The Empowerment of Surrender

I visited the cemetery today where my grandparents and great-grandparents are buried.  Walking among the grave stones, I took notice of the two dates engraved on each one - birth and death.  What a beautiful reminder of the temporality of life; of our short time in this world as we understand it.  Laying to rest a loved one, and being at peace with this action, is an extraordinary act of surrender.

Letting go is not easy, and in our modern world, not always encouraged.  While surrender is a word often uttered within the walls of a yoga studio, outside of that space, surrender is associated with becoming powerless, failing, or giving up.  In a yoga practice, however, surrender is an empowering act.  One that enables us to give ourselves over to something greater. To let go of "I", or our ego, and become truly whole.  In the Yoga Sutra, Patanjali refers to this practice as Ishvara Pranidhana - the shift in thinking from our ego to our divine self, where we reside in grace, peace, and freedom.  Ishvara Pranidhana is our sacred connection to our divine self.

I nearly always begin my yoga practice in Child's pose, kneeling, prayer-like into the earth. We begin life close to the earth, with a innate connection to our Source.  It is here where we bring ourselves back to Ishvara Pranidhana.  Where we surrender to our voice within, letting go of our yesterdays, our tomorrows, and entering into this sacred space. This moment of Now.  As we move through our practice, we move up from the earth, finding greater heights, experiencing challenges and perhaps even flying.  We come back to the earth at times, sometimes to rest or reconnect, or because we have fallen.  Yet when we fall, the earth is always there to catch us.  To fall from a pose is a truly an act of letting go. You may never build the strength and flexibility to fly in Bird of Paradise without first falling.  Our falls make us stronger.  We learn something knew each time we let go and allow ourselves to be free, to be playful, to challenge ourselves.

Yoga is a delicate balance between control and letting go.  A back and forth of honoring your limits and of knowing when to push yourself a bit further.  We learn to work with a pose, and not against it.  We find the strength to take that lesson with us when we leave our mat and work with, not against, the events and situations we encounter in our lives. Ishvara Pranidhana, awakens our connection to our Source and gives us the freedom to surrender to and accept with love and gratitude, all that which Is.    

At the end of our yoga practice, the most important pose awaits.  Savasana, corpse pose. The time when we surrender completely into the arms of the earth.  In Savasana we honor our burdens, and for a few minutes, at least, lay them to rest. Our burdens may still exist when we leave our mat, but we know that we will leave feeling lighter, more free, and willing to let go of that weight when the time comes to do so.

Yoga shows us the temporality of everything. We learn to accept that nothing is permanent, that each practice will be different. We learn to let go, to welcome every possibility, and to act with grace, honor, and love.

"To live in this world

you must be able

to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it 

against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and when the time comes to let it go,

to let it go."

Your Divine Self, a poem

My joy is yours

And yours is mine

Our love unites

Each one, divine.

Shine our light

And you shall see

That I am you 

And you are me.

Our love is shared

Among us all

Believe in this 

And never fall.

Your peace within

Forever still

Comforts you

And guides your will.

My will is yours 

And yours in mine

Our connection shared

You are divine.

Namaste.

Little Yogis

"Dissolving the five Kleshas, or veils, brings forth the radiance of the Divine Self."

Yoga Sutras, 11.3

The other day I taught "Yoga Play," or toddler yoga.  My little yogis ranged in age from 2 through 5, although most of them were 2.  While slightly chaotic, it was a fun and beautiful practice. We danced and sang, learned some poses, bowed to one another and said "namaste," and even laid in savasana for a full minute and a half!  What was so beautiful about this though, was seeing their uncluttered, eager, and accepting minds absorb everything we did.  This is where is all begins.  A yoga mindset is a peaceful and loving one, and teaching that to children from the beginning is what will make the world a better place.

To an adult, practicing yoga can be sort of like learning a foreign language - only its the language we are truly made to speak so it has only become foreign to us. Children come into this world with no misperceptions, their inner light shinning brightly.  They come in knowing and understanding far more than we know as adults. As we begin to invest ourselves into the world around us, however, and as we are influenced by our life situation and the people in it, our vision becomes skewed.  The Kleshas, or veils, which represent themselves as our mental and emotional mindset, draw thicker and thicker over our eyes until we have become lost from our true selves and fully invested in the material world.  Our inner light fades, and we accept our thoughts, emotions, and past experiences as our identity.

As adults, lifting this veil is far more difficult depending on how much you have invested yourself into what you think is the truth. As we get older, our minds and bodies are more resistant to things that are new or different.  Yet what we must understand is that it is a matter of remembering what we already know, not learning something that is new.  With children, we have the opportunity to lift the veil before it has been drawn shut.  Keeping that inner light glowing and lit in our children, preventing the veil from blocking their spirit, will make the world a better place.

Namaste.