Emotional Times: Love and Desire

We all have an innate desire to feel loved forever and ever...this is totally valid! I think it's what makes us tick. There is a knowledge deep within each of us that love exists and that it is truly all that you need...that it will make you happy forever and ever. And it's true! So then why aren't we all happy and in love all of the time? It is in our methods of finding love that we fail and find suffering. It is in our ignorance that we find it hard to separate love and desire, love and attachment, love and lust...

Here's what to know about the best subject EVER!

L-O-V-E IS:
1. Different than attachment. Attachment brings fear because we expect some sort of outcome. Attachment can turn into love when fear is removed. If there is fear, there is no love. Period. If you are fearless, you are not able to attach and so you can have real love and no suffering.
2. Pure and selfless. Love is to give and not to get.
3. Different than desire. Desire is insatiable. It can never truly be fulfilled. Desire implies it is something you don't already have (quite different from love which is in us all) and that you must look externally for it. This search leads to suffering.
4. Infinite. It is never damaged and it never dries up.
5. Creative. It has the power to redeem, renew, transform.
6. Present in all conditions. It is the greatest wealth, the greatest peace, and it's yours NOW.

Yoga is...equanimity of mind

Our problems in this life come from weaknesses in the mind. Just as a body-builder works out in the gym to strengthen his muscles, the yogi works to strengthen the mind. A weak mind will collapse under the weight of negative thoughts like fear and worry.

So to strengthen the mind, just as the body-builder uses weight resistance, the yogi uses tendency resistance. We all have our inborn tendencies, the ways we tend to react out of our subconscious mind to situations around us. These ways often do not serve us best and to react out of a place of purity takes a lot of energy, resistance and strength.

Just as the body-builder checks his progress in the mirror, the yogi or 'mind-builder' checks his progress in the people around him. Other people are our mirrors in this life to show us our progress in our journey towards inner peace. Interactions show us where we are still weak and where we are strong.

Om tat sat

Yoga is...calm

There are SO many definitions of Yoga. Today, we cover that Yoga is a state of CALM:

"When the surface of a lake is still, the bottom can be clearly seen. Thsi is impossible when the surface is agitated by waves. In the same way, when the mind is still, with no thought or desires, you can see the self. This state of calm is called Yoga" -Swami Sivananda in "Bliss Divine"

Airplane Reading: Special Delivery

As my first post, I thought I would share a quick story from my recent flight home to the east coast for a family emergency. In this blog, my purpose is to share tidbits of insight and wisdom that come through during my studies in yoga and life. My only hope is that even one person finds some comfort and inspiration here. Om shanti!

Sometimes we get a little gift in the pocket in front of us on the airplane. And sometimes we leave them. Sometimes, rather than a gift, it might be a temptation, as I recieved on this particular flight. I suppose we can see temptations as gifts too...in either case, whether we yield or not, we experience some sensory pleasure (usually followed by pain) or we resist and gain strength. The gift that I unwittingly left, and the one I recieved are so far apart in nature and yet all a part of the duality of our world.

Traveling from the ashram in Grass Valley, CA back to the east coast, I , with best intentions, brought along a copy of Swami Sivananda's, "Thought Power". I have been trying to get around to reading this book for some time now. I did, however, purchase a copy of Vogue at the airport newstand so that could be seen as the first indication I might not read the book... Taking my seat on the plane and preparing for the first leg of this venture across the country, I pull out all of my proposed reading materials: Thought Power, Vogue, and Cards of Destiny (more on that book another time) and stuck them in the seat pocket in front of me, leaving the Thought Power behind as I departed the aircraft to switch planes.

As I dug through my over-stuffed carry-on bag for said book that I was finally going to read, it was nowhere to be found. I pondered for a moment on where it could be and began to feel a smile spread across my face. "Oh the soul that finds that powerful book!" I thought to myself. Surely it is karmic that the next person to sit in that seat, or clean out that pocket, who finds that book and reads the wise truths of this great master's teachings on the mind and power of thought, will be changed forever. This could be their salvation; their awakening.

To know I was somehow part of this delivery from the Divine feels pretty neat. I somehow followed through on some karmic action to benefit another soul. So the question remains....why was the 'gift' in my seat pocket a copy of Us Weekly? ;)