Yoga is amazing for the spine. The poses along the sides of this post are excellent examples of positions that draw our attention to the spine. Optimizing each pose, we breathe through the crown of the head, and lengthen the spine.
Focusing on the breath, allowing it to come in and fill up the chest, and then fill up the belly, naturally elongates the spine and helps us realign, and lengthen. Proper spinal alignment is the key to optimal health and wellness. Our posture in our daily life can change for the better with this cultivated awareness.
Alas, we do not often think about the spine, just like we may often not think of the breath. Yet getting in touch with each of these energy and life-supporting sources, is super beneficial. Yoga helps promote spinal health, and breath, and weaving together these integral awarenesses, we sit in our center, rooted, grounded, reaching. Poses like staff pose, sphinx pose, half moon pose, extended puppy pose, child's pose etc. are helpful.
As my teacher said, if you want to call something in the body THE CORE, it would actually be the spine. The core is not the abdomen; more central and "core" to our body would be the house and channel for our entire nervous system. The spine supports our nervous system and so many of our reactions through our sensory-somatic nervous system. The nervous system, which happens to reside in the spine, dictates our reactions to stimuli in our environment. Clearing our energy through our breath, bringing more purity and awareness to our actions in life, allowing for compassion for others, nourishing our forgivenesses, the yogic tradition helps us cleanse our system and the filter through which we perceive others.
I was kayaking today and was excited to see a large turtle swimming slowly near me on the water's surface. I was curious and watched, but as my vision focused I saw what was in fact a female duck - you know, the camouflage khaki colored companion of the more colorful mallard. It struck me as I realized that the turtle I was excited to see on surface of water was totally not a turtle and I thought: How many times do we think we perceive correctly but in fact do not? The remedy lies in un-coloring our lens: Looking past ignorance, I-ness, ego, attachments, and fears. As Patanjali writes, simply observing whether are thought patterns are colored or not is extremely helpful in balancing, stabilizing, or calming the mind to see if deeper meditation will come.
Part of being human and fallible is not always perceiving things correctly. That really isn't a turtle, that thing you thought you saw. For me, I have witnessed that misperceiving the intentions of others can cause avoidable stress, cares, and worry. What can cause incorrect perception, according to Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, are a) knowledge of self, b) ignorance, c) metaphoric thinking, d) deep sleep where the mind is lazy, and e) memories. As Paul wrote in an ancient, wisdom text, a letter to the Corinthians: "Now we see but a dim reflection in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now i know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known."
What then is the anecdote to this foggy lens through we presently see? I will say that the thing I can do that most helps me be patient in perceiving and have lovingkindness for myself and for others, this is my yoga practice. Yoga is the stilling of the mind, the weaving together of our strands, and thus the wholeness we can find within. Through regular practice, and embracing all limbs of yoga (not just asanas) we can work on perceiving others - and ourselves - through a softer lens, one that is clearer, purified. As humans, we should consider what we do with the mind, and thus avoid the painful effects of perceiving incorrectly.
And the 8 limbs of yoga are:
Focusing on the breath, allowing it to come in and fill up the chest, and then fill up the belly, naturally elongates the spine and helps us realign, and lengthen. Proper spinal alignment is the key to optimal health and wellness. Our posture in our daily life can change for the better with this cultivated awareness.
Alas, we do not often think about the spine, just like we may often not think of the breath. Yet getting in touch with each of these energy and life-supporting sources, is super beneficial. Yoga helps promote spinal health, and breath, and weaving together these integral awarenesses, we sit in our center, rooted, grounded, reaching. Poses like staff pose, sphinx pose, half moon pose, extended puppy pose, child's pose etc. are helpful.
As my teacher said, if you want to call something in the body THE CORE, it would actually be the spine. The core is not the abdomen; more central and "core" to our body would be the house and channel for our entire nervous system. The spine supports our nervous system and so many of our reactions through our sensory-somatic nervous system. The nervous system, which happens to reside in the spine, dictates our reactions to stimuli in our environment. Clearing our energy through our breath, bringing more purity and awareness to our actions in life, allowing for compassion for others, nourishing our forgivenesses, the yogic tradition helps us cleanse our system and the filter through which we perceive others.
I was kayaking today and was excited to see a large turtle swimming slowly near me on the water's surface. I was curious and watched, but as my vision focused I saw what was in fact a female duck - you know, the camouflage khaki colored companion of the more colorful mallard. It struck me as I realized that the turtle I was excited to see on surface of water was totally not a turtle and I thought: How many times do we think we perceive correctly but in fact do not? The remedy lies in un-coloring our lens: Looking past ignorance, I-ness, ego, attachments, and fears. As Patanjali writes, simply observing whether are thought patterns are colored or not is extremely helpful in balancing, stabilizing, or calming the mind to see if deeper meditation will come.
Part of being human and fallible is not always perceiving things correctly. That really isn't a turtle, that thing you thought you saw. For me, I have witnessed that misperceiving the intentions of others can cause avoidable stress, cares, and worry. What can cause incorrect perception, according to Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, are a) knowledge of self, b) ignorance, c) metaphoric thinking, d) deep sleep where the mind is lazy, and e) memories. As Paul wrote in an ancient, wisdom text, a letter to the Corinthians: "Now we see but a dim reflection in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now i know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known."
What then is the anecdote to this foggy lens through we presently see? I will say that the thing I can do that most helps me be patient in perceiving and have lovingkindness for myself and for others, this is my yoga practice. Yoga is the stilling of the mind, the weaving together of our strands, and thus the wholeness we can find within. Through regular practice, and embracing all limbs of yoga (not just asanas) we can work on perceiving others - and ourselves - through a softer lens, one that is clearer, purified. As humans, we should consider what we do with the mind, and thus avoid the painful effects of perceiving incorrectly.
We are in this world, but we are not of this world. In other words, we can look at matter in a completely different way, and have another perspective on it all.
And the 8 limbs of yoga are:
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