"Where there is great love, there are always miracles."
- Willa Cather
"Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet."
- Plato
"Love is the ultimate outlaw. It just won't adhere to any rules. The most any of us can do is to sign on as its accomplice. Instead of vowing to honor and obey, maybe we should swear to aid and abet. That would mean that security is out of the question. The words "make" and "stay" become inappropriate. My love for you has no strings attached. I love you for free."
-Tom Robbins
"All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt."
One could say that yoga headed West in the 1960s, and be mostly right. When Maharishi Mahesh Yogi became the very public spiritual advisor for The Beatles in 1967, a whole generation felt the call to seek the ancient wisdom of the East, and the counterculture found a beat it could march to. By August of 1969, Sri Swami Satchidanana was giving the opening address at the Woodstock Music Festival to nearly 500 000 open hearted explorers. Both yoga and TM (Transcendental Meditation) exploded onto the scene from seemingly nowhere.
The truth is that the information had been inching it's way across the continents for decades:
Swami Vivekananda traveled to China, Europe, Canada, and America before the turn of the 20th century, speaking about Hinduism and Buddhism at the Parliament of World's Religions in Chicago in 1893. He is quoted as saying in one of his American speeches:
"I do not come to convert you to a new belief. I want you to keep your own belief; I want to make the Methodist a better Methodist; the Presbyterian a better Presbyterian; the Unitarian a better Unitarian. I want to teach you to live the truth, to reveal the light within your own soul"
illustrating the fact that yoga has and always will be, the path rather than the destination. By 1895 he was teaching yoga classes in the Thousand Island region.
The word yoga comes from the root word "yuj" meaning to yoke, or control, which of course makes sense when we consider the discipline involved in pranayama (breath work), or even in maintaining a consistent practice. The word also means "union", and this is the commonly accepted meaning.
Unifying with what, then becomes the question. From even a secular position, yoga can be used to remind us the non-duality of everything. We are part of the eco-system, the universe, the collective subconscious; our existence depends on our neighbors, on our planet, and vice versa. From a spiritual point of view, we are connected not only to all that we see and understand, but we are also made of the same celestial pixiesticks and cosmic rainbows as our neighbors: the spark that makes them human makes us human; our souls can relate to other souls; we are all drops of God, even if we call God by a different name. Simply, thou art that.
There are as many paths toward union as there are creatures seeking them, and the truth is, you don't need to unroll a mat to be in yoga. Sure, physical practice helps to get you there (hatha, raja & kriya yogas), but devotional practices (bhakti yoga), or philosophical approaches (jnana yoga) will as well. In all honesty, whatever leaves you feeling in tune with all that is, will be, and ever was, is your best path to union. Whether it be composing a song or dancing the night away, your sense of fulfillment and completion is the goal behind each route. Be yoga now.
Many of us are familiar with the droning hum heard at the start and close of yoga classes, but how many of us consider the meaning of the word?
It is said that this is the sound of creation; the vibrational tone that literally created the universe and everything in it. For instance, if we put it in the context of the quote "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1:1), this would be the word referred to from a Hindu or yogic perspective.
Most appropriately, OM is pronounced AUM, with three distinct and separate syllables that flow naturally into one another. The opening of the mouth to release sound naturally creates the AHH; the sustaining of the sound with open mouth creates the UHH, and the closing of our mouths as the breath empties from our lungs creates the MMM. Each syllable represents a part of the creative cycle, from inception, to sustenation, to the the close of the cycle, that it all may begin again.
Each stage of the cycle is represented by a god: Brahma is the creator, Vishnu the preserver, and Shiva the destroyer. Together they make up the Trimurti, or the Hindu Trinity.
So the next time you find yourself smiling at the end of class, lost in the soothing sea of OM, take a moment to bask in just how vast that sea really is.
Please forgive the mess. Over the past decade I have spent considerably more time rebuilding than decorating and this fresh landing pad is as yet unadorned.
Through the packing and unpacking I have defined and refined all the pertinent pieces and while they are rarely in order they're all around here somewhere including all the reasons why I should know better by now.
True, it's been a long time since I played with the kind of fire that burns bridges so easily but I'm sure I'll remember the drill if you hum a few bars and it's true they say there's something purifying about uncontrolled flames and that if the flaw wasn't in Achilles' heel it would've been somewhere else.
I have been a fire-walker so long that sensing smoke is now my nature. I have walked longer than you know water-bucket in one hand match in the other. I have earned each scar and story stood covered in sweat and soot burned the beginnings I have built -- both reinforced walls and warm homes -- and have learned to build both quickly. I have screamed through searing lungs and come through safely on each other side.
So rest assured that the freedom to wear this heart on this sleeve has been hard won and is neither ignorance nor cutsey-poo innocence rather it is a bold blazing testament to the nerve the strength the force of my will to bare myself time and again risking what feels to my core like everything to roll the dice for every modern fairytale every cheesy TV movie every book about the weirdos who find their perfect weirdo because I have the technology to survive all the falling skies along the way but would surely die of a broken heart if I didn't keep up the chase.
If you were here you would be shaking your head and laughing because you would've told me so by now and you would ask if I was really surprised Really? because this is obviously for the best and fish and seas and how didn't I see this coming? but don't worry you'll do it all again for the next charming man and you would point laugh roll your eyes tell me it sucks that it hurts but imagine being you so drink up stop your whining blah blah heartbreak but you know you deserve better and there are boys just lining up to get your heart broken by you and I would finally and reluctantly laugh and probably toss my hair and assure you it's not the case while knowing you meant you.
If you were here I would tell yoiu hey listen all joking aside I'll put my pieces back together again dust off the ol' ticker and try the track again but you gotta know that I can think of about a million drugs I'd rather see you do than that shit you do and I have a hunch that if you don't find yourself a new bad habit I'm gonna find myself trying to deliver some words to a standing room only crowd of crying freaks, family, displaced lunatics, and injured dreamers trying to find some communal comfort in all that we found beautiful in youi and man it's the last fuckin' speech I wanna give and there are gonna be times when your voice will be just the reason we need.
The realization that closing a door can be an intricate process (especially given my need to double 15 go back and do it again check).
The knowledge that once you can tear yourself away from the checking and the door you will be free.
The Liberation cleansing ritual I invented just now in a bathroom mirror under 2 out of 3 working lights that involves in part using your own fresh tears as warpaint and praying to oneself.
The scars I have given myself over the years are mostly hidden by laughter some necessitate long skirts and anecdotes of ninja attacks but I assure you the truth is not dinner convo only rare and selective coffee talk and then still with mostly averted eyes.
I mostly hide the fact that if I wake up for any reason between the hours of 4 and 8 a.m. there is a good chance I will be struck by the jolting and nauseating panic of being equally afraid of living and dying and the certainty that both will kill me. And I wish that someone would comfort me back to sleep because it's exhausting.
I wish I had known I was beautiful sooner.
Mostly hidden is the moment you know your path is changing and even if you feel the electricity i8n the air the moment of the shift still strikes like out of season lightning and you're filled with white light knowing and the smell of your best laid plans ablaze.
I know a girl who once loved a boy north of her border and he would stay on the phone while she slept so she could rest without her demons coming for her for a change.
There is a girl who conquered fear and flew to love and came back alone profoundly in love with the ocean and grateful for new wisdom.
I knew a man who loved everything so painfully that he numbed himself to death while writing an email and while I'm fairly certain it was never meant for my eyes I would pay money to read it now.
I didn't know the girl that my friend messaged me from another coast about who needed someone and it couldn't be him so could it be me? She started shy but then cried as she told me how her ex had recently bitten her face in the street after pleading desperate love again. And I cried too. And thought, there but for the grace of God go I.
Here is the perfect spot to plant my longing; my sparkly eyed consumer label dreams, my middle of the night sweaty waking yearning.
This is the sky under which I will bury my idols and egos my fantasy thems and selves.
These are the clouds that will witness the the ritual of one tiny human woman sprawled crying into the soil to bid adieu to my misconceptions of the needs that I have, my confusion over which route to the big pickle is paved just for me.
These are the under-rated beauteous dandelions that nod in agreement with my intentions and sanction my blessing.
They will turn to puff spread their song and never breathe a word of this.
A popular and easily recognized deity in Hindu mythology, is the elephant-headed God, Ganesha.
There are many stories as to how Ganesha came to have his distinctive elephant head. It is said that he was created as a son by Parvati to guard and protect her quarters while her husband Shiva, was away (it seems understandable that the Gods spend a lot of time working away from home). When Shiva came back, he was greeted by this man and told that he could not pass to Parvati’s quarters. Enraged, Shiva cuts off the man’s head, and goes on past to reunite with his wife.
We can imagine that there was some awkwardness in the reunion as Shiva explains the conflict, and Parvati explains that it was her son that was beheaded. Shiva, ever just, restores the man to life, but all that was around by this time, was an elephant’s head (and better elephant-headed than dead).
Ganesha had a brother named Kartikay. Presented with the challenge of racing around the universe and all of creation, Kartikay sets off to do just that, while his brother slowly and simply walks around their parents, showing his understanding, and thus declaring the universe as nothing more or less than his holy parents. Ganesha of course wins the race, and is named Lord (Isha) of all existing beings (Gana).
-He is associated with the root chakra, providing a solid foundation for the other chakras to bloom.
-He is often seen either riding, or near a rat, and this shows his control over ego and vanity.
-The plate of sweets, or “laddu” symbolize the sweetness of purity, the conch shell represents “om”, the
sound that creates space both literally and figuratively.
-His broken tusk is what he used to pen the Mahabharata (or “The Story of the Bharata Dynasty”, one of India’s two great epics, the other being the Ramayana or “Ram’s Journey”. The Bhagavad Gita, or “Song of God” is contained in the Mahabharata).
-The swastika, when facing clockwise as it often is in association with Ganesha, symbolizes the universe unfolding and evolving, and is thusly associated with Brahma (facing the opposite direction it would symbolize the universe folding in on itself, and thus be associated with Vishnu).
-To see beyond the physical appearance of this deity is to see beyond the appearance of the challenges that arise, beyond surface illusions, and into a truth that allows us to navigate difficult terrain. As such, Ganesha is the Lord of Removing Obstacles.
Unbeknownst to you I swore off poetry one night when I thought you would never hold me again.
Under the freezing clarity of Canadian January and an ironically lovely sky, I saw that if this was not the intricate work of well meaning gods that I thought it was, than surely every fragment of beauty was nothing more than a manifestation of mathematics that only happens to be pleasing and love is nothing more than synapses and endorphins on a joyride with modern myths and Hallmark running the GPS and happiness is measured in the space between sadnesses so poetry could be nothing more than the sound of an echo lost in a sea of roaring echoes all longing to not be an echo.
And though later you held me again and have since and while I have smiled and daydreamed in the days that have passed poetry is sensitive and has proven less forgiving.
