Saucha

Saucha

Saucha is a Sanskrit term which translates to purity and cleanliness.

"Always aim at complete harmony of thought and word and deed. Always aim at purifying your thoughts and everything will be well." - Mohandas Gandhi

Bring cleanliness and order into your environment. The more you treat your surroundings as a temple, the more you welcome the Divine. At the yoga studio, we encourage you to clean your mats and props (rental or otherwise) and then put them away in an orderly fashion. This gives us all a sense of environment. The studio is yours, after all! 

Bring cleanliness and order into your body. The old adage 'you are what you eat' is true! Our physical body is built from the fuel we give it. Mindful eating might bring you to a greater sense of cleanliness and order internally. We encourage you to come to the yoga studio with a clean body, free from heavy perfumes to help us keep the air in the studio clear.

In your asana practice, you can practice saucha by focusing on your breath. The breath is the key to the cleasing benefits of yoga. Deep spinal twists help as well.

Bring cleanliness to your thoughts and deeds. Choose positive thoughts, as our brains can only hold one thought at a time. consider for yourself your intentions in your actions. Are you going through your day with a clear and pure intention? Is there some ulterior motive behind your behaviour? Setting an intention before your asana practice also is a way to practice saucha.

Visit the BYS Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/BristolYogaStudioRI and read about how other members of our community
incorporate saucha into their lives. 

This month’s discussion is Tuesday, July 17, 7:30pm.

Join us to talk about the study of saucha and extending yoga from your mat and into your life.

Aparigraha

The fifth yama “Aparigraha” translates to non-hoarding, non-possessiveness or non-attachment.   While these ideas seem to pointing in different directions, the ultimate lesson of aparigraha lies in our true nature.  When we say ‘Namaste’ to one another, we acknowledge: “The Light in me greets the Light in you,” suggesting that we are connected on an energetic level; one in the same in our true nature.

The practice of aparigraha recognizes that in our human nature we have a tendency to forget this energetic connectedness that is our true self.  It asks us to proactively acknowledge our true nature by practicing non-hoarding, non-possessiveness or non-attachment. 

Non-hoarding means taking and holding only what you really need.  Eating until you’re full and no more.  Sleeping until you’re rested, and no more.  Buying the clothing and the ‘stuff’ you need, but not more than you need.  “Moderation in all things.” as counseled by Terence the ancient Roman Poet.  This practice takes a bit of faith.  We hoard things (food, money) out of fear that it won’t be there when we need it.  Practicing non-hoarding asks us to be faithful that the universe provides what we need. 

(This week, my husband and I started small.  Instead of buying six cans of soup at the grocery store this week, we only bought the two we knew we’d eat.  So far, so good!) 

Non-possessiveness also acknowledges the transient nature of our human existence.  We can never really own a thing, since we can’t take it with us past this life.  Regardless of your belief about what happens after this life, the reality is, all the stuff you’ve acquired eventually ends up in someone else’s hands. 

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.” ~Native American Proverb.

When we begin to think of our physical belongings this way, the relative importance of them might decrease in relation to other things in our lives.  It’s an interesting study, if nothing else. 

Aparigraha as non-attachment acknowledges that change is a constant, and invites is to release our grasp on our own notions of how things should be, and instead see them for what they are.

“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.”  ~ Heraclitus

We know this intuitively, and as Heraclitus also said “The only constant is change.” and yet we get stuck in our own habits and ways of being, ways of seeing the world, ways of seeing ourselves and seeing other people.

The practice of aparigraha is a proactive step toward accepting what Heraclitus so eloquently summarizes for us.  Nothing is ever the same, and yet we go back to our notions of what is and how it is the way it is, clinging to ideas about the way the world looks rather than letting ourselves see it in its true nature.

In our study of satya, we looked at truthfulness and bringing this in to our aparigraha practice will serve us well.  When we look to truth, and are brave enough to see it for what it is, we practice aparigraha. 

Stop! Thief!

A few months ago, a neighbor of mine was arrested for stealing from cars and houses in our neighborhood.  He had broken into my car as well (which is not entirely true, I had left the door unlocked) but he didn’t take anything (that I noticed, anyway).

I have to say that more than anything else, I was shocked that something like this happened in Bristol, in our own driveway.  It seemed really unbelievable to me.  Even though he didn’t take anything from the car, I was so angry.  Angry that he’d nonetheless taken something of value to me: a sense of safety and comfort I had about living in this town.  I was so mad at him that I wanted to leave a note on his door telling him that he should be ashamed of himself.

But strangely, I was also grateful to him.  His actions reminded me that we aren’t living in some utopian version of small town America, but in real life, where sometimes, people do stupid, hurtful things to one another.

At Bristol Yoga Studio this month, we’re taking about a philosophical teaching of yoga called ‘asteya’ which translates from Sanskrit as ‘non-stealing’.  It’s also the 8^th commandment (of the 10 listed in the Bible), and generally a thing that we accept we shouldn’t do.

Among other definitions, the Oxford English Dictionary (“OED”) defines ‘steal’ as: “take or appropriate dishonestly (anything belonging to another, material or immaterial.)”  This really upends my whole idea of stealing.  It doesn’t have to be anything that is of value, we just have to take it dishonestly, (which, also according to the OED, means ‘lacking integrity or straightforwardness’).

So, to not steal from one another, we must engage in honest exchange, with integrity.
Generally, I think we think of stealing as taking something of value, like money or belongings or time, or even trust.  But according to this definition, stealing can be of something material or immaterial; its value doesn’t matter.  I’d argue that the value doesn’t matter because value is subjective.  What I value deeply might vary from what someone else values deeply.  We can’t decide for one another what is, or should be, of value, so this definition suggests that we should avoid stealing anything, regardless of whether we perceive it to be of value.

For example, we shouldn’t be stealing each other’s time.  There is nothing that I loathe more than sitting in a doctor’s office, having arrived for my appointment on time, and then being told that I have to wait, because the doctor is not running on schedule.  From my perspective, this practice is disrespectful of patients and suggests that the patient’s time is somehow worth less than the doctor’s.

But many of my friends and family welcome this time to sit and ‘do nothing’ while they wait for the doctor.  What feels like stealing to me, feels like a gift to another.  So value is subjective.

Admittedly, my own transgressions of this are many – how many times do I tell someone I’ll meet for lunch 12, but then not arrive until 12:15?   How many corporate meetings have I been to for which I wasn’t adequately prepared, and this way wasted the time of my colleagues?

More than just telling the cashier there was a math error in the change we are given, I think that being told to not steal is to ask us to live with integrity as we interact with one another.  I think to not steal is to acknowledge the value of each other’s contributions, possessions and attention, and behave accordingly.

Of course, it also means not eating the grapes while you’re shopping and before they’ve been weighed and adhering to store policies for returns and discounts.  It means paying your debts.  It means not breaking in to your neighbor’s car (even if the door is unlocked) and, most importantly it means behaving as if we all have value.

Because we do.

Asteya - "Non-Stealing"

Stealing something means to take, without consent, something that doesn’t belong to you.

I have been thinking a lot about our third yama ‘asteya’ for some time now and have been reading what others have written and have found it more difficult than our first two yamas (ahimsa and satya) to relate to regular life. 

So it’s taken me some time to get this blog post up, but not because I am not thinking about asteya, but because I am.  Here’s what I have come up with.

First, I really like what Deborah Adele has to say about asteya’s ultimate lesson – we have to prepare ourselves to receive what we would like to have.  For example, if you want to run the Boston Marathon, you have to first train as a runner, run other marathons at a pace that allows you to qualify, and then you have to actually run it.

Folks spend years training for an accomplishment such as this one.  Last year, I went to watch one of my closest friends run in the Boston Marathon and it was amazing to see all of these folks who had committed so much of themselves to this work.  Equally amazing was the pride, the joy and the support from the spectators.  It was as if everyone there knew that what we were witnessing was incredible, and we were bound together in happy recognition of this.

Asteya is like this, it says that to get to a certain place or stature or accomplishment, we have to let ourselves be where we are – we meet ourselves where we are with kindness (ahimsa) and honesty (truth) and from this place, we can prepare ourselves to receive that which we want (to run a marathon or do an arm balance or get out of debt).  Asteya expects truthfulness of where we are so as to not take the gifts of the future. 

Generally when we talk about ‘stealing’ something, that something has value, either to the one who took it or the one who it was taken from.  The two things that come first to mind that are of value are time and money.

With respect to time, I think of how frustrating it is for me to sit in a doctor’s waiting room when I’ve arrived for my appointment on time and I am expected to simply wait until the doctor gets to me.  I feel like I’ve been stolen from.  This led me to realize the importance of being prepared whenever I am meeting with someone I work with.  How frustrating is it to others when I show up to a meeting and am not ready to discuss our agreed upon topic?  Or when I haven’t reviewed the materials sent in advance?  I’ve tried to be mindful - before I make a phone call or send an email or leave a message -  that I am clear about what I want to say and in what way.  This shows the person I am talking to that I recognize the value of their time and am treating it accordingly. 

Of course asteya counsels to not steal physical belongings or money, but I think it’s more subtle than that as well.  It’s about receiving and providing value in exchange for another value (time or money) spent.   This is a tricky one because value is subjective because it has to do with an individual’s perception of what is valuable.  Accordingly, we have to look within ourselves to see what ‘feels’ best regarding what is given and what is received in return.  We have to take responsibility to communicate and understand our own expectations in the value equation. 

For example, some students at Bristol Yoga Studio love our 30-day unlimited class card because they come several times a week to yoga class.  For them, it’s a great value.  Others find it frustrating because they buy the 30-day card, then come only a handful of times in the 30 days and feel like it was a waste.  Which of them is correct?  I’d suggest that someone who buys the 30-day card without being certain of their commitment to be able to come is stealing from themselves.  That money was probably better spent on something that they would actually do.  I always advise people to be honest with themselves about their commitment to practicing yoga before buying the 30-day card. 

The last piece about asteya that I’ll mention here has to do with people helping one another.  The one who offers the help needs to be clear about what they expect in return, if anything, and whether the friend they are helping is willing and able to give it.  I have watched many a relationship suffer because people who were giving did not feel they were adequately acknowledged or appreciated for their work.  The question to ask ourselves is – ‘What do I expect from doing this work?”  Approaching the answer with satya (truthfulness) will shed light on expectations and begin to allow the exchange to also be filled with asteya. 

Satya - Non-lying / Truthfulness

“What are you not seeing because you are seeing what you are seeing?” Yogiraj Achala

“Truth has the power to right wrongs and end sorrows.  It is fierce in its demands and magnanimous in its offerings.  It invites us to places we rarely frequent and where we seldom know what the outcome will be.  Truth demands integrity to live and our own self that is more than not telling a simple lie.”  Deborah Adele

In order to know the truth, we have to first listen.  Can you steady yourself long enough to hear the truth of your physical body, your thoughts, your emotions?  Practicing yoga gives us an outlet to begin to quiet enough to just listen.  Beware!  What comes up might be tough, but holding a space for the truth of it – its simple ‘is-ness’ – is all that’s required.

As we learned in ahimsa, you don’t have to fix yourself.  A commitment to truth is simply about allowing the space for what already is, to be.  Looking at yourself, your life, your thoughts, your physical body with truth, can allow freedom of expression in what actually is. 

How often do you know the truth of your situation, but lack the courage to move on that truth?  When my son Max was diagnosed with craniosysnestosis at four months old, (the only treatment for which was surgery) my first reaction was, simply, NO.  I won’t let him have surgery.  I won’t allow that to happen to my precious boy.  Not because I am a medical doctor and knew better than the experts, but because I was utterly terrified at the risks we were facing.  The truth was, I didn’t know whether surgery was the right thing to do.  But instead of making space to face that non-knowing (and consider the potential that he would have surgery) I rushed to conclusion – Absolutely not – because of my own fear. 

In time, and with love, I found enough space to allow for the possibility of an outcome I didn’t want – surgery – because of something I knew to be true: there was nothing I wouldn’t do to take care of and love him, including facing my own fear. 

In the end, Adam and I spent a lot of time learning and researching the right thing to do for Max, constantly checking ourselves to make sure we were moving from a place of truth, not fear.  As I re-read that last sentence, it sounds so easy and clean.  But I can remember it being one of the hardest things I’ve ever done; I’m not sure I can adequately express here what that was like. 

Yoga helped.  When Max was in surgery months later, I steadied myself by doing an asana practice in the surgical waiting room. 

Often when I am leading a yoga class, I’ll advise folks to be “Right here, right now, and nowhere else.”  The truth of what is, in this very moment, is the place to move from.  Not last week’s practice, not the yoga body you want to have, but the one you have right now.  Practicing presence opens us up to see truth. 

You might as well be honest with yourself on the yoga mat.  

Consider satya through your practice this month, on and off the mat, and join us for the monthly discussion on March 20 at 7:30pm. 

Ahmisa Chat Tonight

We had a great time talking about ahimsa last night.  Thank you to everyone who attended and shared thoughts about this valuable lesson. 

We all agreed that we've got to be more gentle with the words we say to ourself about ourselves.  One of the quotes from the Adele book we highlighted was “I excite myself with my incompetencies.”  Meaning that whenever we find something that about ourselves that we aren’t good at (I used the example of consistently losing my keys) that instead of beating ourselves up over it, we can use that as an amazing opportunity to explore why it is so, and maybe make some space to support ourselves with kindness.  (Like giving myself permission to take my time coming into the house and stop rushing around.) Ahimsa to the self.

One thing that we all found tough as a group was to take the idea of ahimsa onto the mat.  The challenge of discerning between what we should ‘work through’ and what we should just notice is a tough one.  I think the work is really getting to a place where we can even consider getting that discernment.  That is the practice of yoga, and with ahimsa toward oneself (finding balance, finding love for oneself that is forgiving and lenient, and having courage to sit with fear) we can work toward that discernment in asana.

Ahimsa toward others can be expressed in not only not being physically violent, but also in trusting in someone else’s ability to move through their own life in a way that is best for them.  We don’t have to fix other people, or even worry about them.  To do so is its own act of violence.  Further, we don’t even have a right to decide for them what they think of us.  It’s not even up to us to decide how other people see us.  To presume to know that or decide that for someone is also its own act of violence toward another.  To let someone have their own experience, in its truth, no matter what we think of it, is practicing ahimsa toward others. 

As a take away from the discussion, we decided that we’d play around with the idea of pretending for a time that we’re already complete, and try to practice it for periods during the next week.  Deborah Adele suggests:  “There is no need to expect anything from yourself , or criticize or judge anything about you.  No need to compete with anyone, no need to be more than you are (or less than you are).  Note your experience.  Notice how much pleasure, kindness, and patience you can allow yourself to have with yourself.”  This is like the idea of ‘falling in love’ with yourself, where the object of your love (you) can do no wrong, are perfect just as you are.   

I say all the time in classes that everything is already ok – we don’t need to fix ourselves; we’re already perfect.  I mean it.  (More ahimsa to oneself.)

What do you think?  How do you see ahimsa on and off the mat? 

Guest Blogger: Janet Johnson, Yogini at BYS writes about Ahimsa

A Note from Tracy:  As many of you know, as a community, we are taking a look at yoga's ethical guidelines.  We are reading what we can, researching, and coming together once a month to talk about our perspectives on yoga and its philosophical teachings. 

Many of us are reading Deborah Adele's Book:  The Yamas and Niyamas.  You can get it on Amazon, or pick up a copy when you're in the studio next. 

It was Janet (today's guest blogger) who initially brought this book to my attention, and I am grateful to her for not only sharing the book with our community, but also for sharing her personal essay on ahimsa, yoga's first yama.  

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Ahimsa: Taking My Own Ripe Journey 

by: Janet Johnson

The eight yamas and niyamas are a set of yogic guidelines that are similar in purpose to Christianity’s Ten Commandments.  Both serve as a set of rules or laws that support the functioning of relationships and society through tasking the individual to act in certain ways.  However, the yamas and niyamas are not undergirded by the threat of “Thou shalt not…” with the implication being “Or else!”  There is nobody to be afraid of with these restraints, whereas the Ten Commandments are based on the fear of God’s—and by extension, society’s—wrath.  

This is a good thing, because if ahimsa, which is often translated to “nonviolence,” were an actual law, I would be on Death Row.  I violate it multiple times a day toward myself, hopefully less often toward others.  For me, this translates into the fear of not being good enough and not doing enough.  One result is that I have become a slave to my planner and email inbox.   Deborah Adele talks about this very thing: “I had created a violent inner world of pushing, overdoing and under-sleeping…” which leads to this:  “…how we treat ourselves is in truth how we treat those around us.  If you are a taskmaster with yourself, others will feel your whip.”  

I believe that these pressures are not just personality traits that she and I share, but are also deeply political.  The emotions I feel are partially internal, but they are also external, resulting from gendered and cultural forces outside myself.  For example, there is the guilt for not meeting certain expectations for professional women, like being good at my job, having a clean house, and being nice, all on the same day.  That pressure, and then the subsequent anxiety, anger, and guilt at not living up to some invisible, unreachable standard, are socially driven.  Thus, that violence I commit against myself, and subsequently others as I take the role of stern taskmaster, is fed upon by socially constructed cues about what it means to be a woman, a teacher educator, a wife, a sister, a daughter, a friend. 

Ahimsa, and other elements of yoga practice, provides a counternarrative to these pressures.  The idea that I am okay—not just okay, even, but perfect--just the way I am, is radical in western thought.  How can I be perfect when I forgot to shave my legs, dirty dishes are in the sink, and there are 114 unanswered messages in my inbox? Self-acceptance feels Stuart Smalley-ish:  “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and doggone it, people like me.”  This seems faintly ridiculous because our culture provides archetypes of perfect women, wives, mothers, etc., and it is clear that I most certainly am not “good enough.” Instead, yoga tells me that the external does not matter; that I am indeed a worthy human being, just like everyone else.

Running and yoga are good lessons in ahimsa, as my expectations are necessarily limited by my physical body.  My lungs, heart, and legs can only be taxed so far, so fast.  My hips and hamstrings will only stretch to a certain point.  Wise coaches and yoga teachers tell me to listen to my body.  This listening has become part of my running and yoga practice, and as a result, I have been able to push my own perceived boundaries in unexpected ways.  

If I am to practice ahimsa, this acceptance of my physical boundaries will necessarily carry over to the rest of my life by recognizing and respecting my personal and professional boundaries as well.  I have a job in which, as one colleague said, there is no end.  I could work 24 hours a day, and there would still be emails to answer, proposals to write, papers to grade, classes to plan, ideas to consider, students to support, colleagues to share.  This is what drew me to this work in the first place:  it requires engagement of my mind and my heart.  I cannot imagine a better fit for my personality than this profession. 

In order to have the energy to do my life’s work, then, it seems I must try to understand and appreciate all that is mine to do, and all that is others’ to do.   One of the ways I violate ahimsa is that I try to fix things for people instead of letting them figure it out for themselves.  Deborah Adele suggests that being a fixer and worrier is a violation of ahimsa, because when we worry about others, we imply that they are not capable of, as one of my student teachers said, “taking their own ripe journey.”  When I consciously withdraw my worries and fears on behalf of others, I have more positive energy to give to the world.  

In this way, ahimsa is both personal and political.  It is personal, because it means living with integrity through recognizing and respecting my own boundaries.  It is also political in that it asks me to resist gendered and classed pressures that are implicit and explicit in this culture. However, ahimsa does not require that I withdraw from the world; just that I make deliberate, thoughtful, and compassionate choices.   It is both freeing and frightening to step outside the familiar zone governed by fear and judgment.  Like everything, this will be a nonlinear, recursive process, in which I get it right sometimes, and fail miserably at other times.  I may not have Stuart Smalley’s confidence, but at least I can get off my own personal Death Row.    

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Janet is a writer, runner, yogi, teacher and researcher, not necessarily in that order.  She started practicing yoga at Bristol Yoga Studio when it opened and feels blessed to be part of such an accepting and inspiring community.  For Janet, yoga is a physical, spiritual, and intellectual practice, and she aspires to match her commitment to social justice with yogic principles.