Mindfulness Yoga- A Body-Mind approach to Freedom

I now place more emphasis on the true purpose of practice, which is the process of learning to be free.

Free from our conditioning.

Free of the habit of misery.

Free of unnecessary suffering.

How is that possible in the context of yoga or exercise?

First and foremost it is important to understand that your body is the place where you live. Bodies love to move and muscles love to stretch......IF...you honour and respect your current limits, capacity or level of fitness and strength. 

So what are some of the forms of self induced misery caused by our conditioning? 

•  competitiveness, yoga is mindful movement not training for the Olympics, be clear why you are practicing.

•striving for a goal, suffering stress trying to be more than you can be comfortably, or trying to get it right.

•comparing mind and all it's permutations of self criticism or self righteousness.

•the idea that if it's difficult and if it hurts it must be working, it must be good for me.

•enduring and putting up with pain as a way of achieving a result or to eventually experience the pleasure or the relief of stopping

The point I am trying to make is two fold.

1. Rather than perpetuating the myth that what we are doing is something that will bring us pleasure, happiness, fulfilment, or well-being, instead, “we practice feeling good and being free as a way of learning how to feel good and to be free. “

I can't stress how profound that understanding is. In other words “THIS IS IT”, right now is all there is and anything less than ease, comfort, pleasure and fulfilment in each moment must be questioned and will be seen to be self coercion and ultimately unkind.

2. Practice in this way shows us all of the ways we make unnecessary struggle with a conditioned mind that wants to control, manipulate or impose on the reality of what is ultimately a natural process. 

I hope that what I am talking about makes some sense to you. Just for a moment let yourself remember being a child, say seven years old and delighting in just moving without any idea of getting a result, for no particular reason, from the place of natural, uncontrived curiosity and pleasure. Simply being a body, being alive.

It may be hard to believe that it is possible to reclaim or relearn the ease and spontaneity that is natural to a body/mind unencumbered by conditioned expectation. I am really just learning how to live an embodied life and passionate about learning how to teach an embodied practice.

Namaste