Autumn Lotus Yoga

A trifecta of influences including a friend (www.schmetterlingyoga.blogspot.com), teacher (Cat Kabira of Back Bay & South Boston Yoga) and a fellow blogger (http://talesofadisorderedeater.org/) have got me cogitating hard.

The topic that keeps coming up is: what to do with uncomfortable, yucky, blech, annoying, just awful feelings.  We all know the ones: shame, misery, self-hatred, depression, take your pick.  We all have our favorites & sometimes can juggle multiple ones simultaneously.

Really, most of us are very talented at going from zero to abject pain in sixty seconds or less.  And I’ve had a lot of issues historically from less-than-stellar means of avoiding/numbing/suppressing these feelings.  (Helllloooooo Tequila, Eating Disorders & Inappropriate Men! : )  

90% of the time, it’s not the immediate physical reality of  that particular moment which hurts – I may be riding on the T feeling crummy because it’s a memory I’m stuck in, a story that keeps repeating in my head, some projected movie of how I imagine others see me, or a delirium about how the future is going to unspool & totally screw me over.

Yoga calls on us to be our authentic selves, and not to run from uncomfortable feelings, whether physical, mental, emotional, whatever.  Parts of the practice can put us into actual physical moments of discomfort & we can train to deal with it with equanimity.  We just acknowledge and be with it and its okay to be sad or grumpy or off balance or uncomfortable or whatever.  Because, really, dealing with the concrete discomfort of squealing quads is a hell of a lot easier than the demons lurking in the fringes of the mind.  I’ll take a five minute hold in Warrior I over battle with those buggers any day.

Showing up as we are, being authentic, is an incredibly healing thing — for god’s sake, it’s our right to feel what we feel and be bitchy when that’s what shows up!!  I’m glad when my friend at Schmetterling Yoga whines & complains & gets that crap off her chest & out of her system.

Suffering is a part of life.  WAAAYYYY too many yoga teachers are all Miss Mary Sunshine & need to be smacked for not speaking out about the tough stuff we all deal with.  It’s part of our obligation to speak up & speak out & be real.

BUT: there’s also this existential relativistic bullshit that needs to be called. Yes, suffering is part of life.  But, hot damn, it’s not ALL of life.

Some feeling states really are better than others. 

Some coping mechanisms are better than others. 

Being depressed sucks.  

Harming ourselves to escape being depressed also sucks. 

Seeking to change a mood, or feeling state or habit of suffering/being a victim in a healthy way can be useful, fun & conducive to general sunshineyness.  (It’s my blog, I can make up words. : )

The space I’m always looking to be in is  centered enough where I can acknowledge my natural, human crummy feelings but there’s this little air gap of choice: choice of whether to pursue being miserable (hey, sometimes it’s okay to just hate the world), or whether to choose a more or less productive means of changing my biochemistry (pranayama or ice cream sundae?? hmmmm…. both good at different times! : ).  

Because without that space, without choice, a brief bout of ennui can turn into a literal death spiral.

It’s worth fighting to touch the witness consciousness where I can work with what I’m feeling  & change my state without wallowing, denial or force.  Because the other choices always seem to involve something illegal, immoral or just plain unnecessary. : )  There’s nothing wrong with feeling like hell.  But there’s also nothing wrong with wanting to feel better.

Tags: Authentic Self, General Yoga Philosophizing, Healing

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 28th, 2009 at 7:16 pm and is filed under Authentic Self, General Yoga Philosophizing, Healing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.