Nurturing Insight

by Meg Agnew
Seattle Yoga Arts Teacher

If you’ve had some experience with insights, you know they can’t be called up on command. The best we can do to encourage the arising of insight is to create hospitable conditions. Reflecting, meditating, journaling, attending a silent retreat and walking meditation are some activities that are frequently associated with the arising of insight. Our relationships, too, are rich sources of insight. Once an insight sprouts up, we do have a wonderful opportunity to nurture its potential to create positive change.

Insights come in many varieties. One insight might invite us to alter our behavior or adopt a more compassionate attitude, while another may encourage us to view our past from a fresh new perspective. More rare is the insight that shifts our entire take on reality, like when Krishna revealed his true identity to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita. Whether heart opening or mind blowing, an insight is a precious gift that springs from our own deep wisdom. How can we honor this offering? How do we nurture this seed of wisdom into a full flowering so that it serves the highest good?

One approach might be to consider which Brahma Vihara our insight is pointing us towards. The Brahma Viharas are qualities or heart-mind states that are revered in both the Buddhist and Yoga traditions. Sometimes referred to as the “heavenly abodes” or the “four immeasurables,” they are: loving-kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity. It is taught that these four are the only states that one experiences after becoming fully enlightened. 

If our insight is truly a wise realization, it will be pointing us toward one (or more) of the Brahma Viharas. When we recognize which one, we can support the full unfolding of our insight by focusing our yoga practice on that particular quality. For example, say we’ve had an insight that seems to be calling for greater acceptance around a difficult issue. In this case, we might practice standing postures with an intention to cultivate equanimity as we connect with the Earth’s unwavering support at our foundation. If our insight is calling us to deepen our heart’s natural capacity for kindness or sympathetic joy, we could choose to do postures such as backbends that physically open the heart center and have been shown to increase feelings of happiness. Compassion for self or others pairs readily with forward bends or restorative poses that quiet and renew. These are simply some suggestions. Stay open and notice what speaks to you. There may be a particular pose that suggests itself as the perfect symbol of your insight-in-progress. Practice it as a heart offering to your arising wisdom and growing capacity for love.

Freedom

By Judith Roth

In the face of today’s information overwhelm, the practice for me always comes down to “Where am I putting my attention and awareness?”

Our quest for freedom lays in the conscious choices we make moment to moment in our daily lives. It’s easily understood that this constant barrage of negativity exuded by our communication systems sometimes takes our breath away, reinforcing the huge adrenaline state of fear.

How many of us purposely absorb ourselves in inspirational writings, prayer, in practices that heal our feeling of separation and find the freedom to move more deeply toward the divine?

Just as the barrage of negativity grows in this current political climate, it’s important to realize that equal amounts of energy that don’t receive publicity are going toward practices enhancing the transformation of consciousness and moving us all closer to healing the myth of separation.

I can feel the inspired energy shift.  In the face of storms of negativity promoted by the media, the  season ahead could reflect the shift in consciousness actively taking place on our planet.

The rippling effect of our practices, gatherings and devotion are powerfully transformational.

Find Judith Roth at Sky Temple in Yelapa, Mexico.  http://www.yogainyelapa.com/

On Prana

by Elizabeth Rainey

prāṇa: vital air, life breath, vitality, energy, power

We breath in and out hundreds of times a day and with this activity we animate our body-mind. Intertwined in the flow of the breath rides the mysterious force that enlivens us and allows us to move our bodies and create with our minds. It pulsates in every cell and coordinates all our activities. It is the sparkle in our eyes and the radiance of our being. The breath ... so fundamental, so magical, so easily forgotten.

Through our yoga practice we become more attuned to this subtle and foundational aspect of our being and learn how to nurture and honor it. Our āsana practice is designed to help free the body-mind of obstacles and blockages so that we have more energy available to us. Over time we begin to sense where it is stuck and where it moves freely and endeavor to bring it into a dynamic balance.  Through the practice of prāṇāyāma we cultivate a relationship with our subtle body and invite its potent currents to open, clear and infuse every aspect of our body-mind. The practice of meditation is the settling of our prāṇic body into the open space of our awareness where it can expand beyond the body-mind.

It is said that the link between body and mind is the breath. We know from experience that when we are agitated so is our breath and when our breath is deep and easy so is our body-mind. So, as we attend to our breath (and prāṇa) we access a deeper, more subtle and steady part of our being. And we begin to be able to infuse that steadiness into the constant dance of our body-mind and life.  We also acknowledge our  interconnectedness with every other living being on this planet in an intimate dance of inhale and exhale.

Breathe the light
Ride the wave of possibility that enters you moment by moment
Speak from that sacred place of connection
Honor this divine gift of breath with every action and thought
Be inspired.

See more about Rainey at elizabethrainey.com.
 

Beginner's Mind

By Angi Donovan

What if you could go back to the very first time you felt the powerful presence of your breath? Or back to all the new and intriguing sensations that came to light in your first yoga class? What if you could go back to that wide open space where what you “know” was not yet known?

While we have built much strength, flexibility and balance by being experienced yoginis and yogis, the unbiased and deeply receptive state of a beginner’s mind can easily get lost in all the knowledge that is gained.  So as the kids of our community return to school this September we too will return to new ground where the experience of life is bigger and more interesting, and where our perception enthusiastically wonders what the next moment will hold.

Start fresh this month as you take your sense of awareness and practice back into the enlightening power of the beginner’s mind!

Step Into Presence

by Angi Donovan

My teaching theme for August is stepping into presence.  You’ll know when you have arrived to this place called presence. There will be no stories, no judgments, no expectations; just grounded feet, an open heart and for the very first time you may find yourself living just as you are. No fears to hide from, only eyes staring directly into the moment ready to love. Yoga is our practice for this great adventure; our mats a space for something new, our bodies a medium to be felt and expressed, and our hearts an opening to what is real. If you pay attention you can be caught by the humbling aliveness of your own being.  Each time we stop to breathe or move or take in, we step into the profound experience we call presence.  Explore this with me in class this August 2012 and come to know the power of the moment exactly as you are.  See you there!

With Much Love,
Angi

Welcome!

Welcome to the Seattle Yoga Arts blog, where we aim to broaden the conversation about yoga, help you get to know your talented teachers better, and expand on ideas and topics that arise in class, study and from the great hearts of us all.

Please submit blog posts that have to do with yoga, healing, meditation, practice, insight about life as it relates to practice, inspiration, and evolution to desiree@seattleyogaarts.com.

Your teachers will also use this space to expand on their class teaching topics in the realms of anatomy, yoga philosophy, asana theory and practice, and much more.

Check in often and subscribe to this blog for regular doses of imagination and ingenuity.  The human mind is as creative as all the forms of nature, and we hope to hear from you here!

With a bow of gratitude for the great light you each bring to our community.

Denise Benitez
Founder/Teacher
Seattle Yoga Arts