Go Head On

Go Head On!  ~Jeanne Draper Phillips

One of my Mother’s many expressions comes to mind this New Year’s Eve… “Go head on!”  I remember her saying this over the years.  It always made us smile and still does as this       90-year young will reply with these words to your proclamation of plans both big and small. 

She communicated so much in these three words.  “Go head on” was her message…

that you are capable, strong and know what to do

that you can choose what to believe, think, and be

that you are responsible for your decisions, and

that you are loved - no matter what.

So “Go head on!”  During the New Year, at each new moon, with each new day, and with each new breath…”Go head on.” 

You are perfect with your perceived imperfections. 

You are all knowing when thoughts are confused or clouded. 

You are a magnificent kaleidoscope of all your experiences and each color and shape from your past are part of your spectacular You. 

And… you are loved.  You ARE love.    

My Mom

Practicing Flexibility and Allowance

  

Interruptions. Intrusions. Distractions. The unexpected…will happen.  It always does.  Yet we respond as if it shouldn’t.  That the disruption is an insult to our being.  As if we are assaulted, pushed, or pulled out of our place of comfort or knowing.  We may think, “How dare you?” or “Why me?”  And yet, it will happen again and again.  We know life is change, life is moving, and always shifting.

And we also know that stability is enhanced with flexibility.  Ask an engineer or an architect.  Like a bridge or building, we are stronger when we are flexible and practice allowance.  We are stronger when we allow interruptions to our expectations and experience.  We are stronger with allowance and when we decide with love how to respond…how to be. 

Each time there is the unexpected, the interruption or the irritation, we can practice allowance.  We can allow an opportunity to strengthen and possibly to discover something incredible about ourselves and others.

You Can Always Come Home

Our family home was on River Road, a corner lot with a gravel,  semicircular driveway in the front of the home.    You could see visitors come and go when standing on the front porch or sidewalk. 

I went to college four days after graduating high school.  I completed my first four years of college within three by going year-round.  I did not live at home again.  I was a short-term visitor during the two-to-three week breaks between quarterly sessions.  Sometimes traveling to and from school with my older brother or with friends, and then driving myself when I got my first car… a 1964 Rambler. 

During these years my dad would come out of the house to greet me and he would come out to the car when I was leaving.  There were hugs and kisses.  And then his last words were, “You can always come home.”  His words echoed as I left home and drove out the driveway onto River Road.  This tradition continued when Bobby and I would visit.  As we were leaving, he’d say to both of us, “You can always come home.” 

My Dad’s words come to mind and heart often.  They are a source of comfort.  Over the years, his words have evolved into a personal mantra to support my yoga practices whether it’s my home on the mat, home with my breath, or being centered and present within my heart, my true essence, my home within.

“You can always come home,” reminds me to get on my mat when I’m just too busy or tired. It reminds me to breathe when I have forgotten to breathe. It encourages me to sit in stillness when I need to be still.  It grounds me, bringing me home to that place within that knows, clarifies, simplifies, and recognizes it is all right.

You can always come home.

A hOMe tree

Being in the pose...

The pose is what you are doing.  Yoga is how you are being in the pose. 

  Rolf Gates  

This quote caught my attention and I continue to ponder its meaning for my practice on and off the mat.  “Doing yoga” is how I speak of my practice.  When I am asked, “What are you doing, Claire?”  I respond, “I’m doing yoga.” 

Some may think of this as minor semantics of language.  However for me, I find words are powerful. Our thoughts that link these powerful words together become our way of thinking.  Our way of thinking becomes our way of acting. 

“Doing yoga” implies action.  You are moving, performing, and engaging in this activity from beginning to end.  This is true for the pose or for when I am off the mat, it can be any action or activity. 

However, yoga is more than the act.  Yoga is more than the pose.  Yoga is more than the act of putting your body into shapes, stretching, or becoming flexible.  Yoga is about being…we are human beings.  Kurt Vonnegut wrote, “I am a human being, not a human doing.”  Yet, I find that I am often a human doing.  Doing this or that, without being present or mindful or aware of the doing.

Yoga is joining and connecting the past/present/future to the stillness of now.  Yoga is being in the pause between the inhale and exhale.  Being between strength and ease.  Being fully aligned and centered with our Truth.

The words and thoughts, our simple expressions begin the pattern or habit.  It is through the practice of yoga that Rolf Gates’ words ring true for me.  How do I want to be in the pose?  How do I want to practice?  Am I doing yoga or am I being in yoga?

Well alright…It’s all right.

There is no better feeling.  No better comfort.  You hug, lean your head on her shoulder, and she pats you on the back.  She says over and over, “Mother knows.  It’s going to be alright.”  I hear these words clear as a bell.  When things are not working out like I plan or things are just out of sorts, I hear her words.  I feel her patting my back. 

“Well alright…It’s alright” are the words spoken at the end of each class I teach.  When one of my master teachers asked, “Claire, what do you want to teach?”, my answer was immediate.  I want students to learn to capture the feeling and knowing that all is right in this moment. 

It’s through the practice of yoga that we connect breath and movement, mind and body, heart and spirit, and to that best part of ourselves.  We  learn and practice to move and to be still.  It’s within the stillness and being within the postures that we find this connection to heart and center.  Lingering in the stillness serves to bring clarity and to our awareness that all is right.  It’s all right.