Be still and know...

In order to be fully present for something or for someone, you need to come empty. It doesn't help you to listen well if you bring all your preferences and opinions with you. If you are already full of knowing, you cannot learn new things. You will not be able to hear or receive new information.

Practicing silence is a powerful way to begin the study of deep listening. Observing your own auto pilot responses (the way you would be responding if you were not in silence) can be shocking and all revealing. Remain the witness without getting critical and without censoring and you will be able to see more and more of your own opinions and judgments and how those personal thoughts get in the way of Sat (Truth). Truth is always present but it becomes obscured with our "take" on things.

Contracting/Expanding

Notice your words, everyday, every moment - what do you choose to speak about? What words do you use? Are you speaking about your troubles? Are you speaking of your fears, inadequacies or your lack? Are you telling others what is wrong with them? Are you jabbing at the, cutting and criticizing them? Right now, you can turn that around. Don't feed your investments in unhappiness any longer. Simply notice that its there and don't give it any more of your awareness or attention. And certainly don't feed it by dwelling there. Notice it and then look around and notice everything else as well.

Actually, notice as many different things as you can. Let your field of vision and awareness expand. For example, if you are angry about something that just happened, notice what your mind makes it mean, or how the event is interpreted. Then notice how your body responds, and notice your breath. Then notice the sounds in and around the room you are in. Feel the energy of the area you are in, the village, state, country, planet, cosmos... and so on.

The field of vision tends to narrow around the things we give the most attention to. If you insist on obsessing over a wrong done to you or something you said that you now regret you only serve to bind yourself tighter with the ropes of unhappiness. I call that a contraction. When you release your desire to dwell there and willingly open to awareness, I call that expansion of consciousness. The more you do it, the easier it gets and the freer and lighter and more joyful you become.

When I look around myself and realize that all I see are all the things that are wrong with others and situations, and I feel grumbly and judgmental and critical about the world or about myself, I know I am in a contracted state and before I make any quick decisions, I need to get quiet and free myself up from all the thinking that holds me hostage. I sit still and quiet. Anyone can benefit from time outs, in the same way a child does when sent to his room after a temper tantrum. You don't have to wait until you feel contracted to benefit. Actually a regular dose is the best medicine for the world.

Listening and Understanding

I hear a lot of people complaining that they aren't being heard - at work, in relationships, and at home. If everyone in this situation would use the experience as an opportunity to hone their own listening skills, the world would be a lot quieter, more peaceful and more understanding. You can learn to listen more completely than you ever thought possible. As you sit quietly in meditation, listen to sounds in and around the room you are in. Without judgment, listen to your own thoughts, your fears and dreams, and listen to your heart. Listen without any need to change anything or even to hear anything. Listen with acceptance and patience. Even when what you hear is a desire to jump up and get busy again. Eckhart Tolle tells of one teacher who, when asked, said he learned the incredible stillness that he emanated by watching a cat watching a mouse hole. Try to stay that still and attentive, alert, but also at ease. When you learn to listen to yourself with that much awareness, you will move into your day feeling nurtured all the way to your soul. You will feel less needy or dependent on others to behave in a certain way in order for you to feel happy. Then you will be able to learn to listen that deeply to others. Be reserved in your speech so you can quiet your mind enough to listen, to really listen to others. Listen without thinking about what you will say next, without judging, without criticizing. This will have a profound effect on your relationships and on your life.

Truth

Sat means the ultimate truth, the unchangeable, completely undistorted, timeless truth that is beyond space and individuality. It refers to Truth as the infinite, all-pervading vastness that is the substance of your being. All actions, words, ideas and wisdom that take you closer to this truth are a part of the practice of Satya.

In her excellent book “The Zen of Listening”, Rebecca Shafir shared an interesting twist on the word compassion. She said “compassion does not mean pity or sympathy; it means getting a sense of the other person’s frustration. Com means “to connect with” and passion means “suffering”. True compassion begins with compassion for yourself. I have come to think of listening, deep listening, as a very direct path to yoga; a cut-to-the-chase direct path to self-realization. The state of meditation is one of listening without action: without a doer who is listening. It has been said that praying is when you talk to God and Meditation is when you listen. Practicing silence is a powerful way to begin the study of deep listening. Observing your own autopilot responses, the way you would be responding if you were not in silence, can be shocking and all-revealing. Remain the witness without getting critical and without censoring and you will be able to see more and more of your own opinions and judgments and how those “personal” thoughts get in the way of SAT. Truth is always present but it becomes obscured with our “take” on things.

I love the work of Byron Katie (www.thework.com) for finding your way to truth. She takes a whack-upside-the-head approach to recognizing how the mind colors events to make them fit with the story line and create all kinds of unnecessary suffering. Those interpretations hold us hostage to our story and block us from the liberation of SAT. Of your complaint, your statement of “truth” she instructs you to ask first, is that true? If your answer is yes, then her second question is “are you sure that your statement is 100% true?” She is asking you to look again to see how your “true” statements frequently are more or less subjective truths, meaning, what is true in your own mind, according to your interpretations, desires and past experience. A person has to be willing to see clearly and willing to lay down the sword and shield to do this kind of work. You have to be ready for honesty and humility at a level you may not have experienced before. It is very common for people to get defensive doing work with Byron Katie but if you are open and honest and willing to release your hold on a limited view, and willing to release a need to be “right”, then truth is revealed and it is so brilliant that you will want to throw your head back and laugh and cry at the same time. You will start to behave in strange ways, seeking out people who may find a hidden button for you and push that button so you can do “the work” and find that sweetness that comes with the release. Liberation is, well, it’s liberating!

Support and Inspiration

I cannot even imagine my early days of practicing yoga without the inspired reading material I was taking in. I read the Bhagavad Gita, The yoga Sutras, Autobiography of a Yogi, Miracle of Love and a large collection of books on the teachings of Ramana Maharshi. Those words filled me with awe and reverence for Presence, Truth and Consciousness. Study of the yogic teachings and scriptures is essential for fueling a practice that will last. Otherwise your life is tugging you in every other possible direction and it is easy to get lost, to forget why you came, to give up the practice in lieu of a dream world of your own making.

The other thing I did a lot was I kept a journal and in it I wrote quotes from the books I was reading, along with questions and epiphanies I had. I also took the liberty to color, draw, scribble or otherwise add design to my journal pages. Today there is no shortage of great yogic writings online and in bookstores and magazines. My favorite website these days is Stillness Speaks. Check it out. There you will find my teacher Francis Lucille along with other great teachers of consciousness. You can see videos and read words of wisdom there. But don’t forget the classic greats like the yoga sutras. Even if you don’t fully understand them, read them. I have read them many times because each time I do, my understanding is entirely different than it had been a year or two prior so I am able to digest and utilize that much more of it. But in order for that to happen, you have to start. Then you can create your own collection of words of wisdom gleaned from books, videos and your own epiphanies.

Emptiness

In the 17 years I’ve been teaching yoga, the most common complaint I’ve heard is that it seems impossible to develop and stick with a yoga practice. The main reason for that is that it seems people have filled their lives to capacity and perhaps a little beyond, to just shy of a breaking point – so that life is lived in a super stressed-out, high anxiety, push and shove sort of way, cramming as much as possible into every day, spreading one life very thinly over as broad an area as possible. It seems there is some kind of nobility or honor in MORE: doing more, having more, taking on more, accomplishing more, knowing more, talking more, collecting more stuff, more friends, more responsibilities, more demands, more problems, more music, more work. What most people seem to crave is more time, more peace and calm, more centering, more relaxing, more joy. But the move to fill every corner of space and time continues. Tapas (austerity, intensity) invites us to empty out. “Austerity”, in this sense, refers not to extreme austerities but of living simply. Clearing out your mind, your heart, your garage, your closets, your clutter, your calendar to make room for yoga – for a more affirming lifestyle, that is the intention behind tapas. If you’ve ever spent a day or even a few hours cleaning an over-stuffed closet or a garage full of junk, you know the wonderful feeling you get when the job is complete. All joking about the backache aside, there is normally a surge of energy that comes after emptying out a space or organizing a room or closet. Everything you have takes energy. Just sitting in a room with your stuff takes energy. You are seeing it. You have to look through it to find the stuff you are looking for. You have to clean around it. It is in your space. Start to discriminate about what you invite into your space. Just because you received it for a gift doesn’t mean you have to look at it for the next 20 years. Sometimes I use things like that (gifts) in a more seasonal way; bringing them out at certain times of the year, in memory of the giver, in celebration. That way I can rotate some of the things I have. If you want to invite yoga into your life, and you find you are struggling to keep your practice, try to clear out a place for it, and I don’t mean a small corner of a table filled with junk. I mean CLEAR OUT the riff raff. Otherwise, you are filling your life with a gesture that essentially says that what you really want to invest in is STUFF, BUSYNESS, WORLDLY PURSUITS.

You always start where you are. Look around. You can start anywhere – any little gesture of releasing, of clearing, will have its affect on you. Go ahead and try it. You will start to enjoy it so much you will want to keep going. That’s a good thing because tapas is not something you just do once and it is done. Like every aspect of yoga practice, it will become an ongoing part of your life – looking around to see what needs your attention. Shoveling STUFF out the back door as fast as you can, watching in amazement as it continues its march into your life, right through the front door! We live in the land of abundance – the land of plenty. There is no shortage of STUFF. Actually, some of the poorest people I’ve known in the USA have the largest piles of stuff. So if you want to make room for true prosperity and wealth of the most lasting kind, simplify your life. Start now and continue regularly to observe everything, including the flow of thought and feeling. What you take in, not only food and beverages, but also ideas, images, books and magazines, movies, videos, TV programs, it all becomes a part of you. And just like everything else, it can move you in the direction of peace and truth, of awareness and understanding or away from it. It can help you to understand and thrive, or it can add to the proverbial clutter of mind, emotion, and environment. Learn to discriminate. Learn to listen quietly, to watch, to see, and to say no thank you. This is not selfishness. This is managing your energy so you are not drained or distracted. It carves you out so you can be more fully alive, more fully present, much more available than ever before. It carves you out so, like a fine violin, you will resonate with beautiful vibrations.

Mindful Speaking

“There is only one decision you need to make: either you are working at your freedom or you are accepting your bondage.”
Robert Adams

Some of the habitual actions and thoughts you have each day are only adding to the coat of illusion you are wearing. How do you start your day? What are your activities and what are your thoughts and what are the first words to come from your mouth? Make them beautiful. Make your morning ritual beautiful by listening to something inspirational or something beautiful, or by simply moving into a meditative mind set whereby you observe your thoughts and feelings in an objective fashion and choose your first words with care. Say something loving and beautiful to someone. Or if you find yourself alone when you arise, then let your internal dialog be one of encouragement and support. Even if you have an inner (or outer) critic who abuses you first thing, still, find some goodness to comment on as well. At Kripalu, where I took my first yoga teacher training, that practice was built into the programs. Each time we had our practice teach, before we received any comments from our peers, we were to share our own experience with the group. First, we shared what we felt our strengths were in the practice teach, then we shared where we saw our teaching “edge”, or where we felt most challenged. It was a great feature of their program and it taught me to be able to find good even when things might seem to have turned out disastrous. It also helped me to recognize my inner critic’s voice in a more objective light, become my own best advocate and to see myself with a more balanced eye. It is a practice that helps to keep me grounded in reality, as opposed to being lost and confused in self-criticism and judgments.

So when you start your day, start it out by aligning with the way you want to feel. If you have a habit of grumbling first thing about what’s wrong, change your habit to one of offering words of love and praise, and give voice to what’s RIGHT, regardless of what others around you are saying. That way you set the stage for a day of beauty and joy. Then, at day’s end, you might decide to try a Kripalu-style evaluation where you first go over your day with an eye for what went right, where your strengths lie, and any little ways you made the world a better place. Then you might also notice, with the same objective mind, areas where you will want to practice being more mindful and aware of your words, actions, and intentions. I enjoy ending my day with a note of gratitude. No matter what your circumstance, there is always something to give thanks for: possessions, friendships, opportunities, skills, experiences, and even hardships (they, too, have their gifts).