Summer Shift

(photo by Chuck Savage)

I hope you enjoyed the change series as much as I did.  

I find that knowing what to expect really helps me keep my center as I move through the process.  It doesn’t mean it’s easy but at least it’s (sort of) predictable

Changing for the Summer

With change in mind, I’m making a shift this summer.  I’ve written these weekly notes for more than three years now.  I love it.  AND… this summer I want time to focus on some bigger projects.  I’m considering putting some writings together into something a bit more focused and tangible. 

SO.. for the summer I’ll be a bit quieter on the blog.  I’m thinking I”ll drop in with tiny thoughts that come up from my teaching or coaching experiences.  Or I may recycle posts that I write for Instagram and Facebook (I’ll be intentionally slowing down there too).    I won’t go totally silent, but it’ll be a little different. 

I hope you’ll bear with me since it’s in service of something greater than weekly posts.     And now, Onward….

Reflection on the Brahmaviharas

Through the month of May I taught the Brahmaviharas in many of my classes.  The Brahmaviharas come from sūtra 1.33 in Patañjali’s yoga sūtras.  This is a text from India from about 2,000 years ago and is considered one of the seminal texts on yoga.

In the Brahmaviharas, Patañjali gives us ways to deal with other people.  These strategies are dependent on how the other person is behaving.  With happy people - be friendly.  With folks who are suffering, have compassion.  Be joyful when folks are behaving meritously.  And stay in equanimity when folks are un-meritous.   Those are the instructions Patañjali gives.

But why?

A student asked  a great question one week: “Why should we be friendly towards happy people? They don’t need it (they’re already happy)”  

The answer is that Patañjali isn’t worried about the other person.  He’s concerned with you.  You’ve chosen to embrace yoga.  Patañjali wants you to be successful at your yoga.  He even says in this sūtra that behaving this way will give you a “luminous mind.”

So, you don’t offer these things to others for their sake.  You do it for YOURS.  You are the one who might lose yourself when someone else is behaving poorly or is in a good mood.  The friendliness towards happy people isn’t so that they feel good…. it’s so that maybe their happiness can rub off on you.  

The opposite is that you might be irritated with their happiness.  You might see someone behaving poorly and then get angry with them and suddenly you’re behaving poorly.  You could see someone suffering and sink into guilt or shame.  You might watch someone’s good deed and become jealous or anxious that you’re not doing enough.  Any of these reactions - and so many others - could pull you away from your yogic studies and into a less than luminous mind.

Patañjali wants yoga to guide us, even when we’re not surrounded by others who are practicing it.   So, you’re friendly towards others for YOU.  You do it to keep yourself on your yogic path.  If others become inspired by your life, great.  They can become yoga practitioners.  But until they do, Patañjali has nothing to say to them.   He’s focused on you.

It’s for YOU

I love this because it is the reminder that your yoga is for you.  It may help change the entire world.  But it’s for YOU first.  It alleviates your suffering and gives you tools for how to meet the world with consciousness and Grace.  

If we can do that we may be able to bring more peace into our own hearts.  And what gift it would be if that peace spilled out into the greater world.

Stay on your path.  Let others do what they’re doing.  Stay close to the teachings and close to your Heart.  

Thanks so much for reading - I’ll drop in with these light notes throughout the summer.  Be well!