Autumn Lotus Yoga

I posted earlier today to reflect being in a bit of a mood & workin’ with it. Since then did teacher’s practice & assisted & all better now.  Seem to talk alot about whether & how to work with emotional states & continue to find it interesting. 

How to explain?  Buddha had his bodhi tree, Newton had his apple… I got to change my entire life, get everything I wanted, do exactly what I dreamed (bummer, hunh? only to learn that that I could still drive myself from zero to despair in under 30 seconds.

Point being: a lot of our experience of reality is concocted between our ears.

Caveat:  there is true external torment in the world.  It’s not all illusion.

But much of it IS just shadows on the wall.  Finger puppet shadows even.  All dependent on what we’re focusing on.

So, if you want to change the state rather than explore or wallow in it, what then?  First off, don’t insult your own intelligence.  Feeling suicidal will not respond to a hot bath and mug of cocoa.  Trust me.  Neither will abuse, addiction, trauma, eating disorders, other mental or physical illnesses. 

With time & professional help, any & all of those can be addressed.  Get the help.  Do it.  Now.   But what about all the other crap that flesh is heir to?  Self-pity, loathing, anger, misery, general crankiness?  How do we work with that?  And why the hell isn’t it taught in school??

Big surprise,  posture & breathing matter.  How you sit, stand, move & breath can help you feel better or drag you down into more suckiness (technical term there .

Another no-brainer (pun intended) — your self-talk matters.  Observe it, stop it in its tracks.  Ignoring works, so does rational argument.  But it has to be done over & over again.  Any of those automatic negative thoughts that show up have to be squashed every time they do.

Get distracted, get out of your own head.  Even for a few breaths can be enough to interrupt the cycle.

Finding a loving mirror helps.  Talk about anything, doesn’t have to be what’s buggin’ you if you’re not ready.  Just go to someone who will give you positive reinforcement.  Pets count.

And for god’s sake, choose to do something silly over something stupid.  Do cartwheels, dye your hair blue, listen to loud music, find a ridiculous movie.  Anything other than hurting yourself or someone else.

There’s also always yoga… which changes your posture, breathing, self-talk, provides a loving mirror from teachers & fellow students, gets you out of your head & doing something silly.  Shocker that it’s so popular…

This entry was posted on Monday, September 21st, 2009 at 8:48 pm and is filed under Healing, Uncategorized. 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.