Thursday 21st July 2005
Well I came home from work tonight, ate a salad, cooked my son’s dinner, washed dishes, went out and did my weekly shopping, came home and walked the dog. By that time it was 9.30pm. I picked up Light on Yoga again. The lingering fantasy of a regular evening practice was hanging around in the shadowy corners of my room, tempting me. When I first thought of it last night I had no misconceptions that I’d ever be able to incorporate it into my busy life.
So there it was, 9.30pm and I’m thinking “I got up at 5.15am this morning, I’ll be up at 5.15am tomorrow, what’s it going to be?”. The choices were bed or practice.
Well, strike me down, I must be a real yogi at last. I scanned the courses at the back of Light on Yoga and decided to make a conservative start with the sequence from week 19-21.
The sequence is odd - totally backwards. You start with Headstand plus some variations, then Shoulderstand plus variations, Jathara, Navasana, Utkatasana (the only standing pose), then a few simple backbends, Mahamudra, some forward bends including Marichyasana A and B, Purvottanasana, Bharadvadrasana, Malasana and Baddha Konasana.
All the seated poses are done bending up the left leg first according to the instructions from the book which is the opposite to Ashtanga... someone’s got it VERY wrong. Isn’t there a reason behind doing it on one side first – something to do with the peristaltic movement from the large to the small intestine – food moves from the right side to the left side of the abdomen or something like that.
Looking at the list of poses, I thought it would be a two hour practice but it only took me one and a half hours (not including Savasana because I fell straight into bed instead).
I did all the poses for 8 long breaths excluding Headstand and Shoulderstand which I held for 20 breaths. Did Ujjiyi pranayama throughout and tried to integrate bandha work as well. It was a nice, quiet, but deep practice and it showed up a lot of weak areas in my body that need to be worked on.
There were a few poses that I really wanted to come out of after 5 breaths: Purvottanasana and Baradvadrasana 1 especially.
Niralamba Sarvangasana came surprisingly easy. It’s a precarious balance but beautiful when you get it. There’s an incredible elegance about it – the same as holding a free handstand. It’s like you’re suspended in between two moments, and those two moments are sliding apart, leaving you in an increasingly silent vortex. You exist momentarily in a timeless, eternal pause in those balances, alive, awake and breathing while everything else around you has frozen.
"Perfection in sarvangasana is reached when the posture can be maintained without the support of the hands. Niralamba means "without support", sometimes it is used the word purna. Under a symbolic point of view, as the body is sustained by nothing, it indicates the overcoming of the ego and the sensory control, at that stage the Purusa realises its own nature which for its own quality does not rest on anything, as it is self sustained. As the atman, has not a beginning nor an end, because the reality is unique, omnipervading and undivided, so there is nothing to lean on."
If I was a 6 day a week Ashtangi (4 is a good week for me), I probably wouldn’t consider doing an Iyengar practice. But in my current circumstances (motivationally challenged), any extra asana work can only be to my advantage.
It’s like being on a very specific cleansing diet and slipping in some healthy food which is not on your list. Because it's healthy you can justify it.
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Wednesday 20th July 2005
I dug out my decaying copy of Light on Yoga last night to look up the name of a pose, then flicking through the loose pages I happened across the program of courses near the end of the book. The suggested regimen spans something like 3 years. I remembered starting this in my early yoga days and getting bored after the first week. So much for beginners mind.
I playfully toyed with the idea of picking up the regimen again, following Mr Iyengar’s course. “Hmmm..I could do my Ashtanga practice in the mornings and the Iyengar practice at night –not every night of course – maybe 3 evenings a week”.
It sounded good at the time as I was snuggled up in bed.
When Glenn Ceresoli was here giving a workshop earlier this year, we did a morning and an evening practice for 5 days straight with him. The daily double practice filled up every vacant space in my mind. All mundane activity in between the sessions paled into insignificance.
A morning Ashtanga/evening Iyengar practice is quite an alluring proposition, but unfortunately pretty far-fetched for someone who has such a heavy schedule already and a poor history of disciplined asana practice. I can barely find time to squeeze in 4 morning practices a week as it is. But what the heck, entertaining a little fantasy now and then is harmless.
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Tuesday 19th July 2005
The Gallery space at 6am has been like an icebox lately even though I’ve been covering the entrance with a curtain, putting on two heaters and bringing extra blankets for Savasana. It’s been pretty difficult to get any heat happening in the body during practice. No heat means no progress. Heat is the transforming element that burns the impurities from the body and mind and although a heated environment isn’t essential for asana practice it’s an essential ingredient in the alchemy of Ashtanga.
So with the cold biting at our heels, we whipped through Primary this morning. I shortened my normally long, slow breathing so I could move in and out of poses quicker to stay warm. Not safe to challenge the limits or work deeply today – priority one was just to keep moving and generating enough heat to ward off the threat of stalling and freezing over.
Alas the bit of heat I generated never quite got as far as my toes. The little digits stayed frozen throughout the standing poses and each time I jumped back to Chaturanga I imagined them breaking off and tumbling over the floor like dice. In Paschimottanasana I wrapped my hands around my toes to thaw them out then resorted to putting my fluffy pink bedsocks back on for the rest of practice.
Secret thanks to Cameron. In his blog on 15th July he vowed:
“…my new commitment: practice of some kind or another on all practice days. Period. Figure it out, make it happen. If all I can muster is sun sals, then so be it. But that's the new deal with myself.”
Those few words of resolve have pricked my conscience and inspired me to do a little better, try a little harder to establish a daily practice. Discipline, tapas, commitment.
And having said that I'm feeling quite grateful to all the other yogis who blog their experiences, struggles, joys, breakthroughs and inner dialogues. Broadcasting this stuff to the world takes honesty and courage (especially when it’s read by people you know) but it's also an act of sharing and generosity. I can sense the invisible worldwide support network, real connections existing in time and space that join us together.
We are indeed all one, and our thoughts and feelings travel through the body of the universe like nerve impulses, connecting us all to the mind of the universe and to each other.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Sunday 17th July 2005
Well it’s pretty cold.
A couple of us rocked up for a 7am Sunday morning self practice at Simi’s shala only to find the electricity was off. We managed to get the lights working but not the heaters, so it was a cold, hard practice. I warmed up and cooled down repeatedly like a yo-yo. Marichyasana C and D have become little annoyances since my back injury. I can understand losing Marichy D, but Marichy C? Well, maybe I’m exaggerating a bit – I can still bind in C so I suppose I haven’t technically lost it, I just can’t breathe or move in it anymore. The twist isn’t a workable one where I can nudge out the edge with each exhalation. It’s regressed to a stuck kind of twist with no give, no room to negotiate.
I worked on them both today, holding them for extra breaths at that frustrating point where they go no further (when they've hardly gone anywhere to begin with).
My female cycle started this morning so I didn’t do the finishing inversions. I’ve now got a good excuse to take tomorrow off…at last a real excuse for piking out on a Monday practice.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Friday 14th July 2005
Ashtanga Iyengar reflection
Finally got to Darren’s 6am led Iyengar class this morning after an absence of 2 months. It’s a nice complement to the Ashtanga practice. Darren’s very calm. He doesn’t talk much in this class, just quietly calls the poses in the silence of the emerging dawn. This sort of class allows us the space to explore within our own experience.
I was critically aware of the asymmetry in my body this morning – one hand presses much more heavily into the floor than the other in Dog Pose, Vatayanasana was a breeze on one side and an embarrassingly awkward frustration on the other. Not to mention Padmasana … vastly different on one side to the other because I only ever do it on one side.
I hardly notice my alignment bleeps during an Ashtanga practice – my focus is more with bandhas and breath. When these are both strong and united, my body quite magically aligns itself along the energetic core of the spine and my mind is totally drawn into this epicentre as well. Every disparate part sucks together as one working entity, aligned, powerful and moving with purpose.
This cohesion rarely arises during Iyengar practices. Instead I feel out my body’s imperfections during the long holdings and try to correct them from the outside, from the skeletal and muscular structure and placement. Although there is a certain depth to this engagement – concentration is strongly focussed within the body - the subject of my focus seems superficial when compared with the internal energetic focus generated during an Ashtanga practice.
Just different ways of working I suppose.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Gallery space at 6am has been like an icebox lately even though I’ve been covering the entrance with a curtain, putting on two heaters and bringing extra blankets for Savasana. It’s been pretty difficult to get any heat happening in the body during practice. No heat means no progress. Heat is the transforming element that burns the impurities from the body and mind and although a heated environment isn’t essential for asana practice it’s an essential ingredient in the alchemy of Ashtanga.
So with the cold biting at our heels, we whipped through Primary this morning. I shortened my normally long, slow breathing so I could move in and out of poses quicker to stay warm. Not safe to challenge the limits or work deeply today – priority one was just to keep moving and generating enough heat to ward off the threat of stalling and freezing over.
Alas the bit of heat I generated never quite got as far as my toes. The little digits stayed frozen throughout the standing poses and each time I jumped back to Chaturanga I imagined them breaking off and tumbling over the floor like dice. In Paschimottanasana I wrapped my hands around my toes to thaw them out then resorted to putting my fluffy pink bedsocks back on for the rest of practice.
Secret thanks to Cameron. In his blog on 15th July he vowed:
“…my new commitment: practice of some kind or another on all practice days. Period. Figure it out, make it happen. If all I can muster is sun sals, then so be it. But that's the new deal with myself.”
Those few words of resolve have pricked my conscience and inspired me to do a little better, try a little harder to establish a daily practice. Discipline, tapas, commitment.
And having said that I'm feeling quite grateful to all the other yogis who blog their experiences, struggles, joys, breakthroughs and inner dialogues. Broadcasting this stuff to the world takes honesty and courage (especially when it’s read by people you know) but it's also an act of sharing and generosity. I can sense the invisible worldwide support network, real connections existing in time and space that join us together.
We are indeed all one, and our thoughts and feelings travel through the body of the universe like nerve impulses, connecting us all to the mind of the universe and to each other.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Sunday 17th July 2005
Well it’s pretty cold.
A couple of us rocked up for a 7am Sunday morning self practice at Simi’s shala only to find the electricity was off. We managed to get the lights working but not the heaters, so it was a cold, hard practice. I warmed up and cooled down repeatedly like a yo-yo. Marichyasana C and D have become little annoyances since my back injury. I can understand losing Marichy D, but Marichy C? Well, maybe I’m exaggerating a bit – I can still bind in C so I suppose I haven’t technically lost it, I just can’t breathe or move in it anymore. The twist isn’t a workable one where I can nudge out the edge with each exhalation. It’s regressed to a stuck kind of twist with no give, no room to negotiate.
I worked on them both today, holding them for extra breaths at that frustrating point where they go no further (when they've hardly gone anywhere to begin with).
My female cycle started this morning so I didn’t do the finishing inversions. I’ve now got a good excuse to take tomorrow off…at last a real excuse for piking out on a Monday practice.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Friday 14th July 2005
Ashtanga Iyengar reflection
Finally got to Darren’s 6am led Iyengar class this morning after an absence of 2 months. It’s a nice complement to the Ashtanga practice. Darren’s very calm. He doesn’t talk much in this class, just quietly calls the poses in the silence of the emerging dawn. This sort of class allows us the space to explore within our own experience.
I was critically aware of the asymmetry in my body this morning – one hand presses much more heavily into the floor than the other in Dog Pose, Vatayanasana was a breeze on one side and an embarrassingly awkward frustration on the other. Not to mention Padmasana … vastly different on one side to the other because I only ever do it on one side.
I hardly notice my alignment bleeps during an Ashtanga practice – my focus is more with bandhas and breath. When these are both strong and united, my body quite magically aligns itself along the energetic core of the spine and my mind is totally drawn into this epicentre as well. Every disparate part sucks together as one working entity, aligned, powerful and moving with purpose.
This cohesion rarely arises during Iyengar practices. Instead I feel out my body’s imperfections during the long holdings and try to correct them from the outside, from the skeletal and muscular structure and placement. Although there is a certain depth to this engagement – concentration is strongly focussed within the body - the subject of my focus seems superficial when compared with the internal energetic focus generated during an Ashtanga practice.
Just different ways of working I suppose.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Thursday 14th July 2005
Winter...blah
Did I say I had no trouble getting up in the mornings? I’ll retract that statement unequivocally.
Today I actually did manage to get out of bed on time. Got to the Gallery and set up for Ashtanga practice. The town hall bell rang softly in the quiet chill of the dawn…6am. As the familiar bell rang out, instead of starting my sun salutes, I did about 10 minutes of opening stretches, procrastinating really.
The motivation to start practice passed and I conceded defeat, sat in meditation for about 30 minutes, then packed up mats and blankets, went home, got back into bed and fell asleep at 6.45am. 45 minutes later I was up getting ready to go back to the Gallery for the working day.
To make up for not practising this morning I decided to do penance and go to a Level 3 Iyengar class at 6pm this evening. I left work just after 5 and raced home, breaking all records for feeding my son and showering. Made it there at 5.45 to find the class actually started at 5.30. I crept back out the door and went home. Again.
What’s a girl to do on a day like this?
It’s mid winter. Mornings are bitterly cold. I'm sure my skin is getting thinner year by year.
Checked out swellnet today - crap surf is forecast this weekend. Thank God. With enormous relief I emailed around to cancel Saturday’s surf trip.
A combination of age, sensitivity and sensibility is keeping me out of the ice cold ocean this winter.
Again I concede defeat.
Will have to join the senior citizens with their mini-malibus in the water next spring.
Winter…blah.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Winter...blah
Did I say I had no trouble getting up in the mornings? I’ll retract that statement unequivocally.
Today I actually did manage to get out of bed on time. Got to the Gallery and set up for Ashtanga practice. The town hall bell rang softly in the quiet chill of the dawn…6am. As the familiar bell rang out, instead of starting my sun salutes, I did about 10 minutes of opening stretches, procrastinating really.
The motivation to start practice passed and I conceded defeat, sat in meditation for about 30 minutes, then packed up mats and blankets, went home, got back into bed and fell asleep at 6.45am. 45 minutes later I was up getting ready to go back to the Gallery for the working day.
To make up for not practising this morning I decided to do penance and go to a Level 3 Iyengar class at 6pm this evening. I left work just after 5 and raced home, breaking all records for feeding my son and showering. Made it there at 5.45 to find the class actually started at 5.30. I crept back out the door and went home. Again.
What’s a girl to do on a day like this?
It’s mid winter. Mornings are bitterly cold. I'm sure my skin is getting thinner year by year.
Checked out swellnet today - crap surf is forecast this weekend. Thank God. With enormous relief I emailed around to cancel Saturday’s surf trip.
A combination of age, sensitivity and sensibility is keeping me out of the ice cold ocean this winter.
Again I concede defeat.
Will have to join the senior citizens with their mini-malibus in the water next spring.
Winter…blah.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Tuesday 12th July 2005
Practice – Mondayitis
Practice has generally become consistently strong and really satisfying with the exception of Mondays. What is it in my psyche that smothers all good Monday practice intentions to death under the blanket of inertia? Bed holds me prisoner.
Despite promising Angie that I’d practice at the shala yesterday morning, as usual on a Monday I failed to get out of bed. Monday morning has a hex on it. I have no explanation. Do I have a psychological block to the start of the week, or maybe there’s an assertive sub-conscious directive for an extra sleep-in that overrides my resolute Sunday intentions? I don’t think it’s laziness…I have no problems getting out of bed at 5.15am for practice on any other morning. It’s a curious phenomena. Every Sunday I swear I’ll break the Monday morning drought, but when that alarm goes off, my sub-conscious overrides my will and sabotages it every time.
Up until today I’ve been taking the detour from Navasana straight to Baddha Konasana due to the bulging disc problem but this morning I did every pose from go to whoa in Primary series. Bhujapidasana and Garbha Pindasana felt great and the nine rolls just may have been my best ever! (what sense does that make when I haven’t done this for 2 months).
Kurmasana was about 80% - couldn’t quite get that strong heels-off-the-floor energy injection, and predictably, Supta Kurmasana was poor; being the pose that caused my injury it’s the one that will take a long time for my body to forgive. Although it was my first try for 2 months, I was still a bit dismayed that I couldn’t bind my wrists, but I guess with time, patience and care, it will return. Who knows…the injury may even be the catalyst for a total restructure of my body. Maybe it’s reconfiguring itself to allow a full binding of legs behind the head – something that’s always eluded me.
I play with the amusing thought that an injury breaks the body so that it can be put back together differently, reform in a different shape, an updated model perhaps that can do even more that the last one.
Such wishful thinking…
______________________________________________________________________________________________
Sunday 10th July 2005
Teaching yoga as a vehicle for enlightenment
Well I’m starting to get very excited and inspired about teaching yoga again.
I’ve done a lot of self reflection, evaluation and inner work over the past month or so to turn around the self-doubts and stalling that have been holding me back. Now it feels like I’ve cleared all that out, like I’m free of all the negative thinking around my ability to teach. Heck, I’ve been teaching for a few years now, long enough to watch my students progress and change and begin to discover life’s hidden dimensions. Some have contacted me recently asking me to teach again. Their loyalty and enthusiasm has helped me to finally accept that I have something really valuable and sacred to pass on.
Turning around self doubt has been a fascinating exercise – confronting all the hidden negative attitudes and the negative thoughts I have about myself. As I began to see them clearly, face them and question their validity, they began to disappear. They had no real substance, they were just thoughts but were exerting a powerful influence over me and all my decisions.
For me the purpose of both yoga and Buddhist practice is to purify the body and mind, to systematically work to release and remove these negative blocks and obstacles that hold us back from realising our highest potential. Authentic spiritual practice works to purify our five layers (koshas), starting with the outer body and moving inwards to the very subtle layers of the heart and mind.
A human being, when rid of their self-limiting obstacles will eventually come upon the truth of their existence, that in essence they are a vehicle for the pure expression of the divine force (The Profound Realisation after which the final journey begins).
So my spiritual practice is now my daily life. I watch how I think, react, speak, interact, how I face difficult and challenging situations, how I can neutralise negative habits and turn them around so that my presence in the world is positive and emanates love and light.
Lately I’ve been avidly scouring my Buddhist books for references to the “Noble Ones”, a Buddhist term given to stages of enlightenment. The first stage is called Stream Entry and it takes sustained effort and practice to enter this state of consciousness. When I came upon the definitions and teachings about the Noble Ones, my jaw immediately hit the floor. I recognised them. I was doing this level of work as part of my natural evolution, and without a teacher.
Stream Entry begins with an extraordinary experience of awakening which can come about through any dedicated spiritual practice (not necessarily Buddhist). The rather quaint Buddhist term for this awakening is a “path moment”. It’s like The Initiation, and once this happens, you enter into a stage of development that prevents any further indulgence in the old, negative patterns of thinking and acting. Something really big has changed in you forever. You’re a freshman in the school of Noble Ones! According to the texts, Stream Entry is recognisable by particular characteristics:
- A deep commitment to ethical principles (eg yamas and niyamas or precepts)
- All doubt is removed about the purpose of spiritual development
- Ignorance about the Self is removed (the belief that we are of a particular personality)
- Liberation from the belief in rites, rituals and religious practices (as opposed to genuine spiritual practice and inner work)
- Some traces of negative mind states will still be present such as personal desires, attachment, clinging, aversion, greed, anger, self-deception etc. but they are greatly diminished.
- Supreme importance is given to the widsom of knowing the truth of things.
It’s been hard to accept that this is where I am, especially as ‘I’ am not me anymore; I actually don’t even exist as a ‘person’ that this has happened to. One of the conundrums of the experience of No-Self is that as soon as you talk about it you are talking from the Self. But this all gets way too complicated to explain.
But anyway I’m up there, and since accepting it I’ve felt greatly consoled, like my entire life history and existence suddenly makes sense. But what has been more profound and valuable is that these teachings on the Noble Ones have shown me how to proceed. I've never had a teacher for this kind of inner spiritual work, but I've somehow got here on my own, which proves that old adage that the teacher is within.
Now I have a direction, I know what I have to work on and it’s so crystal clear and penetrating that it’s scary.
The awakening experience (or ‘path-moment’) changes your life – you see that which is behind all life; any idea that you exist as a separate entity with a particular personality is shot to pieces. This ego-identification is the Ignorance referred to in all Buddhist literature. Once you see through all this, you have no doubt about what you’re here for and then there’s no turning back; you have to follow the path towards the final freedom. It’s now a one way trip.
Following Stream Entry there are three more stages: Once Returner, Non-Returner and Arahant. To move on to these stages requires vigilant practice and the work is to gradually purify all negativity, counteract and dissolve all traces of desires, wanting, ill-will, aversion, greed etc…purge out all those negative mind states that pollute our essentially pure hearts. They say that a Stream Enterer has a maximum of seven more lives but they can also reach full enlightenment in this lifetime. A Once Returner has one more life, a Non-Returner is on the home stretch and an Arahant has arrived.
Teaching yoga will provide a challenging arena for me to confront and deal with many of my negative small minded thinking habits. I know it won’t be easy to stay on track, to stay aligned with the higher purpose, the purpose of expressing the divine through my teaching and my life and bringing this light into the lives of others, but the profound realisation is that I have no choice.
What an extraordinary and beautiful journey I am on. My life just keeps opening up to reveal more and more secrets, day by day.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Practice – Mondayitis
Practice has generally become consistently strong and really satisfying with the exception of Mondays. What is it in my psyche that smothers all good Monday practice intentions to death under the blanket of inertia? Bed holds me prisoner.
Despite promising Angie that I’d practice at the shala yesterday morning, as usual on a Monday I failed to get out of bed. Monday morning has a hex on it. I have no explanation. Do I have a psychological block to the start of the week, or maybe there’s an assertive sub-conscious directive for an extra sleep-in that overrides my resolute Sunday intentions? I don’t think it’s laziness…I have no problems getting out of bed at 5.15am for practice on any other morning. It’s a curious phenomena. Every Sunday I swear I’ll break the Monday morning drought, but when that alarm goes off, my sub-conscious overrides my will and sabotages it every time.
Up until today I’ve been taking the detour from Navasana straight to Baddha Konasana due to the bulging disc problem but this morning I did every pose from go to whoa in Primary series. Bhujapidasana and Garbha Pindasana felt great and the nine rolls just may have been my best ever! (what sense does that make when I haven’t done this for 2 months).
Kurmasana was about 80% - couldn’t quite get that strong heels-off-the-floor energy injection, and predictably, Supta Kurmasana was poor; being the pose that caused my injury it’s the one that will take a long time for my body to forgive. Although it was my first try for 2 months, I was still a bit dismayed that I couldn’t bind my wrists, but I guess with time, patience and care, it will return. Who knows…the injury may even be the catalyst for a total restructure of my body. Maybe it’s reconfiguring itself to allow a full binding of legs behind the head – something that’s always eluded me.
I play with the amusing thought that an injury breaks the body so that it can be put back together differently, reform in a different shape, an updated model perhaps that can do even more that the last one.
Such wishful thinking…
______________________________________________________________________________________________
Sunday 10th July 2005
Teaching yoga as a vehicle for enlightenment
Well I’m starting to get very excited and inspired about teaching yoga again.
I’ve done a lot of self reflection, evaluation and inner work over the past month or so to turn around the self-doubts and stalling that have been holding me back. Now it feels like I’ve cleared all that out, like I’m free of all the negative thinking around my ability to teach. Heck, I’ve been teaching for a few years now, long enough to watch my students progress and change and begin to discover life’s hidden dimensions. Some have contacted me recently asking me to teach again. Their loyalty and enthusiasm has helped me to finally accept that I have something really valuable and sacred to pass on.
Turning around self doubt has been a fascinating exercise – confronting all the hidden negative attitudes and the negative thoughts I have about myself. As I began to see them clearly, face them and question their validity, they began to disappear. They had no real substance, they were just thoughts but were exerting a powerful influence over me and all my decisions.
For me the purpose of both yoga and Buddhist practice is to purify the body and mind, to systematically work to release and remove these negative blocks and obstacles that hold us back from realising our highest potential. Authentic spiritual practice works to purify our five layers (koshas), starting with the outer body and moving inwards to the very subtle layers of the heart and mind.
A human being, when rid of their self-limiting obstacles will eventually come upon the truth of their existence, that in essence they are a vehicle for the pure expression of the divine force (The Profound Realisation after which the final journey begins).
So my spiritual practice is now my daily life. I watch how I think, react, speak, interact, how I face difficult and challenging situations, how I can neutralise negative habits and turn them around so that my presence in the world is positive and emanates love and light.
Lately I’ve been avidly scouring my Buddhist books for references to the “Noble Ones”, a Buddhist term given to stages of enlightenment. The first stage is called Stream Entry and it takes sustained effort and practice to enter this state of consciousness. When I came upon the definitions and teachings about the Noble Ones, my jaw immediately hit the floor. I recognised them. I was doing this level of work as part of my natural evolution, and without a teacher.
Stream Entry begins with an extraordinary experience of awakening which can come about through any dedicated spiritual practice (not necessarily Buddhist). The rather quaint Buddhist term for this awakening is a “path moment”. It’s like The Initiation, and once this happens, you enter into a stage of development that prevents any further indulgence in the old, negative patterns of thinking and acting. Something really big has changed in you forever. You’re a freshman in the school of Noble Ones! According to the texts, Stream Entry is recognisable by particular characteristics:
- A deep commitment to ethical principles (eg yamas and niyamas or precepts)
- All doubt is removed about the purpose of spiritual development
- Ignorance about the Self is removed (the belief that we are of a particular personality)
- Liberation from the belief in rites, rituals and religious practices (as opposed to genuine spiritual practice and inner work)
- Some traces of negative mind states will still be present such as personal desires, attachment, clinging, aversion, greed, anger, self-deception etc. but they are greatly diminished.
- Supreme importance is given to the widsom of knowing the truth of things.
It’s been hard to accept that this is where I am, especially as ‘I’ am not me anymore; I actually don’t even exist as a ‘person’ that this has happened to. One of the conundrums of the experience of No-Self is that as soon as you talk about it you are talking from the Self. But this all gets way too complicated to explain.
But anyway I’m up there, and since accepting it I’ve felt greatly consoled, like my entire life history and existence suddenly makes sense. But what has been more profound and valuable is that these teachings on the Noble Ones have shown me how to proceed. I've never had a teacher for this kind of inner spiritual work, but I've somehow got here on my own, which proves that old adage that the teacher is within.
Now I have a direction, I know what I have to work on and it’s so crystal clear and penetrating that it’s scary.
The awakening experience (or ‘path-moment’) changes your life – you see that which is behind all life; any idea that you exist as a separate entity with a particular personality is shot to pieces. This ego-identification is the Ignorance referred to in all Buddhist literature. Once you see through all this, you have no doubt about what you’re here for and then there’s no turning back; you have to follow the path towards the final freedom. It’s now a one way trip.
Following Stream Entry there are three more stages: Once Returner, Non-Returner and Arahant. To move on to these stages requires vigilant practice and the work is to gradually purify all negativity, counteract and dissolve all traces of desires, wanting, ill-will, aversion, greed etc…purge out all those negative mind states that pollute our essentially pure hearts. They say that a Stream Enterer has a maximum of seven more lives but they can also reach full enlightenment in this lifetime. A Once Returner has one more life, a Non-Returner is on the home stretch and an Arahant has arrived.
Teaching yoga will provide a challenging arena for me to confront and deal with many of my negative small minded thinking habits. I know it won’t be easy to stay on track, to stay aligned with the higher purpose, the purpose of expressing the divine through my teaching and my life and bringing this light into the lives of others, but the profound realisation is that I have no choice.
What an extraordinary and beautiful journey I am on. My life just keeps opening up to reveal more and more secrets, day by day.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Tuesday 5th July 2005
Practice
Did close to entire primary this morning still leaving out the poses from Bhujangasana to Garbha Pindasana. Full forward bends are returning and I can now get chest to thigh without compromising the safety of my lumbar spine. Finally the floppy disc has returned safely to its little slot between the vertebrae. I even curled up into the two embryonic Pindasana poses without any hesitation or anxiety.
So despite my sketchy practice over the last 2 months while nursing and recovering from this injury I’m now feeling amazingly strong. And now that I’m on the mend, I’m working to open every joint, stretch every muscle, rev up the performance of every organ and gland, wake up the nerves in their channels and flush superstreams of prana through the nadi highways.
Whoosh.
God I love this body I’m in, and Ashtanga satisfies the organic desire to explore every inch of it. I’ve been approaching each practice with a joyful but intense curiosity, a deep probing of something I’ve lived with for so long but have never really known; this approach keeps me right in there as I practice, totally engaged, and oh…what sweet delights are being revealed.
Somewhere along the line the connection with my body, my practice and my journey has gone from a casual friendship to a deeply intimate love. Mmm Mmmmmm…
Teaching
Well after months of procrastinating, I’ve finally accepted the offer from the universe to teach yoga again and made peace with all the self-doubting demons that have been holding me back from committing to it.
So now I’ve got six weeks to get it all together for the starting date of August 20th. It’s slowly gathering its own momentum; ideas and plans are beginning to flow and I’m losing the (yikes) 3 kg I put on in the last 2 months to my boyfriend’s dismay (he liked my blossoming female curves).
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Practice
Did close to entire primary this morning still leaving out the poses from Bhujangasana to Garbha Pindasana. Full forward bends are returning and I can now get chest to thigh without compromising the safety of my lumbar spine. Finally the floppy disc has returned safely to its little slot between the vertebrae. I even curled up into the two embryonic Pindasana poses without any hesitation or anxiety.
So despite my sketchy practice over the last 2 months while nursing and recovering from this injury I’m now feeling amazingly strong. And now that I’m on the mend, I’m working to open every joint, stretch every muscle, rev up the performance of every organ and gland, wake up the nerves in their channels and flush superstreams of prana through the nadi highways.
Whoosh.
God I love this body I’m in, and Ashtanga satisfies the organic desire to explore every inch of it. I’ve been approaching each practice with a joyful but intense curiosity, a deep probing of something I’ve lived with for so long but have never really known; this approach keeps me right in there as I practice, totally engaged, and oh…what sweet delights are being revealed.
Somewhere along the line the connection with my body, my practice and my journey has gone from a casual friendship to a deeply intimate love. Mmm Mmmmmm…
Teaching
Well after months of procrastinating, I’ve finally accepted the offer from the universe to teach yoga again and made peace with all the self-doubting demons that have been holding me back from committing to it.
So now I’ve got six weeks to get it all together for the starting date of August 20th. It’s slowly gathering its own momentum; ideas and plans are beginning to flow and I’m losing the (yikes) 3 kg I put on in the last 2 months to my boyfriend’s dismay (he liked my blossoming female curves).
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Friday 1st July 2004
Ashtanga practice has fallen apart a bit over the last couple of weeks, well a lot actually.
Last week I managed three Mysore practices in a row before my monthly female cycle started, but this week I did one practice on Wednesday and that was it! Thursday (yesterday) was Simi’s last day teaching before leaving for India so the morning Mysore students now have no teacher until David returns at the end of August, that’s 2 months!
So it’s time to re-evaluate, re-group and re-invent my practice again. I don’t really mind the change back to self practice for a while, especially since I haven’t been doing so good at getting to classes anyway. I’ll have to set up a commitment to three days in the Gallery space and try to get to at least one, maybe two early morning sessions at the shala with the other orphans. And now that my back’s on the mend I can go back to Darren’s led Iyengar class on Friday mornings which I haven’t been to since late April (pre-Vipassana retreat).
So lately I’ve been THINKING a lot about practice rather than DOING it, but I figure that’s a season unto itself, a hibernation. I’ve been more drawn to Buddhist practices since my last Vipassana retreat and avidly re-reading my eclectic collection of Buddhist texts. Although I’ve read them all before, and done the practices for years, it’s all suddenly becoming a lot more lucid. Descriptions of stream entry, states of meditative absorption, nirvana…they’re no longer concepts or lovely states just beyond the grasp of my understanding. They’re real for me now. I’ve tasted the mango and entered the stream that flows towards the final goal.
Now I need to fully accept it and stop swimming against the current…
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
Ashtanga practice has fallen apart a bit over the last couple of weeks, well a lot actually.
Last week I managed three Mysore practices in a row before my monthly female cycle started, but this week I did one practice on Wednesday and that was it! Thursday (yesterday) was Simi’s last day teaching before leaving for India so the morning Mysore students now have no teacher until David returns at the end of August, that’s 2 months!
So it’s time to re-evaluate, re-group and re-invent my practice again. I don’t really mind the change back to self practice for a while, especially since I haven’t been doing so good at getting to classes anyway. I’ll have to set up a commitment to three days in the Gallery space and try to get to at least one, maybe two early morning sessions at the shala with the other orphans. And now that my back’s on the mend I can go back to Darren’s led Iyengar class on Friday mornings which I haven’t been to since late April (pre-Vipassana retreat).
So lately I’ve been THINKING a lot about practice rather than DOING it, but I figure that’s a season unto itself, a hibernation. I’ve been more drawn to Buddhist practices since my last Vipassana retreat and avidly re-reading my eclectic collection of Buddhist texts. Although I’ve read them all before, and done the practices for years, it’s all suddenly becoming a lot more lucid. Descriptions of stream entry, states of meditative absorption, nirvana…they’re no longer concepts or lovely states just beyond the grasp of my understanding. They’re real for me now. I’ve tasted the mango and entered the stream that flows towards the final goal.
Now I need to fully accept it and stop swimming against the current…
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