Book Review: Walking Through Illusion

I always seem to find that things, ideas, people, and events arrive right on time, serving their purpose to deepen insight, learn something, or teach something. This book's arrival in my mailbox turned out to be no exception. Walking Through Illusion, by Betsy Otter Thompson, is a recounting of the author's own experience with soul-searching told through the allegory of a conversation with the biblical Jesus about his life experiences and those of the people around him. While some research had been done into biblical accounts of the people's lives we read about in this book, the author emphasizes that it is rather, "an emotional accounting of what might have been," and that, "the true research for this book was done in my heart (pp 232, 233)." Seeing the structure of the book as an allegory for the author's own emotional journey, then, more clearly reveals the nuggets of wisdom within, rather than getting caught up in historical or theological implications.

As for everything arriving on time, I immediately and gratefully recognized timely reminders of principles I need to keep in the forefront of my actions and thoughts. One of the foundations of the message in this book is that we are each capable of and responsible for manifesting our own reality and the lessons we need to learn to remind us of our beautiful and enduring essence. According to the author, "Nothing changed overnight, but overnight I knew that change was possible. I also knew that I was the one to enact it (p 42)." She goes on to emphasize that we can direct our efforts of manifestation through the basic principle of the golden rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. She explains it neatly as a law of physics: every action has an equal and opposite reaction. So, in order to manifest positive and nurturing experiences in life, we must put forth actions, thoughts, and emotions that we would want reflected right back to us. The author also represents this principle through the analogy of the mirror: "for every emotional action taken, an emotional mirror returned (p 2)." These are all empowering reminders of the consciousness I strive to cultivate in my thoughts, feelings, and actions. They are seemingly simplistic and basic, these ideas of manifesting the reality we desire by acting according to the golden rule and a fundamental law of physics. Yet, it is surprisingly difficult to maintain awareness of them and act accordingly at all moments of our lives. This seems to me to be one of the principle reasons for living life: to explore these principles and all their repercussions in order to fully understand ourselves and that of which we are made.

Such are the messages Ms. Otter Thompson's book had for me. There are numerous more life lessons she has explored and shares through a variety of stories. That seems to be a particular strength of the book, for each allegory has the opportunity to convey a useful concept where another story may not resonate. All things considered, it is a bravely open account of the author's emotional journey to empowerment and peace. It's nuggets of wisdom are universal, and I'm sure any reader will find timely reminders for his or her journey as well.

Find out more about this book and the author:

http://www.betsythompson.com

http://www.betsyotterthompson.blogspot.com

Home Practice: Yes, It's Important!

In fact, it's down-right necessary! If you've read my profile, you know that I started practicing yoga when I was 16, going to classes with my mother. When I went to college, though, my practice tapered off into near nothingness. It wasn't until I was 25 that yoga reemerged in my life. Scott, my partner, challenged me to 90 consecutive days of yoga, betting that it would relieve many of the nagging little health problems I was experiencing, including those related to my scoliosis, and even help me quit smoking. I accepted the challenge and haven't missed a day of yoga practice since. The benefits to my health and the improvement in my quality of life have been tremendous. I quit smoking and, because I replaced it with a healthy habit I love, I have no desire to smoke and no cravings, ever. All of this is a direct result of my consistent daily yoga practice.

How did I afford to practice yoga everyday? After all, an unlimited pass at a yoga studio costs around $160-200 a month. The answer is simple: HOME PRACTICE! I started my daily practice by purchasing unlimited passes at a yoga studio, but quickly realized that my meager budget really had no room for this expense. Fortunately, in his infinite wisdom, Scott had given me a starter yoga kit complete with a mat, blocks, and a strap along with a few practice DVD's. With dedication and careful study, I developed my daily yoga practice primarily at home for the first year.

I emphasize to my students and friends that yoga class is not the place to practice. Don't get me wrong, going to class is incredibly important. It's the place to study and learn new things, refining your practice under the guidance of a trained teacher. Class is necessary. However, the place to practice is at home, on your own time, in your own space. Practicing at home is the essence of svadhyaya, or the study of the self. This deepens your practice, and makes it uniquely yours. Once we begin down this path, the benefits just roll in.

Because the home practice is so important, I've dedicated a page here exclusively to home practice topics. I've started it off with my tips on how to start your home practice, based on the blueprint I followed with much success.  I hope you will find some strategies there that resonate with you. Happy practicing!

Laughing All the Way

In my practice the other day, I decided to focus on a little section of B.K.S. Iyengar's Light on Yoga that presents variations of salabhasana, or locust pose, and dhanurasana, or bow pose. All was going according to normal until I came to this variation:

Images from http://www.familyhistoryfiles.com

"Well, how hard could that be?" I thought. You see, reading the instruction I found that I was supposed to take dhanurasana and then simply roll onto one side, roll back up to center, then roll to the other side. Right. I'm always up for a challenge, though, so I decided to charge ahead. Once in dhanurasana, I try to roll easily to the right. Nothing happens. So I start rocking side to side, building momentum to roll over that frontal hip bone that keeps putting on the brakes. Rocking a little more, and I've got it! I'm going over! And over, and over, in slow motion, almost like a giant tree falling from a great height. Falling, until.... BOOM! I land on my right side with a resounding THUD. Instantaneously, laughter bursts through. Laughter so pure and hard and deep that before I know it, I've got tears streaming down my face, snot pouring from my nose, and I can hardly breathe. I haven't experienced an uncontrollable, riotous laughing fit from my yoga in some time. And it feels so good!

This got me thinking about "Laughter Yoga." I've heard brief stories about it here and there, and especially of it's purported health benefits. Yet, I believed it to be a very small, almost obscure facet of modern yoga. As it turns out, I was wrong. Watch the video below to see what I mean.



This comes as such a poignant reminder of the beautifully diverse tools that yoga can offer us to help heal ourselves and prevent future suffering. I just had a visit from my Auntie this week, who wanted to visit her old home of Hawai'i in the midst of her battle with lung cancer. She is the latest in a merry-go-round of family members to tangle with some form of the disease. I only had a brief visit with her and of course found that catching up on family stories took most of our time together, pushing a discussion of yogic healing techniques off to another day.

How perfect that my practice then led me to this easy, fun, and accessible exercise of laughter! Learning to laugh even when you feel you have nothing to laugh about is really the heart of what yoga is trying to teach us. If we can peel back the layers of suffering in this existence to find our pure joy within, then we have found our essence. It is then that no misfortunes can move us, and we will be able to feel peacefully content at all times. I will definitely be sending some resources to my Auntie, to get her laughing all the way on her path through this life.

It's so simple that we don't even think about it: laughter is good for you! What do you have to laugh about?

http://laughteryoga.org/

http://www.laughteryogaamerica.com/

(Deep Breath) On Yoga and Religion

I’m pretty new to the blogger scene. So I take time in my day to research other blogs, and yoga blogs in particular, to become more familiar with their setup, design, content, and authors. We are something of a community after all. Upon going about my usual research today, I found the yoga blog world to be abuzz with a particular article claiming that Christianity and yoga are mutually exclusive. My interest, and apparently that of many others, was piqued, and I feel compelled to clarify some misunderstandings revealed there. The article in question was written by Dr. R. Albert Mohler, Jr, the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, which is one of the largest seminaries in the world and carries heavy weight with the Southern Baptist Convention. His piece, “The Subtle Body - Should Christians Practice Yoga?” argues that, “When Christians practice yoga, they must either deny the reality of what yoga represents or fail to see the contradictions between their Christian commitments and their embrace of yoga.”

He wrote a follow-up on his blog after being inundated with emails expressing quite the opposite.  In this follow-up, Dr. Mohler defends himself by saying that his critics offer no scriptural or theological arguments, but merely opinions. Yet, in his original article on the subject, Dr. Mohler surprisingly offers no substantial theological evidence in support of his opinions. Instead of citing the Biblical text that he claims to be in opposition to the practice of yoga, he cites a book (Stefanie Syman’s The Subtle Body: The Story of Yoga in America) about yoga and its modern assimilation into Western culture. Reading Ms. Syman’s book is certainly on the to-do list now, to see for myself why it stirred Dr. Mohler so. Dr. Mohler’s only other citation beyond his own belief, is one sentence from a Denver Seminary professor quoted as such, “a respected specialist on the New Age Movement, warns Christians that yoga is not merely about physical exercise or health. ‘All forms of yoga involve occult assumptions,’ he warns, ‘even hatha yoga, which is often presented as a merely physical discipline.’” Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary defines occult as, “matters regarded as involving the action or influence of supernatural or supernormal powers or some secret knowledge of them.” The assertion that yoga involves “occult assumptions” does not necessarily distinguish it from Christianity. Jesus’ many miracles, including rising from the dead, seemingly had much to do with supernatural power. In fact, by this definition, the belief in an omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent God involves quite a bit of assumptions regarding supernatural or supernormal powers.

Dr. Mohler goes on: “Yoga begins and ends with an understanding of the body that is, to say the very least, at odds with the Christian understanding. Christians are not called to empty the mind or to see the human body as a means of connecting to and coming to know the divine.” Why then does the Bible in 1 Corinthians 3:16 state, “Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 goes on, “Know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.” Here, the practice of yoga seems to beautifully complement the Bible’s call to “glorify God in your body” and honor the body as the “temple of the Holy Spirit.”

What Dr. Mohler calls an emptying of the mind, appears to be a reference to meditation. He says, “Believers are called to meditate upon the Word of God — an external Word that comes to us by divine revelation — not to meditate by means of incomprehensible syllables.” He again attempts to draw a distinction that does not necessarily exist here. What are “incomprehensible syllables” to Dr. Mohler are the Word of God to others. In fact, the Word of God to which he refers (the Bible) would be incomprehensible syllables to him were he to encounter the texts in their original language, rather than the modern translated and edited versions we have today. Moreover, Jesus undoubtedly gave numerous examples of meditating to hear the Word of God and to commune with God in the Bible. His 40 day fast in the desert is but one incidence among many (Matthew 4 and Luke 4). He would often leave his disciples for long periods of time to sit quietly and pray, or meditate as it may be (Matthew 14:23, Mark 1:35, and Luke 4:42 are a few examples). Even more intriguingly, historical evidence mounts suggesting that Jesus would have had contact with Buddhism, as scholars draw compelling parallels between the teachings of Gautama, the Buddha and Jesus.

While the tone of Dr. Mohler’s article is mostly subdued, he does venture off on a particular extremity: “While most adherents of yoga avoid the more exotic forms of ritualized sex that are associated with tantric yoga, virtually all forms of yoga involve an emphasis on channeling sexual energy throughout the body as a means of spiritual enlightenment.” How can this be, when one of the ethical disciplines, or yamas, recognized by most yogis is brahmacharya? This is often translated as outright celibacy, but for many modern yogis translates into “leading a life of pure thoughts, pure actions and pure aspirations.” Such unsubstantiated conjecture on the part of Dr. Mohler only further reveals that he has little to no familiarity with yoga, and is instead cherry-picking evidence to support a belief masquerading as fact, and to stir up fear.

Dr. Mohler concludes, “Nevertheless, a significant number of American Christians either experiment with yoga or become adherents of some yoga discipline. Most seem unaware that yoga cannot be neatly separated into physical and spiritual dimensions. The physical is the spiritual in yoga, and the exercises and disciplines of yoga are meant to connect with the divine.” I agree with this description of yoga. However, he is operating on the misunderstanding that the spiritual aspects of yoga are inherently tied to Hinduism and Buddhism (2 distinctly different systems), when in fact, yoga’s roots reach farther back in time than either system. Yoga has evolved its many facets over time as it has been incorporated into and found new characteristics in use as a component of various spiritual practices. Evidence of yogic postures in stone carvings dates back to 3000 BC.

Yoga means union. It is anything but a divisive practice, nor does it exclude anyone of any faith. A thoughtful analysis of the evidence reveals that yoga can eloquently complement not only Christianity but any faith, while also equally appealing to those who are uncertain or profess no spiritual faith at all. It truly has something to offer to everyone. On this topic, I don’t think I could put it better than Mr. B.K.S. Iyengar in Light on Yoga, “Yoga is not a religion by itself. It is the science of religions, the study of which will enable a sādhaka (seeker) the better to appreciate his own faith.”