Incredible India (part 3)

Warrior mind

No one is leaving, no one is going home early and, in fact, more are coming, squeezing into the cracks, or forcing others into the cracks!  It is the third week of the month, backbends or looking through the eyes of the back.

Headstand gives us plenty of opportunity to watch: the whine,  “Ah, my neck is going to break, it’s impossible to hold my shoulders up any longer!”;  the rage; the fear, all crossing my mind in an instant, “How dare you force me to do this!”

Then it stops, my mind stills and the reactions settle. Again and again what I notice is my flagging capacity and my doubt. I am drawn to the perceptions, which will verify these observations.  But then a ‘do or die’ quality enters the arena, and the option to come down no longer begs for acknowledgement.

Next come the back bends, there is no slow introduction or warming up, in we jump, no props, nothing, again to make the mind independent, not to learn on devices, but to do what can be done. Urdva Danurasana. The men have strength, but they fade, they do not have endurance, they can’t find their way deeper and only know how to use strength. The women have endurance, but they are not strong.

We go up again and again and again. For the men it is to get access in to the upper back, armpits, shoulders, for the women to bring lightness to the buttocks. This is what our bodies are doing, but what we learn is what the mind is doing.

Now she drops the gem into the panting, attaining minds:  when you come to the end of the exhalation and you pause, hold the breath, the mind will quieten, the body is kept strong while the mind is quiet, the mind is learning self control while the body is holding and supporting this capacity.

Everyone will have his or her own experience. Everyone can do as they need, they can stay up or not, they come down or not.  Geetaiji gives us the raw will to stay, to work, to observe and correct. There are no devices to lean on in the structure of the class,
all are removed and we are naked.

It is a very concrete and organic experience, one that moves beyond opinions into presence. It is not upward moving into the intellectual, but one that humbles and spreads us out.  This is what yoga is capable of doing at its best, while at the other end of the spectrum it is capable of filling and distorting us.  We can let it steal us away from the real and into an imaginary perception of ourselves, into the idea that facts are the same as experience.  Unfortunately many become teachers before they are really practitioners / true learners, and so are at risk of having to defend and protect their status.  We are learners, and this path takes us out of our heads alone and into our hearts, to serve the heartbeat of our God, our earth, letting us live with humility and courage.