Mercury went retrograde on Monday. Yes, that means everything is FUBAR. Insert a huge, frustrating yell here . . .
No, actually, I do not feel better.
Let's just keep breathing through this, okay?
Inhale,
Ma'lena
PS. Um, don't forget to exhale, too.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
SAVASANA, THE SACRED REST
By
Ma’lena Walley
Savasana, or corpse pose, is the one where we lie on our backs, feet splayed, arms alongside, allowing ourselves to sink into the earth. Still as a corpse. This pose should be simple yet most of us find it challenging. Sometimes it seems impossible to lie down, settle our breath and quiet our mind. Many people fall asleep—not surprising in a culture starved for rest.
Rest is a state wherein we cease movement and attempt to recover and refresh ourselves. Savasana takes this rest even deeper by allowing us to tap into the divine.
When we come in to the pose, we give ourselves permission to create a space around us and within us that is sanctified. To fall into savasana is to enter a rest that is sacred, one that brings us peace and comfort as well as the safety to completely be: be silent, be reflective, be receptive, become the holy being that we already are. We feel the power of gravity and surrender utterly, without reserve. We feel everything becoming heavy, muscles and bones sinking, nestling into the earth, sending out roots that anchor us and connect us to everything and everyone
Savasana is an active rest; we breathe and our bodies gently rise and fall, moving effortlessly. As we settle into comfort, releasing tension and mental chatter, our breathing slows and deepens into our own pattern and rhythm.
In savasana the part of the brain that responds to meditation—the parietal lobe—becomes tranquil. Thus we soften ourselves from the inside out: organs—stomach and liver, heart and lungs, kidneys and bowels. We push the softening outward, allowing it to radiate into our veins and nervous system, limbic, respiratory, immune and circulatory systems. We invite the softness into our muscles and bones, down to the marrow, softening our joints, tendons and fascia, softening all the way out to the surface of our skin—softening, settling, sinking into the earth, nestling into a burrow so that we are completely safe and comfortable. Now as we breathe we experience the quietude of body and mind before stepping into our spirit—that endless mobius of timelessness where we are able to reach the divine.
We are at ease. We move from comfort into calm; from quiet into stillness . . . We breathe and release, breathe and release.
©Ma’lena Walley, May 2009
By
Ma’lena Walley
Savasana, or corpse pose, is the one where we lie on our backs, feet splayed, arms alongside, allowing ourselves to sink into the earth. Still as a corpse. This pose should be simple yet most of us find it challenging. Sometimes it seems impossible to lie down, settle our breath and quiet our mind. Many people fall asleep—not surprising in a culture starved for rest.
Rest is a state wherein we cease movement and attempt to recover and refresh ourselves. Savasana takes this rest even deeper by allowing us to tap into the divine.
When we come in to the pose, we give ourselves permission to create a space around us and within us that is sanctified. To fall into savasana is to enter a rest that is sacred, one that brings us peace and comfort as well as the safety to completely be: be silent, be reflective, be receptive, become the holy being that we already are. We feel the power of gravity and surrender utterly, without reserve. We feel everything becoming heavy, muscles and bones sinking, nestling into the earth, sending out roots that anchor us and connect us to everything and everyone
Savasana is an active rest; we breathe and our bodies gently rise and fall, moving effortlessly. As we settle into comfort, releasing tension and mental chatter, our breathing slows and deepens into our own pattern and rhythm.
In savasana the part of the brain that responds to meditation—the parietal lobe—becomes tranquil. Thus we soften ourselves from the inside out: organs—stomach and liver, heart and lungs, kidneys and bowels. We push the softening outward, allowing it to radiate into our veins and nervous system, limbic, respiratory, immune and circulatory systems. We invite the softness into our muscles and bones, down to the marrow, softening our joints, tendons and fascia, softening all the way out to the surface of our skin—softening, settling, sinking into the earth, nestling into a burrow so that we are completely safe and comfortable. Now as we breathe we experience the quietude of body and mind before stepping into our spirit—that endless mobius of timelessness where we are able to reach the divine.
We are at ease. We move from comfort into calm; from quiet into stillness . . . We breathe and release, breathe and release.
©Ma’lena Walley, May 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Astrologer at Moon Tree
Are you astrology phobic? Curious? Wanting to experience a full reading and have never had the nerve or opportunity? Here is your chance.
Robert Brown, www.writingsinthesky.com, will be available for readings in the studio. He already has an appointment for a one hour reading, $100, in the studio on Thursday, August 13th. Call if you are interested in making an appointment that day for an in-person reading. 456-5116.
Beginning in the Fall, Robert will begin doing psychic fair readings, $20 for 20 minutes, or $40 for 40 minutes. These will take place on the third Saturdays of every month. Call 456-5116 for more information.
Besides being one of my best friends, Robert is smart, funny and imaginative. He is also intuitive and usually spot on in his readings. I've been skeptical about this sort of metaphysical mumbo jumbo--tarot, auras, crystal work, etc.--yet now having had several readings with Robert, I've come to appreciate this science, particularly when Mercury is Retrograde and the Moon is void (of course.)
Please explore his website, and come to the studio for a reading. If nothing else, it will be fun and you will learn a great deal about yourself.
Appointment are required. No drop ins, please.
Aries all the way,
Ma'lena
Robert Brown, www.writingsinthesky.com, will be available for readings in the studio. He already has an appointment for a one hour reading, $100, in the studio on Thursday, August 13th. Call if you are interested in making an appointment that day for an in-person reading. 456-5116.
Beginning in the Fall, Robert will begin doing psychic fair readings, $20 for 20 minutes, or $40 for 40 minutes. These will take place on the third Saturdays of every month. Call 456-5116 for more information.
Besides being one of my best friends, Robert is smart, funny and imaginative. He is also intuitive and usually spot on in his readings. I've been skeptical about this sort of metaphysical mumbo jumbo--tarot, auras, crystal work, etc.--yet now having had several readings with Robert, I've come to appreciate this science, particularly when Mercury is Retrograde and the Moon is void (of course.)
Please explore his website, and come to the studio for a reading. If nothing else, it will be fun and you will learn a great deal about yourself.
Appointment are required. No drop ins, please.
Aries all the way,
Ma'lena
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
1st Monday Meditation with Robert Brown
Last night Robert Brown, astrologer, teacher and supreme friend, taught a Kundalini meditation class at Moon Tree Gentle Yoga. There were only two of us, and we were enchanted. We learned a 31 minute "Sa Ta Na Ma" sequence that left us renewed and energized.
Robert is a great teacher and I hope to entice him in to doing more classes in the future. For now, check out his website: www.writingsinthesky.com
Sa Ta Na Ma,
Ma'lena
Robert is a great teacher and I hope to entice him in to doing more classes in the future. For now, check out his website: www.writingsinthesky.com
Sa Ta Na Ma,
Ma'lena
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Spring in Spokane--one never knows . . .
Hail! Snow. What's next?
I do love variety, don't you? Yesterday I sat sipping tea while I watched the hail power down; we have come to expect the unexpected here in Spokane.
I have come to feel the same about the classes I offer at Moon Tree--unexpected and varied. My Monday evening Meditation class is going through some changes. Instead of having a class every Monday, I am now going to offer the class on the first Monday of each month, with the prospect of adding a second class on the third Monday of the month. Everyone is invited, all are welcome--chair students, advanced students, students from other studios, strangers, friends and assorted.
Likewise, the Chair Yoga class is on hold for now except I promise to not play crappy music while you are waiting! (I never want to listen to someone else's idea of an appropriate soundtrack while I am waiting on hold for whomever or whatever to get back to me. Why can't we just have silence?)
My Sweet Boy, Fidelio.
My beautiful cat, Fidelio, died on my 55th birthday. What a lesson in acceptance it has been. I am grieving still, bereft, because I miss him every day and still have a hard time believing he is gone. It was shocking, but perhaps not entirely unexpected. Still, the timing . . . I will always remember him on my birthday, which is a good thing.
That's all for now. I'm off to teach my Tuesday evening classes. This week's theme is sweetness.
Sugar and spice,
Ma'lena
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
The Amazing Write to Reshape Workshop
A few weekends ago saw the end of a successful 8-week workshop, "Write to Reshape Your Life." It was a learning experience for all of us, myself included. We explored many ways to jounal and tell o0our stories, using writing, art, spoken word, laughter and yoga.
Most of us learned quite a lot about each other; we bonded over tea and tears. All of us came into the course with expectations, and I believe that those expectations were fullfilled in ways both expected and surprising.
I didn't know if I would succeed, and I knew that together we created a powerful synergy of wisdom . . .
Week 1:For our first class, we introduced ourselves, told a bit about our expectations and what we hoped to do within the workshop. I talked some about journaling, and then we spent time writing a journal entry. We discussed, "The Writing Diet," by Julia Cameron. The second hour saw us playing with paper--specifically, we made lifesized paperdolls to use throughout the workshop, coloring, collaging, decorating as we saw ourselves, or as we wanted to be. The last hour was devoted to asana and meditation, but because we spent so much time laughing and playing, we had a short practice. This would prove to be true throughout the entire workshop experience.
Week 2: This workshop fell on an old holiday, Candlemas, or Imbolc,which means in the belly. It celebrates beginnings, and the return of light. I asked everyone to write down 3 thing they wished to transform. We then burned each in a small bowl of sand and sage, watching as each wish or action transformed from paper into ash. In the second hour we did some journaling, some meditating and then I gave each woman a goddess alter ego to encourage and embrace. We then raided a coloring book from artist Sudie Rakusin for coloring later. We closed in the third hour with an asana practice. Much tea drinking during the entire workshop.
Week 3: I brought in some music therapy, offering some information about vibrations and waves--beta, alpha, gamma, theta and delta and how each state corresponds to a particular state of being, relaxing, creating, meditating, sleeping, working. I played Claude Debussy's, "Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun," after which we discussed how the music made us feel, and what memories and emotions were evoked. In the second hour we played with paper and glue and listened to the first part of a playlist I created using songs given to me. Finally, we closed the day with asana practice.
Week 4: I began with a Kosha meditation and moved into a lecture about Koshas and our vibrational lives, the Chakras. I taught the seed sounds for each Chakra and we then chanted for a while--lam, vam, ram, yam, ham, om. Our second hour had us sharing body poems, and everyone had a wonderful poem to share. After a break we moved into asana practice.
Week 5: We revisited and reviewed Koshas and Chakras then I offered another way to quantify with an interpretation of IQ (intelligence), EQ (emotional intelligence),BQ (body intelligence), CQ (our cellular intelligence), and SQ (spiritual intelligence). After a tea break we shared more poems and journal entries. I reviewed the role of storytelling in our lives, how myths, fables, tales, memoirs, anecdotes and jokes all invoke memories and shared information via archetypes and tropes allowing us to convey information, conclusions, concepts, moral cautions, etc. I spoke of the importance of being witnessed and the value of being entertained and, finally, how stories teach us. We all took turns sharing one of the three stories from the list of assigned subjects. Some were quite funny, some sad, some chaotic yet heartfelt. We all learned from the stories. We closed the workshop with a lively and tearful talk, sharing memories and more stories. I closed the day with a meditation.
Week 6: This week we looked for our center, our spiritual receptor. After our opening meditation, I offered some details about the brain, the parts, the lobes and the location and function of each part, especially the parietal lobe and its value in our perception and experience of the divine, as well as how this part of the brain responds when meditating and praying. I explained the role of receptors within each cell and how every system of the body and mind communicates coming together in a mutually beneficial bodymind. It is within this cooperative structure that we find wisdom, intuition and are able to tap into our genetic memory and pool of knowledge. We had a short tea break andd then moved into sharing a favorite book, quote, picture or piece of art. Every picture had a story . . . after that, we practised some poses and a long Savasana with meditation.
Week 7: Since one of our women missed the previous week, I repeated and reviewed the brain and receptor information--always a good idea with such complicated machinery and operating instructions--and then I spoke about finding our center, our place of grounding. This led into a suggestion that we might be able to discover our spiritual receptor--something that resonates and sets our spiritual center vibrating and responding. Our hour of art incuded playing with medicine cards. We picked out one we identified with and then one at random. This is fun, scary and always enlightening. We closed the workshop with asana and meditation.
Week 8: I reviewed everything (please don't make me list it all again!)then spoke of the importance of finding and using our noetic selves (the use of knowledge that we have inherantly which lies beyond what our normal senses tell us. Wisdom, intuition, cellular memory and genetic knowledge, as Jung said, that vast reservoir of knowledge. In the second hour I read my story, "Bittersweet," offered below. We did a chocolate taste testing, unveiled our paperdolls and ended the entire series of workshops with a yoga nidra.
A good time was had by all.
Bittersweet, by Ma'lena Walley
One day the goddess Cocatina was bored.
"I need to make something," she said to herself, "something so delectable people would die for it."
Into her kitchen she went and she stirred and whipped, reduced and infused. She kept the ingredients simple: eggs, milk, butter, honey and as many giggles as she could capture with her net.
"This is a fine hummingbird souffle, but certainly not something to die for." Her kitchen seemed untouched, still clean.
From her garden she pulled and plucked, snipped and gathered up aromatics, flowers and seeds. She pounded leaves and mashed seeds; she poured sweat and silk. "Ah," she told her audience of sparrows, "this is wonderful lavender seed cake with nasturtium icing, but not quite . . . here," she offered it up, "eat and sing for me while I continue."
Next, Cocatna found some beans she'd been saving in a sack. She went to work grinding and mixing; folding in desire and pleasure, sugar and sadness, a bunch of yes. Almost as an afterthought, along with a dollop of cream, Cocatina added a pinch of eros.
“Oh, perhaps a bit more,” she said as she scooped a tidy handful. “This might do it.”
She heated and cooled, tempering her concoction, a ribbon as “dark as the new moon and as smooth as a velvet cloche. It smelled of yesterday and tomorrow. The taste? “Yes,” Cocatina murmured.
Tired, Cocatina took a nap and dreamed of poppies and bluejays, yolks and sunflowers, pigs and peonies. When she woke up she was ready.
“Taste,” she said to her neighbor, a man who wore blue and did something magical everyday with numbers. “Cal, if I told you that this would make you die, would you still eat it?”
Cal took a quantum bite and chewed. “Yes,” he told her. “I would do anything for more. Please?” He ate and sighed, ate and sighed. “This,” he declared, “is infinitely perfect.”
Pleased, Cocatina then found a woman who wore yellow; she fed birds and grew roses.
“Here,” Cocatina offered, “have some of this chocolate and tell me if you would die for more.” She handed the woman a glistening, dark bar of her chocolate. Cocatina thought she heard the chocolate call the woman’s name, Flora. So overcome by the richness of the substance Flora swooned into her bed of roses causing them to bloom.
“Ah,” Cocatina laughed, “that is answer enough for me.”
Next Cocatina approached Mystery, an aloof goddess who had the pinkest cheeks Cocatina had ever seen. “Would you die for another bite of this,” she asked, offering up a sleek bar?
Mystery nibbled a corner of the bar. “No,” Mystery said, “I would not die for this—or anything else.”
“You shall never have chocolate again, “ Cocatina proclaimed.
She returned to her kitchen and made more; enough for everyone—except Mystery.
Mystery was so sad it spilled into her last bite of chocolate, which is why some chocolate is bittersweet.
©Ma’lena Walley, 2009
I will be offering this workshop again in September. I am already coming up with new ideas and challenging ways to approach the way we use our bodymind. Since a few of the participants expressed a desire to take the course again (that is an endorsement, eh?) my task will be to reinvent it in a fresh manner. Reinvention.
Most of us learned quite a lot about each other; we bonded over tea and tears. All of us came into the course with expectations, and I believe that those expectations were fullfilled in ways both expected and surprising.
I didn't know if I would succeed, and I knew that together we created a powerful synergy of wisdom . . .
Week 1:For our first class, we introduced ourselves, told a bit about our expectations and what we hoped to do within the workshop. I talked some about journaling, and then we spent time writing a journal entry. We discussed, "The Writing Diet," by Julia Cameron. The second hour saw us playing with paper--specifically, we made lifesized paperdolls to use throughout the workshop, coloring, collaging, decorating as we saw ourselves, or as we wanted to be. The last hour was devoted to asana and meditation, but because we spent so much time laughing and playing, we had a short practice. This would prove to be true throughout the entire workshop experience.
Week 2: This workshop fell on an old holiday, Candlemas, or Imbolc,which means in the belly. It celebrates beginnings, and the return of light. I asked everyone to write down 3 thing they wished to transform. We then burned each in a small bowl of sand and sage, watching as each wish or action transformed from paper into ash. In the second hour we did some journaling, some meditating and then I gave each woman a goddess alter ego to encourage and embrace. We then raided a coloring book from artist Sudie Rakusin for coloring later. We closed in the third hour with an asana practice. Much tea drinking during the entire workshop.
Week 3: I brought in some music therapy, offering some information about vibrations and waves--beta, alpha, gamma, theta and delta and how each state corresponds to a particular state of being, relaxing, creating, meditating, sleeping, working. I played Claude Debussy's, "Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun," after which we discussed how the music made us feel, and what memories and emotions were evoked. In the second hour we played with paper and glue and listened to the first part of a playlist I created using songs given to me. Finally, we closed the day with asana practice.
Week 4: I began with a Kosha meditation and moved into a lecture about Koshas and our vibrational lives, the Chakras. I taught the seed sounds for each Chakra and we then chanted for a while--lam, vam, ram, yam, ham, om. Our second hour had us sharing body poems, and everyone had a wonderful poem to share. After a break we moved into asana practice.
Week 5: We revisited and reviewed Koshas and Chakras then I offered another way to quantify with an interpretation of IQ (intelligence), EQ (emotional intelligence),BQ (body intelligence), CQ (our cellular intelligence), and SQ (spiritual intelligence). After a tea break we shared more poems and journal entries. I reviewed the role of storytelling in our lives, how myths, fables, tales, memoirs, anecdotes and jokes all invoke memories and shared information via archetypes and tropes allowing us to convey information, conclusions, concepts, moral cautions, etc. I spoke of the importance of being witnessed and the value of being entertained and, finally, how stories teach us. We all took turns sharing one of the three stories from the list of assigned subjects. Some were quite funny, some sad, some chaotic yet heartfelt. We all learned from the stories. We closed the workshop with a lively and tearful talk, sharing memories and more stories. I closed the day with a meditation.
Week 6: This week we looked for our center, our spiritual receptor. After our opening meditation, I offered some details about the brain, the parts, the lobes and the location and function of each part, especially the parietal lobe and its value in our perception and experience of the divine, as well as how this part of the brain responds when meditating and praying. I explained the role of receptors within each cell and how every system of the body and mind communicates coming together in a mutually beneficial bodymind. It is within this cooperative structure that we find wisdom, intuition and are able to tap into our genetic memory and pool of knowledge. We had a short tea break andd then moved into sharing a favorite book, quote, picture or piece of art. Every picture had a story . . . after that, we practised some poses and a long Savasana with meditation.
Week 7: Since one of our women missed the previous week, I repeated and reviewed the brain and receptor information--always a good idea with such complicated machinery and operating instructions--and then I spoke about finding our center, our place of grounding. This led into a suggestion that we might be able to discover our spiritual receptor--something that resonates and sets our spiritual center vibrating and responding. Our hour of art incuded playing with medicine cards. We picked out one we identified with and then one at random. This is fun, scary and always enlightening. We closed the workshop with asana and meditation.
Week 8: I reviewed everything (please don't make me list it all again!)then spoke of the importance of finding and using our noetic selves (the use of knowledge that we have inherantly which lies beyond what our normal senses tell us. Wisdom, intuition, cellular memory and genetic knowledge, as Jung said, that vast reservoir of knowledge. In the second hour I read my story, "Bittersweet," offered below. We did a chocolate taste testing, unveiled our paperdolls and ended the entire series of workshops with a yoga nidra.
A good time was had by all.
Bittersweet, by Ma'lena Walley
One day the goddess Cocatina was bored.
"I need to make something," she said to herself, "something so delectable people would die for it."
Into her kitchen she went and she stirred and whipped, reduced and infused. She kept the ingredients simple: eggs, milk, butter, honey and as many giggles as she could capture with her net.
"This is a fine hummingbird souffle, but certainly not something to die for." Her kitchen seemed untouched, still clean.
From her garden she pulled and plucked, snipped and gathered up aromatics, flowers and seeds. She pounded leaves and mashed seeds; she poured sweat and silk. "Ah," she told her audience of sparrows, "this is wonderful lavender seed cake with nasturtium icing, but not quite . . . here," she offered it up, "eat and sing for me while I continue."
Next, Cocatna found some beans she'd been saving in a sack. She went to work grinding and mixing; folding in desire and pleasure, sugar and sadness, a bunch of yes. Almost as an afterthought, along with a dollop of cream, Cocatina added a pinch of eros.
“Oh, perhaps a bit more,” she said as she scooped a tidy handful. “This might do it.”
She heated and cooled, tempering her concoction, a ribbon as “dark as the new moon and as smooth as a velvet cloche. It smelled of yesterday and tomorrow. The taste? “Yes,” Cocatina murmured.
Tired, Cocatina took a nap and dreamed of poppies and bluejays, yolks and sunflowers, pigs and peonies. When she woke up she was ready.
“Taste,” she said to her neighbor, a man who wore blue and did something magical everyday with numbers. “Cal, if I told you that this would make you die, would you still eat it?”
Cal took a quantum bite and chewed. “Yes,” he told her. “I would do anything for more. Please?” He ate and sighed, ate and sighed. “This,” he declared, “is infinitely perfect.”
Pleased, Cocatina then found a woman who wore yellow; she fed birds and grew roses.
“Here,” Cocatina offered, “have some of this chocolate and tell me if you would die for more.” She handed the woman a glistening, dark bar of her chocolate. Cocatina thought she heard the chocolate call the woman’s name, Flora. So overcome by the richness of the substance Flora swooned into her bed of roses causing them to bloom.
“Ah,” Cocatina laughed, “that is answer enough for me.”
Next Cocatina approached Mystery, an aloof goddess who had the pinkest cheeks Cocatina had ever seen. “Would you die for another bite of this,” she asked, offering up a sleek bar?
Mystery nibbled a corner of the bar. “No,” Mystery said, “I would not die for this—or anything else.”
“You shall never have chocolate again, “ Cocatina proclaimed.
She returned to her kitchen and made more; enough for everyone—except Mystery.
Mystery was so sad it spilled into her last bite of chocolate, which is why some chocolate is bittersweet.
©Ma’lena Walley, 2009
I will be offering this workshop again in September. I am already coming up with new ideas and challenging ways to approach the way we use our bodymind. Since a few of the participants expressed a desire to take the course again (that is an endorsement, eh?) my task will be to reinvent it in a fresh manner. Reinvention.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Ch Ch Ch Ch Changes . . .
Today was an exciting day in our nation's history and I am so proud to be a part of it. Looking at the million of folks gathered to watch the inauguration, I was heartened by the unity of those participating. Everyone was included. It's the first time since 1993 that I have been hopeful and full of passion about my government.
Yes, I claim it. I hope you do, too.
Change,
Ma'lena
Yes, I claim it. I hope you do, too.
Change,
Ma'lena
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Snow . . . and more snow; yes, snow
The steady accumulation of snow has been making it difficult to maneuver around the streets of Spokane. I live on a hilltop, and while I might successfully get down off of the hill, the challenge of getting back up frequently is enough incentive to keep me home.
We have just begun our first session of the new year, 2009. I am hoping that you will all show up for classes in spite of the snow, or perhaps because of it.
This week we will be exploring the theme of hibernation. Slowing down, moving into dormancy and stillness so that we might simply be.
Stay warm,
Ma'lena
We have just begun our first session of the new year, 2009. I am hoping that you will all show up for classes in spite of the snow, or perhaps because of it.
This week we will be exploring the theme of hibernation. Slowing down, moving into dormancy and stillness so that we might simply be.
Stay warm,
Ma'lena
Ahimsa
The Kindness of Strangers, Including Ourselves
By
Ma’lena Walley
2008©
Often it is easier to be kinder to strangers than it is to extend kindness and compassion to our families and ourselves—if we feel secure we release the beasts of anger, violence and cruelty. No matter how we may wish to behave, our limbic system rules our instinctual emotive life.
The basic yogic precept of ahimsa means nonviolence. Along with ahimsa’s nonharming/nonviolence definition there is also the connotation of kindness.. Acting with the compass of kindness makes violent and harmful acts difficult; when done, these then become acts of intention. Behaving, speaking and thinking as well as being mindful in ahimsa obviates harmful or violent acts—in theory because we are humans with foibles, flaws and passions. We fail, we falter, and we lose faith. After any unkindness, we come home to ourselves, the aftermath. This is when we need an open heart, a softening, an opening and an invitation to compassion.
It is challenging to act kindly in our culture of violence. Violence prevails; it is casual and pervasive. We are so desensitized that many of us no longer recognize it. Our language reflects this: think about what happens when you are angry and you say, “I’m gonna rip your lungs out,” or similarly brutal language. Your body and psyche hears this and responds in the limbic system by reverting to the fight or flight mode of shallow breathing, elevated BP, etc. As a complex system of nerves and networks, the limbic center of our brain involves instinct and mood, basic emotions—fear, pleasure, anger—as well as drives and urges. These primal components are often sealed into our cortex in a bonding of memory and sense.
For myself, every time I overeat, or choose unhealthy food I am acting with violence towards my body—I harm myself. The sequela of guilt follows—harming. This cycle continues and I succumb to stress, self-loathing and feelings of failure and futility. Ahimsa allows me to release part of the calculus of failure. When I do eat something unhealthy, I can compassionately accept that it is a behavior with which I continuously struggle. Yet kindness helps me avoid guilt and recrimination and more harmful eating. With guilt removed from the equation, I am free to act with kindness towards myself and everyone else.
Ahimsa requires patience, acceptance and being in the present. When macerating fruit, the fruit sits in a sweetened bath of liquid. While steeping and infusing, the fruit responds by softening, sweetening and taking on the characteristics of the sweetened liquid. Let yourself steep in ahimsa so that you become infused with it. Intensely flavored with kindness, you will telegraph the soft sweetness of ahimsa into your limbic and immune systems, your autonomic nervous system, as well as your heart, mind, and spirit, and these will act in concert to calibrate your behavior. The longer you steep, the more profound the changes.
By
Ma’lena Walley
2008©
Often it is easier to be kinder to strangers than it is to extend kindness and compassion to our families and ourselves—if we feel secure we release the beasts of anger, violence and cruelty. No matter how we may wish to behave, our limbic system rules our instinctual emotive life.
The basic yogic precept of ahimsa means nonviolence. Along with ahimsa’s nonharming/nonviolence definition there is also the connotation of kindness.. Acting with the compass of kindness makes violent and harmful acts difficult; when done, these then become acts of intention. Behaving, speaking and thinking as well as being mindful in ahimsa obviates harmful or violent acts—in theory because we are humans with foibles, flaws and passions. We fail, we falter, and we lose faith. After any unkindness, we come home to ourselves, the aftermath. This is when we need an open heart, a softening, an opening and an invitation to compassion.
It is challenging to act kindly in our culture of violence. Violence prevails; it is casual and pervasive. We are so desensitized that many of us no longer recognize it. Our language reflects this: think about what happens when you are angry and you say, “I’m gonna rip your lungs out,” or similarly brutal language. Your body and psyche hears this and responds in the limbic system by reverting to the fight or flight mode of shallow breathing, elevated BP, etc. As a complex system of nerves and networks, the limbic center of our brain involves instinct and mood, basic emotions—fear, pleasure, anger—as well as drives and urges. These primal components are often sealed into our cortex in a bonding of memory and sense.
For myself, every time I overeat, or choose unhealthy food I am acting with violence towards my body—I harm myself. The sequela of guilt follows—harming. This cycle continues and I succumb to stress, self-loathing and feelings of failure and futility. Ahimsa allows me to release part of the calculus of failure. When I do eat something unhealthy, I can compassionately accept that it is a behavior with which I continuously struggle. Yet kindness helps me avoid guilt and recrimination and more harmful eating. With guilt removed from the equation, I am free to act with kindness towards myself and everyone else.
Ahimsa requires patience, acceptance and being in the present. When macerating fruit, the fruit sits in a sweetened bath of liquid. While steeping and infusing, the fruit responds by softening, sweetening and taking on the characteristics of the sweetened liquid. Let yourself steep in ahimsa so that you become infused with it. Intensely flavored with kindness, you will telegraph the soft sweetness of ahimsa into your limbic and immune systems, your autonomic nervous system, as well as your heart, mind, and spirit, and these will act in concert to calibrate your behavior. The longer you steep, the more profound the changes.
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