Chop Wood, Carry Water Read online

  In other words, be aware and be present with ahimsa. I still eat meat. I still kill roaches. These are my choices. I do not use plastic bags. And I drive a fuel efficient car. These are my services. Non-violence is a series of guideposts on the road to peace, not a corral for you to circle endlessly and then ultimately give up.

  Just remember to be kind to yourself and to others. Then the rest of it will fall into place.

  28

  Over the course of my study I have had, naturally, many teachers. From parents to professors to yogis to colleagues, my course of instruction has been life-long and wonderfully varied. For this, I consider myself extremely lucky—variety is, after all, the spice of life.

  But, invariably, where there is variety, there is also conflict. I have been offered differing perspectives—especially in yoga--about the ‘best’ way to perform and/or achieve. This can create confusion unless one can manage to integrate that conflicting information and make your own decisions about it. One must begin to make discerning choices based on intuition and intellect, rather than blind, following faith. We call this right discrimination. In yoga, and in life, this is a very valuable skill to cultivate.

  For instance, my very first teacher—and her teacher before her—commonly told students to simply hold a pose for as long as they can and then back down when they become uncomfortable. This is wise and patient advice. Sometimes a teacher will hold a pose too long for your body and abilities. Ignoring your own intuition about how long to remain in a position can cause injuries and create stress.

  However, I had another teacher who was quite firm in his belief that you should hold a pose for as long as he instructed and not release a breath before his dictation. This is also wise advice. His point was that we are so ingrained in our habits of comfort that we are not accurate judges of our ‘thresholds’ and tend to give up before we must. In other words, how do you really know what you can achieve if you always collapse just as it gets difficult?

  So, now we have conflict. Do you follow the gentle advice or the challenging? Who is right? Who is wrong? Well, to answer that I have just one more question: What day is it?

  Neither of them are 100% right or wrong. And which path you take depends on a number of differing factors from the type of day you had to whether or not you worked out this morning to if you are getting sick, etc. You are the only one who can determine the right course for you and that course changes with the tides. Recognizing this is the first step to integrating your intuition and your intellect to come to a position of right discrimination.

  If you were the whipping boy at work then I see no reason to push yourself beyond the boundaries of your comfort. Today. That might be a different story tomorrow when you are the golden child who can do no wrong. Then you might want to consider pushing your edge to see precisely how strong you can be. Ascertain where you are at the moment. Probe the reaches of your Self to determine what you really need to grow. Is it a tender touch? Or a thorough pruning? You have the answer. Its just buried beneath layers of habit. Digging through that is one of yoga’s greatest challenges and one of its most precious rewards.

  If it helps, I also had another teacher (a little slip of a thing with a sweet honey voice and an Atilla-the-Hun like teaching style) who would always claim, “If you are struggling it is because you are in the place you need to be. You are working on what needs to be worked on—so push through!” I’ve always liked that advice because it prompts the right question. Why am I struggling? If you can answer that with frank honesty, you will always know which way to go.

  Because being comfortable is not always right, nor is being right always comfortable. C’est la vie.

  29

  If you are anything like me, two days after Christmas the tree is down and at the curb. The house is fully divested of any and all pine needles, Christmas lights and décor. The presents are put away and finally, a huge sigh of relief has escaped your lips more than once this week.

  And then it hits you. There’s more? More parties to attend? More small talk to make? Torture, ya’ll, torture. Aren’t we done yet? But then again, maybe you are nothing like me and New Year’s Eve is just a blissful continuation of this six week party.

  Personally, I’d rather stick my head under a rock and cry. But then again, I am a creature of extremely moderate temperance and I just can’t play that much. (Anymore…) I cannot hop around blissfully social from Thanksgiving to New Year. It makes me feel as if my scales are out of balance. My dedicated practice of moderation keeps me from tumbling merrily into the common holiday experience.

  Whether you agree or not, I have to tell you that I believe this to be a good thing. Life in moderation opens the door to both longevity and happiness. With moderation you can enjoy all of life without falling victim to its excesses. As often as not, a taste will do you as good—if not better—than a huge, gulping bite. Heaven knows it digests better.

  Excess is a sweet little worm that seems harmless enough. What’s wrong with a little fun, right? Nothing at all. However, it is the lot of fun that convinces you it is not such a bad idea to keep coming back that presents the problem. Excess makes itself at home as an invited guest and then can quickly take over, becoming master. It behooves you to think a bit before you allow it in. More people have died from pleasure than have ever died from pain. It’s a scary concept, but true: alcoholics, drug addicts, chronic overeaters, drunk drivers. These people all suffered from excess and as a result lost their ability to see life clearly. With that ability gone they fell prey to disease, disaster or death.

  Moderate, people, moderate. Life is best enjoyed as a variety of small bites.

  It is easy to fall into the trap of believing that excess is only the process of doing too much. Excess can also easily become the act of extreme restriction. We may have six weeks of partying behind us, but I know most of you are staring six weeks of penance in the face as well. January quickly becomes the month when most people decide they are going to give up something cold turkey or make a life change whole hog. By golly, you will lose that twenty pounds, you will quit smoking, you will exercise for an hour every single day. This is another form of excess.

  And it is why most New Year’s Resolutions fail. As much as we want to believe that we can do it, this “Hoo-yah! Failure is not an option!” attitude rubs against most of our basic natures. We want to be happy and content. It is our natural state of being. Therefore, moving into this mode of restrictive excess goes against our most basic grain. Of course you should try to lose that twenty pounds, quit smoking, or start exercising. That is wise and healthy behaviour. But you should take your time, moderate. It will happen if you are kind to yourself and make appropriate restrictions and appropriate changes.

  Moderation is the key to life. It is the key to sanity. It is the easiest and most natural thing in the world. You are the only one who can choose to let it go. So have a little fun. Have a little discipline.

  And all will be well.

  30

  Allow me to pose a question: What have you done lately to care for yourself? And I mean really care for yourself—authentically.

  That means that the answer cannot be, “I bought myself a new pair of shoes.” The answer cannot be, “I went out for drinks after work,” or “I took the afternoon off to see a movie.” These are unauthentic means of distraction from your true needs. Caring for yourself does not mean taking time to hide out from living, or anesthetizing yourself with life-dulling activities or substances.

  Our perspective on self-care is sadly skewed. We demonstrate how we care for ourselves by working sixty hour weeks and then stuffing our faces with junk while we have a cocktail to dull the day. We expect to stay fit while enjoying the convenience of drive thru everything. And heaven forfend we have a problem, surely a pill can save us. So, lets work like dogs to treat ourselves by eating badly, drinking lots, over-medicating and sitting on our butts. Good thinking, there.

  True self- care is stupidly simple. You need
adequate nourishment. You need exercise. You need some peace and quiet. You need time for greater reflection. You need friends, conversation and love. I’d say that about sums it up. Caring for the self is to give the body, mind, and spirit what it needs most--time and attention. How on earth did we get so stunningly far away from the basics?

  I think part of the answer boils down to how far we have come from the simple days of survival. Once upon a time, knowing how to survive meant understanding how to plant and harvest, how to hunt and gather, how to protect the body from the elements. Surviving was a full time job—but it was one that allowed for self care. When we farmed for our sustenance, we did not grow Doritos. Our food was nourishing. We did not ‘drive thru’ the fields; we actually had to work them. Our work was exercise. Time spent hunting and gathering allowed the mind quiet time to reflect on nature and life. Working together to keep a community alive created friendships and loving relationships. The nature of our existence fulfilled our basic needs for care by default. We had not yet cluttered up our time with illusions of “relaxation”.

  But today, survival skills are a far cry from what they used to be. Knowing how to survive in modern America involves knowing how to navigate the job market, how to manage a stock portfolio, how to manipulate the Credit Monster. Surviving today means understanding how to make and manage money. And money has absolutely nothing to do with loving the greater Self—or the physical one. This task consumes our minds, it eats our time and leaves us empty. Because we are so consumed, we turn to things that are “convenient” even though they can lead us towards self-destruction. Our addiction to convenience has made true self care seem more difficult than it is.

  True self care is stupidly simple. Why do so many still resist? Eat a banana and care for the self. Take a walk and care for the self. Be alone and find peace with yourself. Take a moment to think about God and nature and the Universe for no other reason than you can. Your self needs only the very basics to be healthy, happy and whole.

  And if the alternative is illness, depression or death, what on earth are you waiting for? Quit pretending that you are immune and wake up! If you don’t truly care for your Self neither will anybody else.

  And isn’t that a scary thought?

  31

  So. Say you’re driving into town down US 41. About 200 yards ahead you see a big, messy accident. More than one car, glass everywhere, people starting to get out and assess the damage. Emergency services has just arrived on the scene: police, ambulance and fire. What do you do?

  The way I see it, you have three clear choices. One, you can turn the wheel, change lanes and get off the highway. There are a number of different ways to get into town without being on 41. Two, you can keep driving, slow down and rubberneck, hitting the brakes like everybody else only when it begins to affect you directly. Or, three, you can believe that it will never affect you, maintain course and speed and smash your car into the pileup, joining the mess.

  Let’s call these possible decisions proactive, reactive and denial. Or, more directly, thoughtful, thoughtless, and stupid. Now, let’s say that this isn’t about an accident at all. Let’s say that this is about your life. What do you want to be? Proactive, reactive or in denial?

  Every situation provides an opportunity to be thoughtful and proactive. Even the ones that seem to suddenly slap you upside the head. If you look back far enough, you might see where even these ‘surprise’ events sent up a warning flare to let you know that a course change was warranted. And if you really examine it, you may find an army of people standing by the side of the road with bright orange flags shaking their heads at your obvious oblivion.

  Unfortunately for us, we often don’t take the time to heed the signs. Disaster is viewed as the sudden turn of a coin when in fact it is a slow roll. Not only that, it is a slow roll with a bullhorn attached, shouting all the time. You need to get ahead of it, not behind it, where you can manage its course and dictate how it will affect you. This is being proactive. Yoga is proactive. Conservationism is proactive. Healthy financial habits are proactive. But if you never get proactive, if you never do anything about your health, your earth, your life, you will always be either reacting to or denying the problems at hand. You will always be behind the curve, dealing with a mess.

  Luckily for us, we don’t have to sort out the signs all by ourselves. Like I said, there is an army of people out there with their orange flags, waving them for all they are worth. But you have to knock the stupor off of your eyelids and look. You have to be willing to listen. You have to be willing to take action. Otherwise you are just blindly steering your car into a bus.

  Some of my favourite flag wavers are no-nonsense, cut-to-the-chase, ironically funny and painfully clear whistleblowers that creatively inform you about the course corrections at hand. They open your eyes—sometimes with toothpicks—so that you can see the signs and decide for yourself how to make the changes that take you, and everybody that you share your world with, into a better way of living.

  Please, read Carla Mills’ Smart Health Choices, and watch the film Supersize Me. You must see Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Read Core Truths, and Fast Food Nation. Read anything, anything by Yogi Bhajan. There are a million ways to get where you are going without being part of the mess. And any one of these people will show you a little bit more about how to do it. All together, they might just take you off the highway forever.

  Alright, I’m putting my little orange flag down now. Go get one of your own.

  32

  Sometimes, life is just patently unfair. We can all agree upon that.

  But when it comes to exploring the reason why that is, I have found there to be two very distinct schools of thought. There are those who believe that everything is coincidence and when bad things happen it is just a result of the chaotic nature of the universe. We will call this the “crap happens” theory.

  Then there are those who believe that everything happens for a reason, and when bad things happen, they are a result of choices made at some point during the course of our experience. Lets dub this the “divine pattern” theory.

  I, myself, prefer the latter as it allows more opportunity for thought and reflection. Although I will give points to the “crap” theory for its greatly relaxed attitude, it does tend to limit introspection, heading it right off at the pass.

  This “divine pattern” method of thought travels along the lines of an old yogic philosophy gaining popularity (again) called Karma. In its most simplistic dress, karma boils down to the belief that what you do will come back to you. Do good things, good things happen. Do bad things, well, bad things happen. But this is just the barest expression of a serious idea that expands beyond the confines of human action.

  Make for me the assumption that our souls are eternal. Just for the duration of this essay, for the length of this discussion, agree with me that our souls return to earth time and time again to experience life. I know that for some of you this is a broad jump—feel free to disagree after we have finished talking about Karma. Because without that foundation of reincarnation, karma can only go as far as the Golden Rule.

  Now, being human, we all make mistakes. We make big ones, we make little ones. We wrong people and we are wronged. All of these actions leave little scars on our souls, little ruts of behaviour that we are more likely to fall back into. All of our lives are built on redressing these wrongs, on learning about our patterns and scars and overcoming them. This is how we move toward enlightenment, shedding the ugly parts of our humanity and becoming closer to a being that can join with god. Its heady work. And work that takes awareness of not only our actions, but our motivations behind these actions. Only then can we be free of them.

  Even if you dismiss this idea as preposterous; even if you never believe that the human soul can do, or would do, this, karma still has a lesson for you. It is one of perspective.

  We, as humans, have a terrible habit of short-perspective. We see to our immediate needs, often ign
oring that which is better in the long run. We assume we can just deal with it later and then are surprised when we have to. This tends to make us a bit of a reactionary species, even though we believe ourselves to be clever planners.

  The addition of karma into our awareness widens our perspective. Immensely. It takes our view out over lifetimes, out of our own culture and time. It allows you to see just how large human existence is, and, conversely, just how small we are. And once this deflation of self-importance occurs, we become better able to heal, to learn, to share. We see where we carry scars and those that we inflict upon others.

  Karma reveals the pattern of your life. It is a road map of your decisions and options. It is a great teacher to us all whether you believe in its roots or not. Because even if you only live this one lifetime, it can become the opportunity to express the very best of our nature.

  33

  Did you know that your Sciatic nerve is the longest nerve in your body?

  About the width of your thumb, this essential nerve runs from the root of your spine all the way down your leg and into your foot. This is the nerve that causes lots of trouble, creating that shooting pain in the leg referred to as “sciatica”. One way or another, without attention, this problem will visit most of us at some point in our lives. Oh, joy.

  In yoga circles, this nerve is called the “Life Nerve”. Meaning that if this nerve begins to speak up in the language of pain, there is something in your life that needs to be addressed. And I don’t just mean on the physical plane. The body is vitally connected to the human experience, just as the experience is held within the body. If this nerve starts complaining, it is critical that you examine the deeper reasons why.