YOGA…Creating Space
Please join me for this easy, 43 minute yoga flow. It’s all about creating inner space and opening, expanding. Thanks for practicing with me.
Yoga Flow….Expansion
Join in for an easy, expansive flow of yoga working with the breath, easy poses and relaxation.
Work of the Soul
A few days ago I taught part of a yoga class with a small group of individuals from my yoga teacher training. Soul School is a program led by Sean Johnson and Mitchel Bleier. I met Sean through his beautiful musical gifts with Wild Lotus Band and took my first class with him at a yoga festival in Pensacola. Later, I traveled to Ireland to attend a Celtic spirituality retreat with Sean and Mary Meighan. I’ve practiced yoga for decades and have taken classes with some amazing instructors but knew that if I ever participated in a teacher training course it would be with Sean and Soul School.
Bhakti yoga is Sean’s touchstone…the yoga of loving devotion. The genuine love and heartfelt practice called deeply to me but I could never work out logistics to go to New Orleans to take the course. And then….the pandemic arrived and Soul School became an online offering. I had no more excuses. It was available to me if I dared follow the path.
My intention in participating was to find my Voice. Even though I’ve been super-blessed through the years to have the space and time to develop my skills and talents, I felt there was something missing in my ability to translate what is in my heart to the world and to share the love I have for the world in a way that was helpful and of service. I didn’t really expect to want to teach yoga. I just wanted to participate in the transformational process that I knew would take place.
As a musician and vocalist, Sean offered many teachings on opening the voice. As I worked with the exercises, layers of blocks to creativity began to drop away and I found myself in a creative flow that seemed effortless, as if it was pouring from my soul.
This past Saturday morning I awoke and did my morning meditation. During that quiet time I felt a strong resonance with the archetype of Teacher and heard that my work in the world is that of Teacher. I’ve been a massage therapy instructor, Reiki teacher, Polarity Therapy teacher, scuba instructor, photography instructor, piano teacher, meditation teacher…so it wasn’t a stretch to grasp that truth. But it wasn’t until I was in the teaching role last Saturday that I felt it…deeply felt the Teacher in me awaken to full potential.
In the preparation for teaching part of the class, everything flowed effortlessly. During the class, as I was teaching, I felt all of who I am present. My skills from various pursuits were there lending sparks of wisdom. There was no anxiety or fear. There was only flow. And after I finished I knew I had found the way forward in life.
I’ve been dreaming about teaching yoga outdoors, incorporating my skills as a body-centered psychotherapist from years ago, the body awareness from my days as a massage therapist and energy work practitioner, nature leader, training in various spiritual traditions, musician and poet/writer/mystic. Paying attention to that dream is easy because I’ve never felt so perfectly aligned with myself and Spirit as I did during that segment of class I taught.
Maybe that’s how we know we are doing the work of the soul…effortless alignment and full engagement of all parts of ourselves resulting in pure bliss and joy.
I’m so grateful to Sean and Mitchel for holding space for us during this training. Sean brings the mystical, spiritual to life in the training and Mitchel brings teaching of asanas to beautiful expression. I entered the program wanting to find my voice, not really expecting to become a yoga instructor and I finish the program with a stronger voice, increased creative flow and clarity of path that I’ve longed for…for such a long time.
What’s Next?
Recently I wrote blog posts about releasing old stories we tell ourselves. Part 1 and Part 2 were about our individual, familial, and cultural stories that keep us stuck with a limited definition of who we are. The big question is, what’s next?
We do the hard work of recognizing those abusive stories and clearing them but what happens next? As life generally provides the answer, it came for me during yoga teacher training.
We were discussing archetypes that yoga teachers exhibit and it touched something within me that had been hidden for a while. A long while. I came out of the training remembering my fascination and admiration for Carl Jung, the psychoanalyst who first wrote about archetypes. In graduate school, his psychological theory was the one that deeply spoke to me, so some of that profound explanation of the human psyche returned as I mulled over the class.
Jungian archetypes are universal symbols that originate in the collective unconscious. Archetype means original pattern. I like to think of archetypes as containers holding patterns of being. Jung defined twelve primary types and suggested that each of us has one that dominates our personality but others might also have influence.
The twelve and what they seek are: Ruler–Control; Artist–Innovation; Sage–Knowledge; Innocent–Safety; Explorer–Freedom; Rebel–Liberation; Hero–Mastery; Wizard–Power; Jester–Pleasure; Everyman–Belonging; Lover–Intimacy; Caregiver–Service.
While we might resonate with one more than others, chances are that we find many of these archetypes manifesting within our psyche in some way.
So, back to the yoga teaching training…we had a wonderful discussion about archetypes and the qualities that define them. We took turns leading our group in short meditations like teachers use for opening and closing a class and I led the one at the end of our morning discussion on archetypes.
As I closed my eyes and listened for guidance on what to say, I found myself in a beautiful place of openness and listening to the group energy of our class. What followed was a guided meditation on embodying an archetype that spoke to each person and a way to bring that forth into the world as our gift.
One of the instructors, at the end of the meditation, suggested an entire class could be done with the archetype meditation so the following morning that’s what I did…for myself, my personal practice.
During that time I realized how much space had been cleared by allowing the old storylines to fall away and that now I was able to open to and play with different aspects of my psyche. One of the most amazing surprises that resulted from the practice was realization that the many years of study and participation with a group from the UK that works with the Qabalah was preparing me for work in the world. It wasn’t just a spiritual study to learn. It was a spiritual study to experience and put into practice in the world.
Having more inner space allowed me to clearly see the skills that have been honed through many years of meditation, study and ritual. And to realize those skills learned were not just about study, personal power or personal mastery. The skills gained were leading me to a deeper ability to bring the work of my soul through into physical manifestation with clarity, humility, love and deep compassion.
Without doubt, this was the second most powerful yoga practice I’ve ever done. (The first one was when I was with humpback whales 90 miles off the coast of the Dominican Republic and they led me through a purple fire of initiation…you can read about that in Cosmic Whales: Mystical Stories from the Sea).
As I have worked diligently on releasing the old stories over the past month…oh, let’s be honest–I’ve been working on this for decades….the recent clearing has opened the way to embody powerful archetypes that come directly from the collective unconscious. And the key is to embody and learn from these symbols and be flexible, non-grasping. Allow the power to come through but don’t become attached to it. Learn from it, use it to help manifest whatever your soul mission is, and then be open and flexible for other archetypes to teach us as we open to embody them.
So we clear the old stories and realize our families rarely are what we think we need and often are the sources of great pain as we push against them to grow into our full potential. Yet a friend of mine reminded me many years ago: the family you chose before you incarnated is here to help you grow into your potential…they offer you resistance, something to push against so your growth is more rapid, deeper. And so even though we might grieve what we thought we never had, perhaps we had something even better…other souls willing to challenge us to become more fully who we truly are.
We learn self-care, we learn how to nurture and love ourselves and we learn to refuse to allow further abuse to ourselves–from our self or others– all with appreciation and gratitude for the lessons learned. And we walk forward knowing that as we open to the inner space, our ability to embody who we truly are grows with every old storyline we drop, even the one about being an orphan surrounded by a complete family.
My Anger Practiced Yoga Today
During my yoga practice this morning I felt anger arise. My thoughts kept returning to racial prejudices, white terrorists, environmental laws and regulations being abolished, violence, meanness, insanity of political leadership. At first I redirected my mind to stay with the practice and steered it away from the anger but my body, opening more as I stretched and breathed into it, led me to be present with my emotions. As I stretched and breathed I invited my anger to be with me on the mat.
Too often we judge ourselves negatively when unpleasant or uncomfortable feelings arise–yet isn’t a foundation of yoga to be present with ourselves no matter what?
So today, my anger and I practiced yoga together. It doesn’t have to hide from me any longer. Perhaps the most spiritual practice we can do is to simply practice self-acceptance, self-love. For that is the basis of love that can then flow to others freely and without judgment.
All of who I am is welcome to be here…now and always.