March 13, 2008 Alone in the Waters – Navigating the Second Chakra

Here’s the second chakra entry (betcha can’t guess how many more there’ll be ;-]) I teach a lot of classes which focus on balancing chakras. The second chakra class is always heavy, I have to come to it with a lot of energy and courage. But I also find that students respond really well to the work. Last week one of my students told me that she felt fantastic and happy all day after a morning second chakra class – like something had been lifted. The area can introduce us to important aspects of our psyche that we tend to repress or bury. And of course asanas can really shift the energy.

The second chakra, called svadhisthana, is the next step in the journey. The color of this chakra is moonlight white and its mantra is “Vam.” These are the shape and sound of the liquid factor from which the second chakra is created. This second great element of the universe which emerges from the solid factor. As liquid emerges from solid, the second chakra emerges from the first. “I’m here” exclaims the joyful baby Brahma, “now what?”

According to Carl Jung, it is from this second chakra that we dive into the deep, murky waters of the subconscious mind. The svadhisthana chakra contains these waters in its cup-like crescent moon shape. The yogis identified such tendencies as indifference, lack of common sense and cruelty as emanating from this chakra. So, the second chakra is not only about the strong subconscious drive to reproduce ourselves and all the behaviors that drive elicits, it is also about other instinctual behaviors that often manifest as the “darker” side of our psyche.

Whereas the first chakra is, on a cellular level, about breaking out from the primordial soup into prana-infused uni-cellular life, the second chakra is a place of increasing complexity, where we move into the reptilian mind. There is nothing wrong with reptiles per se. If we look disdainfully on alligators for abandoning their young to fend for themselves we are doing so through the eyes of our more developed human heart chakra. We can’t judge reptiles for being reptiles, but we can understand that there is a big problem with a reptile living in a human body.

When reptilian behaviors arise in human beings, there is a second chakra imbalance. Psychopathic or sociopathic cruelty, self-destructive behavior and “cold-heartedness” emerge from imbalances of the second chakra. But the word “Svadhisthana” also means “that which sustains itself.” The diety who presides over this chakra is Vishnu, the one who sustains life. In other words, even though life can deliver tremendous trauma, abuse and victimization, there is a sustaining hope for the preservation of life, for life to continue for healing to happen. Vishnu is often called “Ananta” which means “The Infinite One”. In other words there are infinite possibilities for healing and wholeness. When the spiritual warrior dives into the waters of the unconscious in her practice, she must come face to face with the darker side of herself as well as the dark side of others. The fullest expression of self embraces its own “negative” tendencies in order to bring them to light and transform them. This is the path of the tantrics – to meet life’s challenges with strength and fortitude while embracing everything, even our darkest moments and our deepest challenges, as an expression of the Divine.

March 3, 2008 Getting to the Root of It

These next few weeks I’ll be writing about the chakras – probably one of the most important practical aspects of yoga theory to understand in terms of why the practice works and what you can expect out of it.
The root is the beginning.

The first chakra is called the “muladhara” which means the “root support.” It is the foundation of the entire system. In the center of the chakra is a golden square, this is the shape and color of the solid factor, the first of the five elements that make up the universe. The solid factor – that force which makes things solid – underlies the creation of the first cakra. The solid factor is often called the “earth.” And the first chakra is a place where we must solidly find our grounding in order to proceed further along on our journey. Resting upon that square is the sound, “Lam” the bija mantra of the first chakra. The four petals of the muladhara chakra represent the four purus-arthas or basic desires of life: kama, artha, dharma and moksa — physical desire, mental-emotional desire, the desire for things to be right in the world, and the desire for liberation. The first cakra is the residence of the kulakunalini, the coiled serpentine power. The Kundalini is asleep here until some event “awakens” this energy. If the Kundalini is awakened through a physical or emotional trauma, the person may suffer confusion and even psychosis and so this is generally not considered a safe way to wake up the serpent power. However, when this energy is called up through initiation into the tantric path, the practitioner can begin the process of self-awakening and self-realization.

The Kundalini is also called “Shakti” or the creative power of the universe. Shakti is also mythologically considered to be the wife of Shiva, the great god, and philosophically, the unqualified consciousness. Shakti desires union with Shiva, who resides in the seventh cakra at the crown of the head. The attempt to bring Shakti to Shiva is the path of the tantric yogi and it is the journey through the cakras.

The diety that presides over this cakra is the baby Brahma. Brahma here being the creator of the universe and also interchangeable with Shiva. The baby Brahma represents the potential and possibility of human life. He is the hope for the future, individually and collectively.

Everything that we can and do long for is within the muladhara. In fact, every desire of the entire universe is latent in this cakra. The muladhara cakra is the place of desire and potential – of what the individual wants in this life, of what is possible to attain. It is the place from which we embark on the subtle journey. However balance in this cakra requires that we accept that the journey may eventually reveal that what we truly want is different from what we originally thought.

February 12, 2008 Water, Silence and Art

What are your habits? Do you perhaps buy a Cinnamon Dolce Frappacino every morning between 8:23 and 8:25 and let it cool for the 5 more minutes it takes you to get to your office? Because you know that, after you turn on the light and place your coat on the back of the door (on the right hook, not the left), it will be the perfect temperature to enjoy while you’re reading your email?
Research has found that 45 percent of our behavior is habitual. That’s right, 45 percent. My goodness, that’s a lot of autopilot. But it’s a good thing because we can let her/him drive while we use our precious brain cells for attending to important tasks which actually require thought processes.
The problem of course is that not all habits are good. Some of them come on unconsciously and can get us in hot water quickly. Swami Vivekananda said something like “You can’t surmount a bad habit until you replace it with a good one.” So our tendency towards habit means we have lots of opportunities to create good ones – it’s these habits that can then take the place of the coffee and cigarettes. And as opposed to giving us anxiety and cancer, they will make our life fuller and our spirit expand.
And the good habits (which of course should include meditating and doing yoga every day ;->) can give us the space for cultivating even more positive habits that nurture our souls.
Flannery O’Connor, one of the 20th century’s greatest American writers, wrote a bunch of letters throughout her life to her friend Betty. After her death, these letters were compiled in a book called, The Habit of Being. In it O’Connor reveals that, despite suffering from a protracted illness which would eventually kill her, her deep commitment to her work led her to an unflinching “habit of art.” She would work for a specific number of hours every day, unfailingly, in devotion to her art. And her habit gave her contentment – contentment which comes from cultivating the habit of being.
After you get the drinking 8 glasses of water a day kind of habits in place, what other habits can you start to create for yourself that affirm your being? Do you enjoy throwing clay on a potter’s wheel and spinning it into smooth, weighty coffee cups? Are you fascinated by reading about wild medicinal herbs? Do you love letting the music of John Coltrane wash over you as you lie on the couch under your favorite afghan? What habit would give you pleasure, stimulate your mind and senses and give your life sweetness? How could you find space in your life to make your habit of being a steady inhabitant of your time.
Yoga is a habit that can bring all our other positive habits to life and through yoga we can more easily experience seated meditation. Stillness is a habit that is a natural tendency – it’s something that every human being desires and is equipped for. It is in stillness that we find answers, meaning, order and peace.

February 5, 2008 Mental Alchemy

While yoga will do a pretty good job opening your hips and stretching your hamstrings, the main point of the practice is to quiet things down in the mind. The great 20th century Bengali saint Ramakrishna said “The mind is like a drunken monkey that’s been stung by a scorpion.” And from my limited experience, I’d have to agree with the guy.

Yogash Citta Vritti Nirodha, the second, and most famous sutra of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras means: yoga is the cessation of the fluxuations of the mind. So there it is, that’s the practice – getting that monkey to quiet itself down – put away the mental to-do lists, cut off the “he-said, she-said” conversations, elminate the negative self talk, stifle the planner.
But here’s the thing: according to yoga philosophy, the very nature of the mind is to think. In fact, the mind cannot even exist without a thought. Well then, what’s the point of stopping it? Truth is, you can’t. But you can divert it, you can assuage it and you can use it’s energy for personal transformation. The real question becomes: what do I think about?

If we can remember that we are not our thoughts, that thoughts are something that we have rather than something that we are, we can create enough distance from them to eliminate some of the pain they may cause us. Another important technique is to release the thought from the tentacles of judgment. If the thought is not me, it’s just a thought, then I don’t have to invest in it. I don’t have to beat myself up for having it. It’s a thought, it will come and go, I have the choice of whether or not I will integrate it.

After gaining some ground in the separation of self and thought, then the practice of intention can be very useful. So what would be the thing that would dissipate a challenging thought? What if every time you had the thought, you used it as an opportunity for alchemy? What if you could take the energy that you use up in the negative thought and apply it to a transformational thought? Say you can’t stop feeling like you have a fat, unattractive body. What if every time that thought came up, you replaced it with “I love my strong, healthy body and I appreciate all that it does for me.” That would mean that every time the negative thought appeared, you had the opportunity to create something new.

This is ancient stuff, this is what the Tantric yoga masters taught. Every time a “negative” thought arises, you have an opportunity for growth.

I’ll talk about the next practice, Guru Vandana, or offering the colors of your mind, in the next post.

January 23, 2008 Love has a Technology

Love can transform societies and ultimately the whole world. We need love.
Love is the answer.
But how do you learn love? How does the world learn to love?
What if you wanted to learn to play the violin, would you just pick up the violin and play? There are a few rare individuals who do and they are masters. But for most of us, we would have to take lessons and practice.
Actually learning to love is something like this. For most of us, we need to take lessons, we need to practice, we need to learn. The possibility is there for all of us, with commitment and tenacity – we can master love, and we can change the world through it.
So what is the system, the technology of love?
IMHO, yoga is a good one. It has been developed and honed over thousands of years. Although it generally requires a decent teacher, it also includes several step-by-step manuals.
A long time ago a great yogi named Krishna lived. He taught, in the Bhagavad Gita, that in order to love, yogis should follow three  paths: Karma yoga – the yoga of taking right action in the world; Jinana yoga – the yoga of seeking to understand spiritual truths and embodying spiritual knowledge; and Bhakti yoga – the yoga of cultivating and deepening a loving relationship with the Divine.
A long time ago, but not as long ago as Krishna, another great yogi, Patanjali, looked deeply into the human mind. And he started to explain it. He collected many of the great yogic teachings, systematized them, and wrote them down. In the Yoga Sutras, his teachings built upon what Krishna had taught. He explained the mind and then explained how the mind can overcome its obstacles to identify with its true nature. The Sutras outline how to develop the relationship with the Divine. In other words, how to love. Patanjali called it Ashtanga yoga – subscribing to situational ethics, controlling the vital force, learning to sit comfortably so that you can withdraw your mind from external distractions, and then concentrating the mind and contemplating the Divine.
Another aspect of the practice he called Kriya yoga – this is his suggestions for how to be in the world: helping others make their lives less difficult, attempting to understand deep spiritual truths, and committing to the action of moving towards your Source. Sounds easy enough, but it does require a strong desire to trace all love back to its Source – the desire to love and be loved by the Divine.

January 17, 2008 Viveka: Honing Critical Thinking Skills

One of my students told me that since she watched Zeitgeist, she hasn’t really been able to sleep well and her mind has been completely absorbed in the horror of what is happening in the world and her seeming powerlessness. For those of you who haven’t seen Zeitgeist yet, it is a video circulating around the internet which presents a neatly interwoven compilation of just about every conspiracy theory you’ve ever heard about from the U.S. government’s orchestration of 9-11 to the international banking scam to Christianity itself! (I think the only thing they left out were the chem-trails).
Too much information.
I am sure there is both truth and fiction in there. It’s hard to deny that the world is in crises. And we would have to be starving fools to consume everything that the media serves up as truth.
Now, more than ever perhaps, is the time for viveka.
Yogis have taught the concept of viveka (discrimination) for centuries. It is a skill we must hone to deal with the vagaries of life on this imperfect planet.
What do I believe, what do I let pass by? Who do I trust, who do I keep at a distance? Where do I get my information? What do I read/watch and what do I leave alone?
Critical thinking skills, in other words. Meditation and yoga develop them.
Specifically  pratyahara - the practice of withdrawing the senses from the world and tuning into the rich inner life waiting in the silence.
It is through pratyahara that viveka emerges and strengthens, and it is through viveka that we can wade through the gunk and get to the essence.
If you simply inhabit the landscape of the pseudo-culture, you can not see the forest for the trees. The excesses of modern life will constantly whip your senses and emotions around. If on the other hand, you decide to live with the conspiracy buffs, you will have to contend with some amount of paranoia and delusion.
But silence delivers an essential truth – that truth is simply the pervasive presence of love. The essence is love and love is a force that every evil conspiracy crumbles before – it is unchanging, unstoppable and inevitable.
It sounds trite, but it’s the replacement of fear with love at every moment that keeps us sane when the world out there doesn’t feel too sane. And it then leads to a clear understanding of the right course of action, of what you should do, personally and collectively.
The practice of silence devoted to cultivating the relationship of love with your inner Self is the antidote to Zeitgeist-induced anxiety. Even the producers of the movie recognized this – it actually ended on an upbeat note that we are all one and we must move together. Samgacchadvam – the yogis have been saying the same thing for 15,000 years.
Too bad the movie didn’t end with a meditation lesson…

Yoga and Depression

At this time of year depression is a huge force that many people are contending with. We’ve been lucky here in Asheville to have a few days of respite from the winter (or, maybe not, if we owe that to global warming). Warmer weather certainly can shift mood. But there are many other reasons for depression besides the lack of sunlight.
My husband’s best friend finally killed herself 2 months ago. She had been suffering for most of her life with depression. It has deeply affected him of course, but more so her family including her young niece who adored her.
It’s likely that you have a similar story about a friend or family member. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 1 in 10 American adults—or approximately 21 million people?suffer from a depressive illness each year. That’s a lot of suffering. We see it everywhere – and it can lead people to self medicate with alcohol, drugs or food. A woman addicted to meth sometimes comes to my house to ask for food. I see the shame and fear in her eyes. I give her bananas or canned black beans. I don’t feel terribly helpful.

I dealt with depression when I was a young adult. Not to be cliche here, but yoga really did help me recover. I also began to realize that my reasons for being depressed were not simply about me, but about the culture I live in. Tremendous pressures on young women to look or behave a certain way have not been erased by the women’s liberation movement. In fact, perhaps there are even more pressures on women to both achieve great successes and look fabulous doing it.
On the other end of the spectrum many people are dealing with obesity resulting from a toxic, excessive American diet. People also struggle with unsatisfying jobs, deep credit card debt, lack of connection to their communities. Not to mention politics – there’s a lot to be depressed about. I don’t know all the reasons for depression, but I do know yoga can help people deal with it.
Research done in May of 2007 at Boston University showed that the neuro-transmitter GABA increased by 27% after yoga practice. Lack of this specific neuro-transmitter has been shown in both depression and anxiety. Yogis don’t need anyone to convince themselves that yoga makes you feel better – but it’s nice to know western medicine is starting to get it too.

My current class series is on Yoga for Emotional Well-Being. The turn out has been truly amazing. People want holistic help. Yoga can deliver, but it’s a practice – that means you have to do it. You have to find the will within and the support without to see the changes.

Here’s another link for how yoga can help depression.

Formalizing Your Resolutions

I made a resolution to start the Subtle Yoga blog in 2008. Today is a good, snowy day out there – a fine day to get started. New Year’s of course, is the time for resolutions. Most people have just been bombarded with eggnog, Christmas cookies and “challenging” familial encounters – then you have 3 more months of dismal weather to look forward to – of course we make resolutions! Some research done recently in California shows that if you make a formalized vow with your resolution, you are more likely to keep it. Yogis aren’t surprised, they have been formalizing vows for millennia. Vows are a way to put it all in perspective – the instant gratification vs. the long-term benefits. You can be swamped by the culture of excess, but your center will remain unperturbed in the power of the vow. So think about that: whether you want to meditate daily, lose weight, or quit smoking – why not formalize it? Get some friends together, light a candle, sing a song, chant a chant, pass a talking stick, say a prayer, read a poem, or meditate together and then pronounce your vows. Make the language positive. Instead of “I will quit smoking” try “I will breathe clean air. I will take care of my body because I deserve to be healthy, strong and happy.” I am hoping we can have a formalized vow session this month at the Women’s Satsaunga gathering at the Asheville Quest Center (January 25 from 7-9 pm). Let me know if you’re interested and I’ll make sure it happens!