Curiosity & Honesty: Entering Into Divine Flow

Curiosity & Honesty: Entering Into Divine Flow
Or
Svadhyaya & Satya: A Path to Connection

This 4 part series is an exploration of themes and concepts related to Yoga practice, spiritual practice, and life practice, a rambling through a tangled, muddy wood of experiences; it is a one-foot-in-front-of-the-other adventure into curiosity. When we are curious, we learn what it means to suspend judgment and step into Divine Flow, the Loving, Creative Spirit-Energy of Existence that moves through all of us. What it feels like. What it looks like, sounds like, smells like, and tastes like to allow unfolding, unfurling, and to feel this happening in the moment.

Part I: Adaptability

In 2000 when I first enrolled in yoga teacher training, I learned that there were “different kinds” of yoga, and really only two: Hatha & Ashtanga Vinyasa. The lead Ashtanga teacher at the studio took one look at me and, with her characteristic smile said, “You’re athletic? You’re coming with me.” I didn’t know a chaturanga from a chakrasana; I figured she knew best, so I agreed, and experienced a resonance. It actually brought my worlds together: Primary Series in Mansfield, Ohio? Primary Series in Mysore, India. Holy Mass in Mansfield, Ohio? Holy Mass in Rome, Italy. It was a fine fit, and through all the years bore all kinds of good fruit, not the least of which was the little website, blog, and small fundraising site The Catholic Yogi (now The Catholic Yogis).

I loved the physicality of the Ashtanga practice. I loved the pattern and routine. I couldn’t perform all the postures perfectly or do every single vinyasa, practice 90 minutes a day, 6 days a week, but I sure tried. And when I failed, I buried my head in the sand, pretended it was fine, told myself it was okay, and didn’t believe myself one bit when I said it. I had four babies by c-section over the course of 8 years, did more pilates than primary series, didn’t have a separate meditation practice, didn’t have a separate pranayama practice, told myself it was okay that I wasn’t “doing all the practices exactly as prescribed, super-correctly, most auspiciously,” and I didn’t believe myself for one second when I said it.

I didn’t even know to look for
and uncover my own needs.
I thought I had to want to try for perfection
in every single thing. All The Time.

Throughout those eight years, lots of “other kinds” of yoga started popping up all over the place (thank you collaboration and The Internet): “Mindful Yoga,” “Vinyasa Yoga,” “Yin Yoga,” “Power Yoga,” “Hot Yoga,” “Restorative Yoga” – the list is seemingly endless. But I didn’t really feel I could dip my toe into any other water. It just wasn’t even an option for me. It was all or nothing. I was stuck in a cycle of “Not good enough; can’t leave.”

Some of the reasons I was not able to practice The Primary “as prescribed by ‘tradition’” was because I was a householder, a person with female bone structure, hip dysplasia, chronic inflammation, subacromial compression in the shoulder, and chronic pain. Not to mention limited physical access and financial resources. My beginning was “before the internet” or at least before its current iteration, and offered so much less access than the abundance of online resources we enjoy today.

It is important to note, too, that I didn’t realize much of this when I was young. I thought I could do everything, and so I should do everything – with or without access, finances, support, accurate information, knowledge, experience, mentorship – should (lots of moralizing there). In fact, I didn’t know until just three years ago when I suffered an end-range-of-motion injury in ardha chandra chapasana that my hip sockets are, in fact, not “fully formed.” (Totally the reason my hips never seemed to “open” beyond my “this is always the way it is” baseline arc, no matter the hours of practice over years of effort, and completely the reason my body always recoiled from kapotasana. Now I am thankful it always felt dangerous enough for me to shake my head and back away.)

I share all this to say that when I was younger, I didn’t know. And, unfortunately, we don’t know what we don’t know until we know it. Or until a wise teacher shares it with us of their own accord. Because, guess what friends: I didn’t even know the questions to ask. I didn’t know it was okay to not try to do “the full thing,” to not try to reach for and achieve some version of “perfection,” to not be hard on myself for not already knowing everything about everything. “Accessible Yoga” didn’t exist back then the way it does now. And even if it did, I probably would’ve given it the “side-eye” and been all judgy about it. I didn’t know it was okay to adapt postures or practices to take care of my needs. In fact, I didn’t even know to look for and uncover my own needs. I simply thought I had to want to try for perfection in every single thing All The Time. “Needs” were irrelevant.

Yes. This Was Exhausting.

It’s important to acknowledge here, too, that even if we can do something, our explicit ability to do that thing does not imply that it is a wise thing to do. That’s right. I said it. And now you can, too, in case you felt alone in that. And now we can say it together.

The first step in cultivating adaptability is giving ourselves permission to do it. Once we allow ourselves to adapt postures and practices, the next step is to experiment. And a healthy dose of curiosity & honesty helps with that.

Curiosity & Honesty

Sometimes honesty is about clarity. And sometimes clarity is about truthfulness. When it comes to practicing adaptability, svadhyaya (self-study & study of sacred texts) and satya (truthfulness) are necessary. We need self-study, the study of sacred scriptures, and truthfulness to get at the heart of our own beliefs and be honest with ourselves about them: do I believe I must strive for someone else’s, or a certain lineage, tradition, or institution’s concept of perfect, ideal, or full? When we look at the specific situations and circumstances, are we seeing clearly? Are we looking to confirm our own biases, or to uncover the truth that takes all perspectives into account? We need more than asana to practice Yoga. We need more than someone else’s practices to walk our own Spirit-Path. So it’s necessary that we get curious about what serves us.

Before we dive into a study of self, scripture, situation, and circumstance, curiosity must be present or we’ll keep banging our heads against the walls of ignorance, judgment, and condemnation. Curiosity opens the doors of truth. The desire to learn and understand opens the gates of sectarianism and leads to a path of connection.

When adapting postures, positions, and perspectives, what are the most important pieces?

Knowing you have the permission (from yourself)
Knowing you have the blessing (of Spirit that lives in all)
Knowing you have the wisdom (within your heart and body)
Knowing you have the ability (to make it happen)

Then?

Gathering the courage
Accessing the creativity
Collecting the support
Receiving & Enjoying the benefits

For Practice & Experience

To begin to practice and experience Divine Flow, consider experimenting with these invitations to contemplative inquiry:

What do I already know about Divine Flow?
What do I wish to learn or experience about Divine Flow?
What am I ready to know or experience about Divine Flow?

Alongside curiosity and compassion, take these inquiries into your meditation or savasana practice, then write or sketch your mind’s, body’s, and heart’s responses and impressions. Notice what you are ready to be curious about, be honest about, and what you are ready to adapt, modify, change, or allow. Are there non-negotiables? Are there non-negotiables that are desperate to negotiate?

What is true for you?

Entering into Divine Flow is a practice of connection. It is relational and requires effort & effortlessness, offering & receiving, allowing & attentiveness. Remember your most important pieces: permission, blessing, wisdom, ability, courage, creativity, support, receiving, & enjoying. Just because we can keep our heads buried in the sand, doesn’t mean it is wise to do. And just because we can lift our eyes to the horizon, doesn’t mean it is wise to do. We must do our own inner work with curiosity and honesty, svadhyaya and satya. Then we can make our own wise choice. This is the first step.

The Spaciousness of Love, Revisited

Dear Readers,

I wrote the original version of this essay around 2018, revised it in 2020 and am now revisiting it again (2024). What you’ll find below is a more spacious version oriented toward finding ways to take right action and right rest. Both action and rest are necessary for a flourishing life. In light of tragic events throughout the world, revelations of social divides and injustice, the recent pandemic, climate extremes, and the continuing ripple effects of white supremacist patriarchal practices that have been passed down through the generations, action, rest, peace, and joy are our only way forward.

I hope there is something here that resonates with you, and that it helps you to reach deeply into your own heart; find new ways of loving and embracing yourself, so that you may find new ways of loving and embracing the people in your own community, and so on outward to your village, township, parish, county, city, state, country, continent, and world. My invitation is to start with yourself, and only then move outward, because you are just as worthy of your own love as your neighbor is. The Energy of Life lives in all of us and encompasses all things. The Creative Force of Existence is the hub; we are the spokes; this life is the rim of our ever-turning wheel of space-time. And the closer we get to each other, the closer we get to all the infinite expressions of the Wholeness of Being.

In the midst of every swirling bit of chaos in our world, I am reminded by my teachers that right action will look different for each and every one of us. For some of us, our first right step might be to hold our children, or our young people close and feel what it feels like to be safe. For some of us, getting involved in our community’s social justice groups is the most pressing immediate action. And others of us will be called to speak in loving kindness with family, friends, and neighbors, or write letters of repair, of trust and strength and hope. Still others of us will find ways to connect with our spiritual communities and allow the passion and guidance of our spiritual leaders, partners, and friends to bolster our hearts in gratitude and love.

May we be drenched in Spirit wisdom, and soaked in gratitude, hope, and love.

The Spaciousness of Love

If love is kind,
it is not cruel .
If love is not jealous,
it is content.
If love is not pompous,
it is humble.
If love is not inflated,
it sees rightly.
If love is not rude,
it is enlightened.
If love is not self-seeking,
it is generous.
If love is not quick-tempered,
it is tranquil.
If love does not brood over injury,
it is reparative.
If love does not rejoice over wrongdoing,
it offers compassion.
If love bears all things,
it does not turn away.
If love believes all things,
it does not deny.
If love endures all things,
it does not cede.
If love never fails,
it always triumphs.

There are jewels to be found throughout ancient scripture, and in this exploration, we’ll look to both Western and Eastern wisdom traditions. In the Christian tradition, the New Testament offers one approach to love and to loving. When we look in the tenth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, a scholar of Jewish law asks Christ, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus says to him in reply, ““What is written in the law? How do you read it?” The scholar responds with what we know as The Greatest Commandment: “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus replies to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live” (Luke 10:25-8).

From this quick exchange it seems our purpose on earth is simple, our mission, obvious, and the answer to the question of inheriting eternal life, a short one: love. That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less.

However, as simple as love appears to be, isn’t it simultaneously complex? What, exactly, is love?

In his first letter to the Corinthians St. Paul articulates clearly and beautifully what love is and what it is not, what love does and what it does not do. And he acknowledges that our actions can be either devoid of love or infused with it. We can serve in bitterness and resentment or in humility and compassion. Even our most helpful of actions can be empty of love, performed in a negative spirit that crushes our own and that of the recipient. St. Paul even goes so far as to proclaim that love is the greatest of all virtues, greater than faith and greater than hope: “Love will remain even when faith has yielded to sight and hope to possession” (USCCB Commentary).

Thankfully we can look to these guidelines and explanations of love to give us a starting point, a kind of pathway forward, but I know how much I stumble and wander about aimlessly, how often I fall and clamber in the dark of my ignorance, for even though I hear the encouragement, “love one another as you love yourself,” it is as if I do not have ears; I still find myself begging to understand how.

The Greatest Commandment, love one another as you love yourself, assumes that we already know how we are to love ourselves.

Zen priest and founder of the Center for Transformative Change, Angel Kyodo Williams, describes love as space: “[Love] is developing our own capacity for spaciousness within ourselves to allow others to be as they are — that is love” (OnBeing interview with Krista Tippett).

If love is space, it is not a vacuum; it does not pull all things into itself but expands and allows people to be who they are. Love makes room for the full expression of the human experience. Unfortunately, there have been many times in which I’ve been loveless. I’ve had a habit of pulling all things into myself, making myself the center of the multiverse, sucking the life out of life. I have been selfish, judgmental, prideful, vain, and vacuous, full of disdain, contempt, and self-righteousness, as I suspect most of us have at one time or another. It is a crushing cycle to find oneself in, as it damages others, as well as ourselves, on multiple levels.

I want to choose space.

Choosing space is hard.

It’s helpful to remember that love is not passive; it’s an action, whether or not it looks like action from the outside. To love is an act of the will; it is to choose, and we can’t make choices without awareness. To be aware is to choose to see rightly, to see ourselves as we really are, without quite so many labels, inherited or created, without stories in which we are always the protagonist; but instead, to choose to see ourselves simply as expressions of Divine Being worthy of love, worthy of forgiveness, by our sheer existence. Awareness can help create this space to see, this space in which we can choose dignity, this space to act in love toward ourself and our neighbor.

All this takes practice. When we work on our yoga mat to create space in the body for healing, we do so with awareness. When we work on our meditation cushion to create space in the mind for choice, we do so with awareness. And when the body is able to breathe and the mind is able to choose, we are able to work in our daily lives to create space in the spirit for loving ourselves. The hope is that if for a moment we can focus on the tree trunk, instead of the ever changing leaves, perhaps we will be able to notice, for even an instant, our constant spirit, instead of our changeable thoughts and emotions. And from inside this space, this separation between ourselves and our thought-feelings, we will find compassion for ourselves, for our families, for our friends, and for each person we encounter.

Creating space isn’t easy. It requires openness of mind and heart, and even body. This can be unnerving and can seem irrational. As human beings we strive to protect ourselves from the possibility of physical, mental, and emotional harm and to fulfill our basic needs. This is survival mode, and it causes us to lose touch with others and even with our truest selves. As we frantically search and scan our surroundings, our circumstances, we become absorbed with negativity. When this is our baseline, chronic way of functioning, we run the risk of closing in on ourselves, constricting our body-mind-heart/spirit, forgetting who we are, and who we are in relation to those around us.

We find spaciousness through embodied practices of curiosity & kindness. It really only takes a drop of curiosity, a kind pause, an open waiting, a question: What can I practice letting go of to make space for something else, something different, new, something like welcoming, or embracing?

Making space for ourselves, and making space for one another are true acts of love. Even paying close attention is loving, for where we place our attention, there also will our love be. Bringing our awareness to the present moment, including the people and events within that moment, and allowing space for the moment to be what it is, is living in love.

Our practices of the limbs of yoga – the yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara, dhyana, dharana – combine with Spirit wisdom, will lead us to the answers. We’ll figure out what needs letting go of through embodied practice, listening to the wisdom held deep in our belly and deep in our heart.

So, we can’t quit. We can rest, but we can’t give up. We can’t deny ourselves the practices even when we are overcome with grief and anger – we take the grief and the anger to the practice with us. Just like we take the joy and the delight to the practice with us. We take everything to the practice. Practice is truly our own best teacher.

Yoga instructor Bryan Kest speaks of a yoga practice on the mat as being like a mini-day, or a mini-life in which we encounter obstacles and challenges, and we practice being with them with equanimity, so that when we go out into the world we function from this baseline of non-reaction, with gentleness and self-compassion as our default mode. Not only do we practice navigating difficulty as yogis, but we also practice nurturing ourselves through deep restorative postures and energy work that have the capacity to restore and bolster our right action in the world. And this is paramount – we must care for ourselves so that we can care for others. Continued, sustained practice creates in us the capacity to grow in wisdom and expand in love. It is when we deny what is present, when we hide from what is happening, when we close in on ourselves and shut everyone else out through fear that our chests tighten, our hearts constrict, and our capacity for love diminishes. Kyodo Williams encourages us when she says, ” for people who are not monastics, the world is our field of practice.”

And so we practice. We get on our mat every day; we let go of reactivity, harsh self-criticisms, vanity and pride, greed and grasping; we start to cultivate space for responding, for healing, for choosing, and for seeing rightly. We fail. We try again.

We welcome wisdom into our heart and out of our heart and begin to understand what it means to be wisely generous and wisely selfish. These wise-heart practices keep us from overextending or overwhelming ourselves, so that we pace, renew, and restore and keep going. We take that spaciousness off our yoga mat, through the doors of our worship spaces, out of the forests and into the moments and circumstances of our lives. We practice; we practice some more, and we practice again and unceasingly, like prayer.

Love is not cruel; it is supportive and humble. Love sees rightly and is enlightened. Love is generous, tranquil, forgiving, repairing compassionate, courageous, honest, eternal, and triumphant. Love is wise.

Love bears all things
because love is spacious. It’s big enough.
It’s always bigger.

Love bears all things because love is spacious. It’s big enough. It’s always bigger. When we understand this and put it into practice by giving ourselves the space to be who we are without judgment, we will be able to give this same non-judgmental, inclusive, curious and kind space to others. From this place we will hear the encouragement, “Love one another as you love yourself,” and we will know – because we live it, because we feel it in our bellies and our bones.

Space is ever-expanding.
So is love.
Love never ends.

St. patrick’s Breastplate, Yoga, & Armor

I love to put on yoga. There’s power here. The practice is sacred ground. It’s the place I pause, and notice, acknowledge, and welcome, and the place where I decide. The power lies in the ridiculous amount of choice I have access to when I pause, breathe, and feel my feet. I love stepping into Mountain, reaching into Half Moon, slipping into Warrior III. I am the Mountain. I am the Half Moon. I am the Warrior. I love putting on stillness, wrapping myself in concentration, and painting my face with rest and joy. In this I am the lake, the eagle’s eye, the lotus and the alleluia.

This all comes with me into my day.

I love to practice yoga anytime of day or night, but I’ve found it to be especially sweet and effective in the morning. It’s a beautiful invocation of blessing and offering for the day ahead. I don’t wear the yoga as armor to keep people out or keep myself in; it’s more like armor to sustain whatever is present, armor as a set of tools I need to do my work in the world, the work of loving and being loved.

Where there’s yoga, there’s prayer, and when I’m practicing at home, and my mind comes into the same space and time as my body, my spirit wakes up, and I recognize God’s presence within and around me. So, when I can wake and walk into the practice, I have an opportunity to make a connection to myself, situate myself in God’s presence and invoke All the Good.

And, where there’s yoga, there’s power. No matter what kind of sequence I’m practicing: downdog, warrior III, downdog, side plank to wild thing, or: forward fold, sleeping big toe pose, reclined twist, supported bridge to legs up the wall, by savasana I have all the power I need for the day ahead. Regardless of when I practice, I walk into the rest of my day shod with peace boots, grounded, connected, and steadfast. Whether I’ve followed a peaceful, invigorating, or restorative arc, I always leave my mat with strength, spaciousness, and power, the perfect set of equipment to be able to serve, to observe, resist, or engage whatever comes.

Yoga is my morning prayer of peace, protection, and power.

Saint Patrick’s Breastplate, also known as The Deer’s Cry or The Lorica, is a traditional Celtic morning prayer of peace, protection, and power. It is attributed to St. Patrick around the year 377, though exact authorship and date is unknown. It is “written as a hymn calling on Christ to surround the supplicant in all bodily directions and invokes God for protection against [all forms of evil.]”* The Breastplate is a thoroughly beautiful prayer. And even though there are parts of it that I shy away from, and sections I modify or leave out when I recite it, like the patriarchs, holy virgins, black laws of heathenry, and false laws of heretics, other verses resonate deep in my bones, especially these:

Christ be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ within me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ where I lie, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise, Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me, Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me.

Meditation 1: A Reading of the Breastplate of Patrick

This is my own variation of the prayer. I took out and added, adjusted, and embraced. I love the rhythms, the repetitions, and the all-encompassing affirmation of Christ’s universality. This prayer came into my mind during a yoga teacher training when my mentor teacher, Michele Vinbury, began our session with her own invocation:

“I allow nothing within or around me
that does not serve the highest good.”

I love the level of trust and confidence inherent in both my teacher’s prayer, as well as in the Lorica. Prayers like these don’t just invoke protection, they are protection: the same way I prayed the Hail Mary for protection as a young child when I was scared, the same way I pray the Hail Mary now, when life and death are both before me. These kinds of prayers are something you can put on, something you can cover yourself with. You feel them in your bones. They have the weight and heft of armor and the precision of a sharpened sword. They get to the very heart of the matter, and in fine detail. These kinds of prayers come to us. Our openness to Divine Flow, Intervention, and Providence allows for it. And the yoga practices have a way of grounding and opening us so that we can be receptive to this kind of experience.

You can find a transcript of this and other variations here.

Meditation 2: The Deers’ Cry

There is a legend telling the story of Saint Patrick who, knowing that he and his accompanying monks were being ambushed and likely to be killed, led his men through the woods reciting this prayer. The enemies saw them in the woods — as a mother deer with calves — and this is how Saint Patrick and his men were saved.

Listen to this beautiful mixed choir acapella arrangement of The Deers’ Cry by the Arvo Part Centre.

An Invitation for your Practice

I invite you to notice what parts of the Lorica speak to you, which words resonate in your bones? Memorize, recite, and chant them deep in your heart so much that your heart chants them always. In this, you will pray without ceasing. You will have an awareness of God as a constant in your life, the God of Presence, Protection, and Power.

Remember, too, that your yoga practice is a prayer. Notice which movements and breathing practices speak to you and resonate in your bones. Memorize and repeat them so that they work their way deep into your neurobiology, your nervous system, your blood. In this way you will be practicing yoga always. You will have with you a sense of deep ground from which to draw your power and a spaciousness surrounding you that allows the essence of others to float through you without disturbance. In this way you will experience the steadiness of the mountain and the spaciousness of freedom.

A Blessing

For your enjoyment, I’ve posted just a few Irish blessings. I think there are millions! Please share your favorites in the comments. The more blessings we share, the better! But first, I’d like to leave you with one of my favorites. It’s my own, so, it’s an Irish-English-German-Polish-Croatian blessing:

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

Irish Blessings

House Blessing

May the power of protection abide
within all the hearts who dwell inside.

Family Blessing

Bless you and yours, as well as the cottage you live in —
may the roof overhead be well thatched,
and those inside be well matched.
May that roof overhead never fall in,
and those within never fall out.

Health & Prosperity Blessings

May you live as long as you want,
And never want as long as you live.

May your troubles be less and your blessings be more
and nothing but happiness come through your door.

Celtic Rune of Hospitality

We saw a stranger yesterday.

We put food in the eating place,

Drink in the drinking place,

Music in the listening place,

and with the sacred name of the triune God

he blessed us and our house,

our cattle and our dear ones.

As the lark says in her song:

Often, often, often, goes the CHRIST

In the stranger’s guise.

*“Saint Patrick’s Breastplate” Philip Freeman;www.oxfordscholarship.com

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