encouragement – Page 3 – Generous Wisdom

Anniversaries, of sorts

My Dear Yoga Friends & Readers,

Today marks the one year anniversary of my first ever moment of teaching yoga online. It is the anniversary of the creation of my first youtube channel. And it is the anniversary of the day my family embarked on new ways of living.

As I write this I’m noticing that some anniversaries are celebrated, and others are noted as a time for pause and reflection on what has been experienced and what has been learned, like deaths.

(I have been known to celebrate when something extraordinarily damaging dies, like a relationship or an administration, for the possibilities that something life-giving will grow in its place – there is great hope and joy in that.)

We are used to celebrating births and lives well-lived, but we don’t necessarily celebrate deathdays. At least none that I’m aware of. Instead, we tend to solemnly acknowledge the day, to give the experience of death the the honor that it’s due.

This week I’ve been celebrating my partner’s birthday and my first bold steps into the online yoga teaching world. I’ve been marking the closure of my children’s schools for “the flu” and my partner’s epic journey navigating and guiding his employees, clients, and their families through the Covid Sea and the Pandemic Ocean as part of his day job.

What anniversaries are you marking this day, week, and month? What are you celebrating?

I’d like to share a yoga practice with you to both commemorate and celebrate the year behind and the year ahead.

My hope for all of us is that we honor our experiences, embrace what is life-giving, and release what no longer needs holding.

May you be blessed like crazy,
and may you have the strength to bear it.

With tenderness, loving-kindness, and care,

Amy

The Universal Yogi

(Photo by Ave Calvar Martinez on Pexels.com)

Striving & Savoring

Dear Friends,

Right now is a new moment. Breathe in and feel the new breath in your body. Breathe out and feel the old breath release. Every breath takes in the new and releases the old. There might be sadness here or tentativeness; there might also be sweetness and joy. Notice what is present with a spot of kindness. Offer yourself any amount of compassion for whatever you are feeling in this moment.

STRIVING

I’ve done a lot of striving in my day, and I bet you have too: striving for the best education, the best job, the best partner, the best family, the best meal, the best soap, the best meditation, the best yoga practice, and on it goes, possibly without end.

I invite you to join me in not striving – for a moment (or even two) – as you take in the words of Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman who speaks of striving in her poem “The Hill We Climb:’

“And yes we are far from polished
far from pristine
but that doesn’t mean we are
striving to form a union that is perfect
We are striving to forge a union with purpose
To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and
conditions of man
And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us
but what stands before us
We close the divide because we know, to put our future first,
we must first put our differences aside”

Sometimes striving is necessary. And sometimes savoring is what’s needed.

SAVORING

I invite you now to look back and notice the good work you have done, just one tiny nugget of goodness you gave to the world, whether it was earlier today, yesterday, or 20 years ago.

Perhaps it was a smile, a delivery of groceries or a warm meal. Maybe you drove someone to work, school, or an appointment and then drove them home, walked your dog, or picked up trash that wasn’t yours. Or, you gave yourself permission to go for a walk, or to sit and rest.

Our striving is not for perfection, friends. It is for a life with purpose, to compose a song filled with various rhythms and key changes, dotted with eighth notes and swept with drawn out phrases and pauses, a life of tiny little nuggets of goodness. Not perfection, but purpose.

My invitation to you today: Savor what is sweet and leave the rest.

Yours in Practice,

Amy

The Universal Yogi

PS – Follow the links above to learn more about Amanda Gorman and hear her reading “The Hill We Climb.” My encouragement is to listen twice. Once with your eyes closed and once with them open (in either order).

PPS – I didn’t want to leave this out in case it might be useful: try savoring your yoga practice, instead of striving throughout the whole thing, trying to get somewhere you think you’re not. Do the yoga as something to enjoy, not to cross off your list. Practice as play.

Go play some yoga 🙂

Vinyasa, Hatha, & Creative Ashtanga

I realize the title seems to imply that this could be a lengthy explanation of definitions, differences, and similarities, but it’s really just a little story. (You might be pleasantly surprised or a bit disappointed, or maybe some of each!)

I hurt my hip in July of 2019 doing a yoga pose that didn’t really need doing, though it was fun, and I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Until I didn’t. In July of 2020 my knee decided it had had enough. What it had enough of, however, I wasn’t really sure. All I had been doing was walking on cement sidewalks a few miles three times a day since April. (Remember April, May, and June of 2020?) I suppose that, combined with an active childhood that included a splash of gymnastics, 16 years of jumping back (and up) in Surya Namaskara A & B, and congenitally under-developed hip sockets and other misaligned joints and weaknesses, resulted in my knee swelling up and me thinking I had gout. Thankfully, I did not have to give up my favorite indulgences. It seems I’d rather have patellar tendonosis instead.

All this is to say that I’ve been enjoying a 10 day meditation challenge, and I took a “creative ashtanga” class this morning to see how it might feel, and my left hip was like, What are you doing? And my left knee was like, Have you been meditating for a long time? My right hip flexor said, What did you do yesterday? And my right shoulder? It was like, Are you kidding me…? After all we’ve been through…? Keep in mind, I made all the postures and vinyasas fit my current body and its needs and wants, and still my body was like, Huh? This doesn’t feel right.

So. There’s vinyasa and there’s vinyasa. I still find my flow even when I’m not jumping, doing push-ups, and raising and lowering my arms a million times. I still connect my postures like strings of pearls. I still love flowing and powering in my yoga practice. It just looks different on the outside.

So. I have hip dysplasia, and I never would’ve found that out if it hadn’t been for sugarcane pose. However, I’d rather not know I have hip dysplasia. Moving forward, if a pose isn’t really necessary, and it’s bordering on extreme, I’m not going to do it. (I’m sort of laughing as I type this because I couldn’t do any sort-of-extreme posture anymore. My body’s not havin’ it!) It kind of reminds me of the time my 2-year-old hit me smack in the third eye with a wooden block. I had enough sense to think, Well? That’s something. I suppose I’ll never be hit in the head exactly the same way ever again. And going forward, I steered clear.

So. What’s changing for you?

For Practice

What have you been forcing yourself to do that you really don’t want to do anymore (or ever really did), and you have a choice around it? What have you been putting yourself in the way of when you could shift to the side?
What would it feel like to practice the way you want to practice, not the way you think you should practice?
How do you think it would be to practice asana simply by feel. Instead of visualizing images of yoga postures (from books, apps, sites, or even in the mirror), close your eyes and feel your way into only the asana your body manifests comfortably. Yep, I said it – comfortably!! Asana = comfortable seat. 😉

Happy Practicing,

Amy

The Universal Yogi