirror I looked at her and she lipped to me with a cold grimace, "NICE."  Holy smokes I was mad. I got home, turned off my car, and was still mad. I kept replaying the incident in my head, and although that woman had driven off and I will probably never see her again, the situation was just playing over and over and over. In grander perspective, this minor incident didn't matter, but for whatever reason it just kept re playing in my mind; I really wanted to stay clinging onto it. Finally I pushed it over enough to make room for my yoga practice.  I had to consciously stop and say to myself, "its over move on".  For about an hour after that my mind was completely on my practice and not that incident. Breathe, alignment, deepening...these were the only things that occupied my headspace for a good hour.  By the time shavasana (corpse pose) came around, I was lying there as per usual, palms up to receptivity...and suddenly this direct instruction came into my head that said to me, "offer love, forgiveness, and peace to this woman you were mad at earlier."  Let it be known...I really didn't want to.

But sometimes you don't have to like the medicine, you just have to take it.

 It was medicine for me to open my heart and offer love and compassion to this stranger. So I did. I took a moment, a deep breath, and softened myself to the thought of this woman; to wish her happiness and personal wealth.  After I made that very difficult choice to wish her happiness I felt this huge weight lift off of me. That's when I came face to face with the burden of holding grudges.  Pride, ego, and self entitlement are so easy to indulge in with us humans. This incident has come to me to demonstrate the medicinal benefits of forgiveness. It cures us from tension and mental stagnation.  After I crossed that very rocky road towards forgiveness, empathy started to play in.  Maybe she had a bad day; maybe her neck hurt her and she didn't want to twist to look in the mirror; maybe I was being the brat that sped up when really I should have slowed down.  All the maybes are important, but only in that they are the building blocks to the triumph of forgiveness and compassion. By the end of my practice I felt blissful.

From this experience I understood how hard it is to forgive and wish well for another that you felt harmed you.  But it is so essential for your personal growth!  Upon further reflection, I remembered the exact meditation technique that deals this this type of situation.  This technique is called Metta Meditation. I'll post an instructional video below:

So there's my story of being cognitive of anger.  Do you have one? Is there some person in your life, maybe a stranger or close acquaintance that has stirred up a tornado of emotion in you? Next time this happens, explore a yogic approach.  I personally chose to do a hatha practice first because I felt that it calmed me down, but whatever you choose...either meditation first or hatha...try to be strong and practice compassion and sympathy.   Also, try to remember this is a practice.  If it doesn't resonate at first, try again until it starts to kick in. I bet it will.

Well I guess that's all I have for today's post. Comments are always welcomed, so please feel free to leave your thoughts in the comment section. Hope the day finds you well. Until next time my little yogis and yoginis =0).
Peace. Namaste.
Roxy