How to Love this Crazy Life

A student came up to me after class yesterday and thanked me. She told me the last time she was in class, I gave her a correction that opened the energy flow to her heart and she began to cry. It was the first time she had cried since she and her husband split up. She went home and cried alot. She began to heal her broken heart.

This has been one hell of a full moon for me. Unresolved issues and unconscious beliefs often pop up during the light of a full moon. Libra, as you know, is all about harmonizing relationships. Being one myself, I can tell you that we Librans love high-minded ideas. Where we fall short is in manifesting them. This Libra full moon came in Taurus, challenging us to really embody those ideas in our daily relationships. I returned from an intense spiritual retreat, where I had done deep work on my father issues, to a week of renovating the upstairs, rebellion from my teen, bronchitus and a broken bone from my son and several minor crises at work. My revelation came when I saw that what stopped me from surrendering to the flow of this crazy life was the image I have of me as the little damaged one who has to be strong and hold it all together.

My yoga practice has given me a context to create meaning out of chaos. It's helped me become a more spacious holding place for my drama. Don't get me wrong, I've got more problems than ever. As a matter of fact, it seems that the more I expand my arms in acceptance, the more I'm challenged to get my arms around another issue. The humor of this is not lost on me. Life is a perfect mirror for what goes on inside us. Damn it!

Seriously though, what I'm finding is that it gets easier to unravel the story, to find a peaceful point of view that remains unscathed by all the fury around me. Sometimes when I'm really caught up in it, there is also the eye of the one who watches, who has a much bigger view.

I know many of us experience this all the time. I see it class. Every day, I see more and more people who can switch in an instant from the personal to the impersonal. It's really important to name this. We need to know what is happening to us. It's not all bad news out there. Yes, the world is challenging us, like never before. But, something exquiste is unfolding in us because we are asking for it.

Even when you're not having a really shitty day, there are days when you are distracted, anxious and feeling the pressure of too many demands. On days like this, the biggest obstacle is the mind. This is when just listening to your breath and fixing your attention on building a mandala-like yoga pose allows you to track the release of muscular tension, the upwelling of vigor and the passing of hopelessness.

It is in these simple moments that the practice is the richest. You find yourself again and all is good. Life is unfolding, and so are you.

You leave your mat feeling better about yourself, the progress you are making and your ability to be a catalyst for something good in life.

AA has a term for it, "meeting life as it is". Byron Katie uses the phrase "stop arguing with reality". In yoga, we speak of living from your center, walking the walk and being guided by grace.

Om Shanti.