Life is Yoga: October 2008

Listening More and Thinking Less!

I am thinking about Beryl Bender Birch a lot lately. She is coming to the studio in November for a 3-day workshop and I can’t wait. She is my teacher and my mentor. Over the course of my years of teaching she has been a wonderful source of inspiration and support, and I am grateful to have her in my life. I was paging through her book Power Yoga, when I can across a bit she wrote about listening. Have you ever noticed you tend to see or read things just when you are in need of them? Below is the passage which I found so powerful and so important.

“Really doing yoga means using the act of listening to the breath, using the act of directing the eyes, using the control of prana and bandhas and ujjayi breathing, and using the postures to stop the mind from running wild each and every time it gets up to go and rebels from the monotony of one-pointed concentration.

We cannot listen and think simultaneously. Either we are transmitting and processing or we are receiving, but we can’t do both at the same time. It has long been clear to me, in trying to become a better listener, that the secret of good listeners is that they simply suspend their thinking process. Poor listeners cannot turn off their minds. You can see their impatience and watch them thinking while you are talking to them. They are simply waiting for you to stop talking before they begin to fill the space with their own stored-up thoughts.”

For me, the act of suspending my thoughts is incredibly challenging. I feel like I am constantly thinking. There are so many applications to this. Not only when I am in a conversation with others, but more often the conversation is going on in my own head. I love the idea of either transmitting or receiving. It is so true that we cannot do both at the same time. In savasana, we all have the challenge of suspending our thoughts without the aid of the “distractions” provided by the sound of the breath, and the postures themselves. All we have to listen to is our own bodies and spirits. I love the idea of shutting down the transmitting in order to open the channels for receiving. It is like using a walkie-talkie. You can’t talk into it and hear the other person at the same time. One line has to close for the other to open. Simply put, I am trying to learn how to shut off that transmitting and see what arises.

Of course, this is what yoga is all about. I have heard it said in so many ways, but of course, for me, my teacher Beryl puts the idea into eloquent and clear focus. Students often ask me, or think to themselves, “What is so important about shutting off your thoughts? Why should I try to clear my mind?” Well for one, the act of transmitting takes energy or prana. The act of receiving adds to and supports the prana within the body. Most of us are constantly overstimulated. Not only are we thinking and transmitting all day long, but our senses are constantly reaching outwards towards sounds and movements and everything else we are bombarded with during the day. Sensory stimulation, I suppose, is a type of receiving, but when too much is coming in at once, it takes energy to shut it out.

Quieting the mind means being able to hear what is really important, not the niggling thoughts that take us over, but what it really means to be human and be part of this great community of ours. While you are in class, or when you are going to sleep, or driving your car, or talking with your friends, partner, or kids, try turning off the transmitting and see what happens. I have found an immediate sense of decompression and calm (momentary, of course, because my thoughts keep intruding!). Also, notice whether your thoughts have anything to do with the present moment. Often these thoughts are about the future or the past but not the present. Try this: when your thoughts invade your mind, go through them one by one and see which ones have any bearing on the present. You may be surprised by how little that present thinking occurs.

Whatever this means to you, trust that positive change happens without effort. It really does. Many of us, including myself, feel that the only way things change is if we make them change. There is another way. What if we allow the change to come without trying to control when and what it is? What if we truly trusted the process. Yoga practice is not about outcome, but those of you who have been practicing a while have surely noticed that it changes you. Maybe not in the way you expected or the way you hoped, but it truly changes you. The key here is intention. Change doesn’t happen if we sit around eating potato chips and watching television. There needs to be true intention behind our actions. Intention to me means, again as Beryl says, Right Action. Right Action is living consistently with your beliefs. Right Action is not compromising your ideals. Is this easy? Hell no, but it feels good. I have always said that regret is my worse enemy. If I make a decision and I knew at the time in my heart that it was right, I will not regret it even if the outcome is not what I wanted. I will always regret, however, a decision that went against everything that I believe in. Living your truth is in many ways true enlightenment.

Peace,
Mimi

 

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