First 13 Weeks

So how it has been to practice for the last 8-9 months?  It went through phases and it goes through phases each week. And each day is different…

I kind of sensed that I have gotten pregnant the second week of my pregnancy.  Right after I suspected I was pregnant, I also realized that I was getting short of breath when I showed and talked at the same time while teaching.  Shortness of breath is related to increasing blood volume in the body with the pregnancy and this was very evident, very soon to me. 

The first 5 weeks I was my normal self during my own practice, so I did practice everything except I did not jump around and I modified closed twists to open twists except Pravritta Trikonasana.  I actually still do Pravritta Trikonasana.  Since I focus on twisting the chest and keeping the hips parallel to do floor, it seems to work…  We even went to a David Garrigues workshop in Amsterdam during the 4^th week.   But as soon as we get back from David’s workshop, nausea began! And it got worse and worse :p So, I was throwing up at least once a day if not more, had headaches and sensitivity to light…  I was going to school three times a week to learn Danish and teaching few classes. After a while, the morning practice became a bit of a hell…  Even raising my head in sun salutations was not possible. So, I could do maybe sun salutations and maybe standing poses during this time.  A week before new years, when I was still desperate to figure out how to practice, I tried to do Iyengar yoga sequence for three days from the book called “Iyengar yoga for Motherhood”, to see if it would work better.  The first day was fine; it seemed to help the nausea. However,  the following days nausea was back, and perhaps worse because being that static did not help either.  Then, I tried to not do any yoga for two days but that did not feel good either.  Finally, I figured out which should have been a no brainer; trying to practice in the morning to an empty stomach was the problem!  The whole nausea thing was usually due to empty stomach, at least in the mornings…  My system was using the food much faster than usual.  They say that during the first 3 months of pregnancy, it is like hiking a mountain everyday for the body.  Therefore, I decided to practice one hour after breakfast to see if that would be okay and tada!!! That was the solution… 

After Christmas break, Danish classes began again, then I had to practice in the afternoons some days, but it was always good to not have empty stomach in contrast to how I usually would practice. During this period, I practiced everyday some of primary about 45 minutes, in a good day 60 minutes, skipping the vinyasas between the sides. I did not really stick to a routine of asanas, so each day, I did poses that felt good to do.  I also sneaked in few poses from second series, especially parighasana to lengthen my side body, which I needed and which I still do.  Moreover, I included Parivritta and Ardha Chandrasana after Parsvottanasana to keep my hips strong.  And not to forget back bends... they were not my favorite during this time but doing Dwipada Pitham felt really nice, so some of the times I would just do that and maybe do couple of regular shoulder bridges instead of Urdhva Danurasana.  Dwipada Pitham is like a vinyasa, one moves between raising the hips and arms over head with an inhale and then with an exhale moving the hips down and arms back to the side of the body. One can leave out the arm movement and just move the hips up and down with synchronized breath, I personally like the arm movement. During the days I do not feel up to Urdhva Danurasana, this is the way I go... 

This was the first 13 weeks. Then a whole new phase began...

TBC...

Hello again with news from new life

It has been a very long time since I have written anything.  Most of it was due to moving, getting married, starting a new life.  End of 2012, N and I decided to get married and move to Denmark (for him that was a move back to Denmark).  Therefore, we got busy figuring things out such as how to get married, finding a place to live in Copenhagen, etc.  As much as it seemed a lot to figure out, it went pretty fast and forward.  We managed all in a couple of months and here I was at the end of January.  Getting married was surreal and at the same time very normal.  Surreal in a sense that I had never imagined myself married, but then marrying with N. was so normal because being with him is so natural. 

After all that, there was a period of me waiting for my papers to be processed.  It is never easy to be a Turk and relocate J !  It took about 6 months for my papers to go through. Then, I could start working and going to the government paid Danish language classes.  When one moves to Denmark from a non-EU country, one is obligated to learn the language, and I must say that Danish is one of the most difficult languages out there.  I have been struggling with it since last mid-August until mid-May of this year, about 3 to 4 times a week, each day being 4-hour long!  Now, I am on a brake, which I had been looking forward to since January.  I am also 35 weeks pregnant!  I had the guilt of taking a break from Danish because my last teacher was so sweet, but I have been also looking forward to not worrying about homework, exams and relax into the idea of becoming a mother soon. The funny thing is that, after a week of break, I got the chickenpox.  So, I guess I would be forced to take a break anyhow.  We were at a summerhouse by the coast, which we had rented for two weeks. The first week was going pretty nice; taking walks in the beach, cooking, relaxing, reading, watching Sherlock Holmes… and then I began to have these spots on my body and I immediately knew that I was getting chickenpox.  I guess it was always at the back of my mind, since I did not get it as a kid and my mom also had it as an adult…  Therefore, we had to go to the next town, to a doctor.  When you are in one of the smaller towns, then transportation gets a bit trickier.  We don’t own a car and have no intention to, we bike in Copenhagen, and the summerhouse we found was okay to get to by train+bus; however, when we had an emergency, it got a bit difficult to get to places.  We took a taxi after missing the bus, which was late…  The doctor who saw me said it seems like a mild version of chickenpox and there is no risk to the baby. And then he sent us off. Luckily, I was 30 weeks pregnant then, so my antibodies were protecting her. I called one of the midwives we are working with and she told me to just watch my fever and if gets too high for long period of time, then to take some medicine.   Of course, that mild chickenpox exalted by the next day.   More spots appeared on my body and they were stinging or itching.  And all that being combined with getting bigger in my belly, I was extremely uncomfortable in my body.  On the other hand, I was very impressed by N. ,who did all he could to help me to find some relief.  He put cold press over my body to relieve the itching & burning day and night, walked an hour to get to some store to buy thermometer… and then, when I did not sleep whole night, early morning he called an emergency doctor who came to the house and did an antihistamine shot and prescribed some antihistamine medication, for which he had to travel to the next town to get them…

It has been an unexpected, very uncomfortable experience. I recovered pretty quickly tough after few days of intensity.  The interesting thing was, there was only one day I did not practice yoga and that was the day after when I could not sleep the whole night and had the antihistamine shot in the morning and slept most of the day and had high fever.  After that day, I had to move because my body got so achy from laying/sitting down in a soft coach most of the day and sleeping in a softer bed than ours… I did a mild practice to wake up my legs and release them and my hips.  I also would not feel the itching while I practiced, so got some relief from that as well… Now the sickness is gone but my skin has not totally recovered, there are still spots on my face and body… My mom had chickenpox together with my sister when my sister was a child, and she had it worse I guess.  Maybe yoga made me a bit stronger in my system and I only had it bad for couple of days instead of couple of weeks…  

Take a Risk :)

Take a risk and TRUST.  This is my task now and then, to cultivate this capacity again.  I assume that we all have this when we are born, and then loose it on the way. I feel the need for this ability more and more for my life to flow… 

And here something I have written a month ago…

Listening to the rain

I envy the raindrop.

How it surrenders

To the present moment.

As it touches the ground

It takes the shape of the ground,

And allows itself to flow…

I envy the raindrop,

Envy being as free as a drop of water,

Not to be fixed on any shape,

Any time, any idea, any title.

Wanting to flow from this earth

To other ways of being,

Not worrying about the past nor the future,

Not worrying about this body, this flesh…

And this body as liquid as it can be,

Perhaps is capable

Of being as free as a raindrop.

This mind as imaginary as a tale

Perhaps is capable

Of being free and spacious…

The skill is finding that deep repose.

question marks...

Today I have been feeling a bit strange…  Yes a bit strange… which is not unusual but somehow today feeling strange has a bit more to it…

It is a full moon day today and also Republic day for Turkey.  I practiced my usual practice in the morning since I will not be able to practice the coming week because I will be participating in some other type of work/process…  Then I taught the moon day class in the morning, which was quite gentle, slow, forward bending… It was a soft morning afterwards, very silent…

At noon, I went out to buy something and on the way I saw an old man at a doorstep.  He was maybe sleeping…  wearing dirty, old clothes.  My heart leaped out and I felt this feeling I feel when I am the heart not my mind, not selfish self…  Then, as my mind got involved, I felt so vain in my little yoga world, in my little self development world, in my little world…  It felt all so empty…  and then kept on walking to my destination…  In the afternoon I was on facebook and read this article posted by a friend which was written by a singer/songwriter from my childhood.  The title of his article was “Republic day in the taciturn people’s country”…  to the point, talking about what most of us ignore to see, how it is all going backwards here… then I looked up the news and saw that police threw gas bombs to people who were walking for the Republic days, who were declaring that this country is secular and will stay secular…  I got teary, I felt so little in my little world.  I know they say change yourself to make change in the world but sometimes it feels damn selfish… yes, I feel strange today.    

Yes she does

As if the present moment is a time

That never exists,

Where all the dreams come true,

Where I am home, clear, and still,

Where I can see with clarity.

It is a time as if it never exists

Whereas it is the only time that is here...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I wrote this very evident little thing to myself after doing some work with Tarika.  She was here for a weekend...  It was nice to listen to her; her genuineness was inspiring...  One more time I was forced to look at myself closely...  My pitfall is to panic.  Lots to work on... and seeing this makes me panic...

These past months have been not easy for me...  I loose clarity, I find clarity, then I loose again, I loose hope which is not so bad to loose and then I regain strength...  Asana practice is there but it is not enough, at least for me, to find inner space since I can get lost in accomplishment...  Luckily enough, there are always more around me happening, presenting themselves freely and I am free to try them...  Maybe I lack faith, I have too much doubt, too much questioning...  but that is my path that I have to walk on and figure things out...

Made of Stone

Yesterday was a lousy day but then I got my visa which is a very good thing.  Everything is in the perspective.  I was stuck in my mind with something else…  which paralyzed me half of the day and it tired me, drained me immensely.  When I look at it from outside, I knew then and now that it was me who could not control my mind going all over the place and making me anxious… I could see it but I could not stop this from happening.  I know now most of the reasons why I am this or that way, but still it happens…   seeing is part of the transformation they say…  I don’t know if I believe in that anymore… 

Still this morning I felt very very much emotionally drained…  very tired…. And I keep thinking all these people I know who are much cooler, much relaxed then I am…  I envy them… and think maybe I belong alone...

Anyways, this morning dad called to let me know my mom’s brother passed away.  He was sick in the hospital at the end of last year, in emergency care.  He got better, went home. When I first visited him in the hospital, he was not conscious much and when I was by his bed side, hardly recognizing him, I could not help it, I fainted right in front him…  I felt so embarrassed…  The third time I was there, he was not in emergency care.  He was sitting up and talking  so much, talking about spices to flavor his food, about fancy pens to write with, to draw with…  He loved to draw… when I was a kid he would draw a bear to the edge of the notebook and then he would trace the same lines at the back of the paper to draw an uncle… that was his joke because he had a fat belly like a bears and in Turkish bear is “Ayi”  and unce is “Dayi”  so very similar…  now he is gone and I remember this story, his blue eyes and him in the hospital.  I was suppose to call him this week to say hi… and I did postpone it thinking I will, there is time… but in reality there is no time sometimes… we postpone things thinking there is time, but maybe there is only now to do what we want to do… what we have in mind…  to say someone you love them, to make the decisions you want to make, to realize your purpose in life… and I was thinking this morning during my practice… what is it we are here for?  And yes sometimes I think I am one of those lame people whose yoga practice defines who they are… and I was thinking that no matter how much focus on the practice, the purpose of being here on this earth is not to be a great yoga instructors, to be little imitations of R. Freeman, M. Ezraty, Sharath R…  being on this earth is about love, loving someone and giving them and receiving from them… loving your partner fully and opening your heart to them.  Loving your friends and opening up to them, giving love and receiving love… being happy for another… There is lots of barriers we put in front of this… it is us, it is the things we bring from our past, and sometimes it is from our back ground, we have no clue what they are but they are there, from our ancestors…  which might sound weird but they say yes we carry some of that energy as well…  so as I am reading the books I have about meditation, I feel very much guilty, it seems like I have a pretty sticky ego… Now I came to the conclusion that I just need to do my meditation and stop reading the books…  I do what I can do and maybe a little bit more, and see if I can first cultivate more love towards my being…

the song by Stone Roses "Made of Stone"

till mysore

This morning there were only two people the first 30 minutes of the class.  And then suddenly as if they were all at a party together last night, the rest of them came at the same time.  I donnu why I thought as if they were out together…  this is how my mind makes connections I guess…  weird… but it was nice that they came J and I managed to get them in and out timely so I could run out to get to the consulate timely…

Well, I ran to the Indian consulate to apply for my visa. The same lady who has been at the desk since I began my India trips asked me “Miss Ahu, when was the last time you were in India?”  and I smiled and said “last January but I got there from Thailand.”  And then she looked at my form and documents, she gave back some of them… she asked me whether I was going to India to learn Yoga or to practice Yoga… as much as I did not know how to answer this, I said “to practice yoga”… I was about to hand in the Visa fee; however, she told me not to pay yet and to please wait (!) just about the same time the consulate left his room…  Ohh so then I got a bit worried, began thinking what if they don’t give me the visa, we got the tickets, rented a place to stay, what if I cannot go, then what happens, how do I see N, also told the shala I am coming, and I am dying to go, well really wanting to be there and to practice and to see my friends, but most importantly, what do we do?  Bought the tickets, not returnable, not cheap…  I sat back and began waiting.  Visa service guys coming with 10 passports… a guy, a lady… waiting… the consulate came in… and after a while she called me, asked for the fee and I asked “is it a problem that I go so often?”  But as I asked the question, someone else barged in and while she was answering him, she forgot about my question and I did not want to ask again… so I left.  The passport to be picked up same day at 5PM… well until I get the passport and see the Visa, I am not sure. Waiting game, luckily a very short one. 

Other then that, it is a cold grey day.  I am waiting… waiting… waiting…  It is like Cara-Kali’s “no sleep till Mysore”…  such an appropriate name…

in Mysore city, outside of Devaraj market

simply

Today is a snowy day :) It is lovely in some ways, of course kind of cold… but it is nice, different from my routine of last few years anyways… big flakes of snow now.  I went out in the noon to go to the organic farmers market, which is 30 minutes walking distance away…  It was watery snow while on the way there…  Walking was fine; cold but since one moves, it was not bad.  However, while I was shopping I took my gloves out to be able to pick the fruits and veggies and to pay…  At the end, I was in lots of pain, frozen fingers syndrome :p  At the time we got into the cab, I was really thankful that in this lousy weather, when there was some load to be carried with frozen fingers, taking a cab was possible J  and the cab driver was a nice man which makes a difference in the experience…

When we arrived, there was no electricity at home; it was cold and dark… I was very hungry; therefore, lack of electricity could not stop me from starting to make my soup.  So, I lighted up some candles and got going…  and at the end the lights came as well… but I realized one more time how much we are dependent on electricity, running water etc… this we are reminded a lot while in India… In Mysore, we would have electricity cuts for 3 times or so everyday and last time in Goa, we were having electric cuts almost every night…  you adapt to this…

Well another thing I realized today was connections…  I have been guilty of not embracing my country, culture, the religion I was born into.  How guilty? well not acknowledging it properly perhaps or refusing it in some sense...  As much as I believe in insignificance of where one is from in the case of relating to them, it is also important not to refuse where we come from; however, knowing this logically did not help my case…  But today I admitted something.  The connection I make with another Turk can be a bit different in some ways… Is it the same language we speak which makes communication easier and deeper or just knowing the similar experiences, same smells, same tastes, same songs or melodies, same jokes…  from childhood, from home, home of our roots, I am not so sure…  It was good to realize this, for one thing, remembering my roots …  No matter how much I do not live them myself, I know them, I relate easily and it moves something inside, like being home.  Also I realized that I might never have this kind of connection with a person from another country no matter how dear they are to me.  Maybe if they spend sometime here and experience the flavors of the daily life, the culture, they can understand like my dear Maria seems to… The good thing about realizing this was, I will not be disappointed if sometimes the connection with another from elsewhere has some gaps in it,  It is only natural…  but this is true with most connections we make.  This counts with my Ashtanga friends also.  The experiences I share with them is unique to that group, the connections I have with them is special in that context and I am not able to have the same kind of connection with others…  how I feel energized and feel home with them is also very special, different.  But today was about being in this country and realizing that I am from here.  I can relate to an old Turkish song, to its melody and words, and then walking in the back streets of Istanbul and feeling the oldness of the city and remembering how it used to make me feel nostalgic to sometime I never experienced while I was a teenager and used to write stories to that old Istanbul…  yes a special day like everyday… a snowy day.

outside from my window... kids so excited in the opposite building.

practice

Uhh I guess I can say I feel a bit lousy…  I was sad last night and I was sad this morning.  During practice, I stopped and sobbed… and of course during pincha… my official last pose.  I am getting it slowly slowly but it has been taking sometime since I am such a Vata, having difficulty of being balanced, steady, strong…   I usually need a break of five breaths after Tittibhasana, then it seems to be happening…  of course you never know from week to week…  anyways.   It was okey to stop and sob as well…  frustration with myself, with my emotions, and with my fears and anyways this is nadi shodhana I am practicing… and perhaps there is a bit of pincha in all this, or all this is in my pincha…  During Savasana I really wondered how I would go down and teach, I just wanted to go back to bed.  It sounded like it was rainy and windy outside as it was within myself…  But then, of course as soon as I began teaching, I forgot about myself.  This is I guess the greatest gift of teaching for me, I become no mind, present… 

Well, now I can again feel my confusion, sadness…  I wonder how conditioned I am, how it runs over me.  Is it from my childhood, or even from before, my past lives or my ancestors?  I donnu.  Does meditation help me to understand myself?  I try… I sit, I dance and sit, I shake and sit, and then I simply sit…  but it is a mess in this head. 

This morning I just drew an Osho Zen Tarot card.  The card I got was Receptivity, Queen of Water.  It is about being feminine; receptive quality of water and emotions… “a time of unboundedness and gratitude for whatever life brings, without any expectations or demands…”  One more time, it is time for me to learn to let go, let go of my expectations, hopes and wishes, fears… Last night I remembered the summer before, how I was depressed and then looking back how I felt thankful for the way things turned out… I have to keep remembering instead of resisting what the moment brings… and whatever happens, not to feel shattered by it.  Very hard…  but one has to practice, practice, practice… practice compassion for oneself and others, practice understanding for oneself and others, practice love for oneself and others, practice being a human being…

how long is now???

2012 has arrived… I was lucky to enter the new year with a loved one.   I noted some of the things I would wish for the new year…  We managed to keep up until the midnight but that was it, after few minutes I was happy to be sleeping, the chicken I am...

The last three weeks went by fast…  sometimes I felt fear because of uncertainty of the future, sometimes I just felt joy just because I was with the one.  I had yet another chance to visit the dark corners of my mind and also to see the feelings that are stored in my memory making entrance to the present with no real connection. 

It is interesting to experience all this which is quite impossible to do for me if I am not with other people, if I am my usual hermit.  I sometimes need a mirror and sometimes I need someone to shake me and say hey you are living some other story not this one, wake up, and sometimes I need them to push my buttons to see what I am hiding deep within…  but to do this, I think there is need for connection, patience and love…  I hope that we are all surrounded by our people to grow with.

The second day of this year, I heard the sad news of someone passing whom I have known of but have never really met.  My heart went for her.  I also realized I felt bad for not meeting her.  We had been in the same places maybe once or few times… I could have met her, but did not.  Still I felt for her, I wished for light and love and peace on her way and tried to think she is not really gone…  However, I was still shocked, I was still shaken and clueless in some sense… I also realized how unpredictable this life is, how uncertain everything is no matter how hard we might try to plan and make things certain… I guess I keep being reminded of all this periodically and then somehow I slip back to my other worrisome state…  have to keep remembering to live fully, to live up to who I am, not a mere shrunken imitation of self because there are no guarantees and life will not wait for me... 

I am now counting days!  I am super excited to be going back to the place where I feel the practice is the most intense and deep and inspiring and where I have my people who supports me, understands me but also forces me to look deep in, to know myself better, and to learn to be more open.  They are mirrors to myself, they are greater examples to the potential I have, they are sisters and brothers for life time…  I cannot wait to be there where my teacher will seem to not know me but will surprise me just when I am convinced that he has no clue about my practice or who I am, by telling me what I need to do or  what he knows I can do… 

Well now is time to be here, but how long is now until I get there? :) and perhaps most importantly how long is now for me to have the courage to be myself fully?   

the mirror for me at Topkapi palace

Farewell to Tarçın

Today we lost the alpha cat Tarçın.  I wrote few month ago that she was sick and was about the leave us but she stayed with us longer than we expected, she was stronger than we imagined.

This morning my sister called me and told me that she was home and Tarçın looked like she might leave.  I went to her and there the alpha cat was laying on the floorö all flat and not moving at all.  My sister and I caressed her, gave her reiki…  Then after a while my sister asked if it was time to take her to the vet to put her to sleep.  We waited for a while to see if she would pick up more energy and maybe eat something.  But all did happen was she moaned loudly and this was the sign that she was in too much pain since animals are much more tolerant to pain than humans and they usually not much vocal about their pain. 

We took Tarçın to the Vet.  He checked her and said the tumors were all over her body…  and if my sister could tolerate, it is best to put her to sleep.  So we did.  My sister stayed with her, I sat for a bit since I tend to collapse in such situations and I wanted avoid such a scene since the Vet did not want anyone during the procedure and hardly let my sister stay.

Then we took Tarçın to my sister’s old house, where my parents live now. Buried her to the garden.  My sister got a beautiful vivid pink cyclamen on the way to plant over where Tarçın was going to be buried.  My father and all, the burial was managed under the rain.

It was so sad to loose Tarçın who had a little mark in the middle of her lips which made her look like she was giving a kiss all the time…  She loved my sister very much, followed her everywhere; she was a very loyal one. As all these things happened today, I thought about what do I know about life and death…  Loosing a dear one, a person or an animal…  loosing a piece of your heart.  Also need to know to let go so they can go in peace, but so difficult when they are so close to your being… on the other hand, it is the same way we will all go, and can this make things a bit more easy...  well it was still very difficult, very sad, very heart breaking.  We fair welled her with tears…   

Piano...

When I was learning to play the piano as small child, my piano teacher would ask my mom after each class how I managed to stay in mom’s belly for 9 months.  I was impatient with the notes; hurrying, running over notes that were suppose to be held longer… Most of the time, she would teach me short Mozart pieces which bore me a bit after a while ( no offence, I love Mozart) because they were always similar to one another.  Later on, when I was in high school I started to take classes from another teacher who would teach conservatory students and he gave me lots of exercises to begin with and then there came Bach, and Chopin…. The exercises were good for me but also the complexity of Bach…  made me concentrate wholly…  Afterwards, the first year and a half of college I was at Grinnell, where we could take 30-minute piano classes once a week for a mere hundred bucks during each semester.  Being in Iowa, which could be utterly boring if you weren’t a pot smoker, I began practicing every day for an hour.  There, I really began to play the piano … I was totally absorbed during those one-hour time slots in the piano room.  There were 4 or 5 piano rooms we could sign up for, and two of them had grand Steiner pianos which I loved playing…  The amazing thing was that, with minimum instructions (30 min a week), but with daily practice, I played the piano at my best… and I guess at that point I also learned to be more patient with the notes that were suppose to be held longer…

Now, time to time, I get excited about playing the piano again.  Now I have no piano, but maybe a keyboard, which is similar to a piano, can do the job…  However, I am sure to be very rusty since it has been years…  I have to go to basics to become quick with reading the notes again and then some drills to get quick with my fingers and then start playing some pieces of music…  This is one of my dreams… why?  Because I love music and I know that it is one of the things which makes me totally absorbed.., so very meditative.

Why am I writing all this?  Perhaps there is more than one reason…  One of them is seeing how impatient I can be which reminds me my childhood piano teacher and the book KA where it is written “...that impatience is the only sin” and the other thing is the Mysore room which is when it is full, makes me totally absorbed, total like when I used to play the piano.  I also have a dream that one day things will become more steady in my life… where I will be living in a more natural environment with a beloved, teaching yoga together, and perhaps there will be space for a piano like keyboard in one corner of our home… I hope this is not a mere dream but a possibility… I wish for this with my whole heart.

be light

Finally on a lighter note J I am feeling fine, I am feeling that my hormones are playing pranks on me each month and I began worrying about things without any cause…  And this morning I decided it is enough, I can see this and practice not taking it seriously. I just read this on a wall of a friend “Worrying is like praying for what you don’t want” ha!  Have to remember this! And I have to enjoy being in love; really, otherwise what is the point???

I also realized this morning why it is important to have a teacher and why actually good teacher trainings are kind of necessary to learn how to teach and adjust… I actually learned a valuable lesson this time while I was gone regarding one’s practice versus teaching. These don’t necessarily reflect each other; yes they can but teaching is a whole different skill which we learn by time, hopefully by studying with good teachers, ideally assisting them… 

Well today is a sunny nice day.  I am reading “Krishnamacharya: His life and Teaching” by A.G. Mohan which is an easy and an interesting read and I should finish it soon… ok, there has been few times I complained that he brags maybe too much regarding being close to Krishnamacharya, but I guess I am a bit envies, I mean who would not be proud of this? J I heard about Mohan and his book from a friend who was in Mysore while Mohan was invited to the shala to give a speech this past season… What is interesting in the book is how Krishnamacharya would give different recipes for each student and how he was always keen on accepting only the really interested people as students which I like…

the mermaid

I am not grounded today…  I feel lots of fear without any reason…  it makes me want to give up everything in life.  I know this sounds so negative but this is how I feel.  I am such an impatient one, I want to see everything laid out in front of me, I want to be sure of what is ahead even though I know this is not possible even when I plan things carefully.  There are always changes, adjustments that come along with time. Before, I did not feel so much fear perhaps because I was the king of my own kingdom…  but now it is different and I am so scared of being hurt that I see that my paranoia can ruin things.  I don’t know how to be serene because all these unconscious old patterns are being awakened and they are bombarding my psyche.  During these times I feel as if nothing is helping me, not the asana, not the meditation, not the therapy, everything out the window and I am on my own with my fears… I suddenly lack trust in myself and in life, that things will be ok, I will be ok no matter what happens.  I forget that painful situations as well as beautiful ones take me wherever I need to be going.  I forget that this need to control things is not helpful but stressful for everyone... this goes on forever… but then I also see that perhaps because of these times, because of this tendency to be so ungrounded that I need such a physically challenging practice which brings me back to my body, back to this earth… 

As I think all these, I keep experimenting.  Just as I think no practice works, I sat on the cushion to see what will happen.…  It brings a bit calmness but that is not for certain each time, next time I might find myself in tears…  But reminding myself, over and over, that we are not separate, we are not all that different from each other and so learning to accept.  As I sat today, the little mermaid story came to my mind…  When I was a kid, each time I was told that story I sobbed; my heart went for the little mermaid… maybe I did associate with her and still does, afraid of becoming a foam in the sea…  So, not to become a foam in the sea, to stay in this body, I have to make sure to wake up for my asana practice tomorrow morning… just like this I have to keep practicing all day long, taming the body, taming the breath, taming the mind, taming the emotions… and then let whatever is suppose to happen, happen…

Time

I donnu how it is slipping through my hands…  It makes me wonder where I will end up in no time again…  I am being reminded of my mom’s words to me when I was too depressed last summer, her telling me not to waste my time with being so sad because this precious time we have goes by so fast, that she cannot believe how the time passed so fast that I am in my 30s now…  Well she of course had a point but also it was invaluable for me at that time to go down so low…  It showed me a lot, also made me feel things more deeply, not pleasant feelings but rather disturbing ones which made me face myself more honestly and brought this process of learning to except myself with more openness… It is still an on going process which will take a life time…

I am facing myself in my practice everyday but also now in someone else who is mirroring me in so many ways…  Practicing on the mat has been fine. Things that I work on do not come easily and then still there are things happening slowly slowly… Some days I get frustrated, why so slow progress??? and then I see it is my mind which gets fixated on doing it the wrong way!  Ha! I am so prone to expect the negative, it is also in my practice and then of course that can be the result. This is actually a good lesson because it is in other parts of my life as well.  One part of my life has been high lighted for the past couple of months.  I have been avoiding it so well and now I have to open the doors and windows and let the new air circulate; however, it is not easy.  Many spider webs, holding onto old memories, old feelings, visions…  I shrink and get scared because expect same ways of treatment I had before which has nothing to do with the one in front of me, …  Then I go to other end, I panic and try to hold on really tight so it does not slip away and of course everything gets cramped up when there is no space to breath..  and one more time to the other side of the pendulum, I begin thinking about giving up, “what is the point, it won’t work anyways” syndrome...  so back and forth…  negative to positive, all great to hell run…  Of course my point of reference is not the actuality of now but the past… Events and people from the past and past behaviour patterns of mine which were adopted at the time due to circumstances that have little to do with the present moment, present me or with the person across from me.  Ahh, this is harder then the yoga practice on my mat.  Realizing, and not going on with all this habitual patterns of past but creating a new reality, a new belief system, new point of view, new ways of responding, communicating and a way to see the reality with naked eyes rather than with a vision blurred with the past…  On the other hand, I guess my practice on the mat still can inform this new task I took upon, and create a reference point. One point to start from is to not give up and to take the task everyday in the same way I take upon my daily practice… I owe this to myself not because there has to be something grand at the end of this whole thing, maybe it will fade away, but I think there is a great possibility of learning, and understanding that can come out of it just as there was from the low I have been through last summer.  I don’t want to avoid, run away from it due to my fears.  I have enough confidence to face other parts of life as well… and there is this beautiful being in front of me who is as human as I am and not afraid to show this to me, no pretentiousness, much openness and same as me dealing with fears and reluctances…