Non-harming

I was looking at the yamas and niyamas, and particularly at Ahimsa, non harming. It is the foundation for all the yoga practices. I asked myself: “What do we need to make that happen?”

Self-study is the first thing that jumps out for me because we do stupid things to ourselves and others when we are not paying attention, or basically are not being conscious. We first have to study our own thoughts, actions and intentions, and all of the subtle workings beneath them, before we can see the error of our ways and choose a more nurturing and effective direction.

Then there’s abhyasa (practice = relentlessly returning to awareness) and vairagya (equanimity = entering the whole affair in an open and objective manner, a willingness to expose your own mind workings and trappings for what they are: trappings/mind patterns).

I decided to make an art of asking myself - before I eat, drink, say, or choose things - “who chooses?”
I say art because I don’t want to take all the naturalness and spontaneity out of my actions and become anal about yoga philosophy. I want to use consciousness as a key to greater consciousness. I want to cultivate it like a precious garden... to invite it into my most personal thoughts, intentions and tendencies with trust and openness.

I ask who chooses, as a way of noticing when I am on auto pilot, saying and doing things out of habit or because I’ve been programmed that way. It comes to me from my early studies of Ramana Maharshi whose most basic teaching was to continually ask “who am I?”