Everyday, think as you wake up,
Today I am fortunate to have woken up. I am alive,
I have a precious human life. I am not going to waste it.
I am going to use all of my energies to develop myself,
To expand my heart out to others, to achieve enlightenment
For the benefit of all beings.
I am going to have kind thoughts towards others.
I am not going to be angry, or think badly about others.
I am going to benefit others as much as I can.
~HH The XIVth Dalai Lama
Excellent Ted Talk by Robert Thurman about the ego and that our misperception that what we are is inside our skin. Short, sweet, interesting and inspiring!
Walk silently.
I read this today on a sign indicating appropriate behavior while in the hallway at my son’s elementary school. When I read it the first time, it made sense to me. I’m sure that I was trained in the same way and have probably seen this message infinite times in my own elementary school and other institutional experiences and beyond. But, the more I looked at the sign, the less I was sure of what it meant. In my experience, this means, don’t make noise when you walk in the hall. But, how do I know this? Walk silently actually means something very different depending on the context.
There are other messages on other signs. One of those messages is that students should “Keep their unkind words to themselves.” Again, upon initial reading, I immediately knew what this meant. It means that I shouldn’t call anyone a Poopy Head, you know, at least to their face. But, again, the more I saw this message, the less I was sure of what this really meant.
I was even less sure of what it meant when I happened to walk by the lunch room on my way to my son’s classroom and heard a lunch aid yelling at a student who had walked up to her and asked for help because their hands were full of too much hand sanitizer. She said, “You took too much soap. Don’t you have soap in your house?” Seems that someone hasn’t been reading the signs in the hall! First of all, it wasn’t soap, it was foaming hand sanitizer. Second of all, it is not beyond my imagination that this child had never used a dispenser for foaming hand sanitizer before. Third of all, the implication that perhaps this child did not maintain hygiene at home and therefore was ignorant on how to use the sanitizer at school wasn’t very kind.
So, on the third day of school, this poor child was berated for having too much hand sanitizer on his hands. I wanted to walk loudly (if you can walk silently, you can also walk loudly!) right into the lunch room with a paper towel and help that child remove the hand sanitizer. Then, I wanted to use some of the hundreds of unkind words that had immediately come to mind when I watched that Pittsburgh Public School employee talk with complete lack of respect or empathy to that dear child.
What I know is that you can put up all the signs in the world, but the best way to lead these children will be by example. We must show them that compassion is possible and makes the world a better place to live for everyone. It feels really good to be compassionate and express empathy and kindness to one another. We can learn to be loud in our silence and have so many kind thoughts that there is little room for the unkind words.
In our yoga practice on the mat, we first learn awareness. The first time that we sit on our mat and wait for class to begin, we become aware of the hundreds of thoughts, ideas and feelings that travel across our mind in a single moment. Some of those thoughts are unkind and we may, at the end of a long day, have myriad unkind words for our family members and colleagues. But, our practice shows us that it isn’t a sign that should keep us from expressing these unkind words. Our practice brings us to a space where we notice that our thoughts and feelings are constantly in flux. Our unkind words in this moment are no more or less true than the kind words that we might have for the very same person on a different day or in different circumstances. As a matter of fact, after calming the body and mind in a yoga class, we might find that all the unkind words are gone anyway as the intensity of the passion of experience has faded.
What I wish for this lunch aid and all the children and teachers and administrators in my son’s school is awareness. Awareness that they live and work in community. Awareness that their feelings and experiences are important, but always changing and shifting. Awareness that we all make choices in how we express ourselves and that these choices impact other people.
On your mat, the next time that you practice, soften your face and tongue. Relax the muscles behind your eyes and soften your inner ears. Feel the expressed and unexpressed unkind words you carry within you. Free yourself slowly by breathing into the unkind spaces and exhaling the unkind. Let you body relax and watch the breath as you free yourself slowly of unkind words. As you practice, catch yourself if you start to think anything but the kindest thoughts about yourself. Forgive yourself for all the times you used too much soap, forgot to sort the laundry, used the wrong color pen, took the subway in the wrong direction and wore different socks. Once you feel better, offer some forgiveness to everyone else.
Tonight, in my practice, I’m going to forgive the lunch aid. It’s a start.
For those of you who live in Pittsburgh and use public buses regularly for transportation, you know that the last week has been a nightmare. At all times of day and night the buses are crowded and most service that we had come to depend on every 15-20 minutes is now only coming once every hour. Many bus drivers are frustrated and exhausted and riders are squished and even riders that have no business standing and hanging on for dear life are being asked to do so. With the reduction in service, many buses are too crowded to stop and pick up new passengers along the route. As I looked out the window when we passed stops by there were literally ten to twenty people waiting at these stops who would now have to wait 30-minutes to an hour for the next bus with absolutely no guarantee that one might come that would actually be able to stop and pick them up.
I am currently 30+ weeks pregnant and was riding the bus with my four year old son last weekend since I had promised him a trip to the library. It was the middle of the day on a Sunday and we got onto a very crowded bus. One person in the front got up to give us their seat and I had my preschool age son sit down and I stood in front of him. The way the seat hit him in the back of the legs caused his legs to “fall asleep” during the ride and when we got up to push our way out of the bus his little legs buckled under him and by the time we made it off the bus he was complaining that his knee hurt. We had to go into a drug store for something and, by that point, my son was loudly insistent that his knee hurt VERY MUCH. Upon inspection it was clear to me that it was related to the seat on the bus and would be relieved in a few minutes since the cause of the problem had been removed.
About 5-minutes later, a man wearing exceptionally filthy clothing and pushing around a small cart of equally filthy belongings came up to me in the drug store. In one of his hands, he held out a damaged children’s toy that had, in its day of new glory, probably been a plastic jeep car of some kind, but was now a three-wheeled go cart without doors or a roof—-just the base and three-wheels remained. The man said to me, “Your little boy’s knee is hurt? Would this help him feel better?” I was so shocked that all I could come up with was, “Oh, no, we couldn’t take your car! Thank you so much, but his knee will feel better in just a minute.” But after we left the store, all I could think about was the incredible human capacity for compassion and generosity that is possible regardless of our perceived or actual economic resources.
Here I was, completely self-absorbed in my clean clothes with my floral Vera Bradley purse working through my frustration at having had to wait for a bus and be so inconvenienced by the uncomfortable ride while I searched the shelf for allergy medicine that I could afford to buy for my child and this man, who appeared to have nothing—certainly, he had less resources than I did at that moment—offered both his compassion for my son’s pain and an extension of a gift of all he had. My response was to refuse the physical gift, but the extension of compassion and this generous offer are gifts that will remain with me for a very long time.
So many of us think that we don’t have anything to offer, when, at any given moment, we are given infinite opportunities to extend compassion and generosity to the people around us. While making donations to organizations and individuals who are doing important work in our community and around the world have their place, if we do not have the financial resources to make these kind of donations, there are still opportunities to give and to improve the lives of other people. A kind word, an offer of help, giving your seat on a crowded bus, or an extension of the resources that you do have without any selfish intent—–these are gifts that we can all give to one another.
Research shows that meditation that includes the extension of compassionate thoughts and wishes, even to complete strangers and on a large scale such as an intention for the happiness of “all living beings” has a profound impact on the shape of our brains and, ultimately, our own health. This is not to suggest that we should be compassionate only to reduce our own emotional and inflammatory response to stress, but there truly are benefits to all living beings, including ourselves, when we make this a part of our practice. Instead of thinking that we have very little to offer, we can delight in the fact that being alive gives us myriad opportunities to explore the gift of compassion regardless of our economic status, career choice or lifestyle. Even better news is that every breath we take is a new opportunity, a refresh button of sorts, and a chance to take this moment to improve the experience of all living beings.
Post by Sharon Fennimore Rudyk, an independent yoga and meditation instructor in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Find out more about comprehensive meditation and stress reduction programs on Sharon’s website.
I was recently shopping at Target for garbage bags, Play Doh and “feminine protection products” (Exactly what are we being protected from? Who is being protected? But I digress…..) and on my way to the cash registers I saw a large display of Father’s Day cards. How convenient! I figured that I would easily be able to snatch up some lovely and thoughtful cards for all the Daddies in my life. The first one I picked up was from the “humorous” section and it had a picture of an overweight man with an exposed belly and a dripping beer can in his hand. The overt message of the card was that the recipient deserved a day to just sit on his butt and drink this beer due to his (On all other days but this one?) magnificent role as DAD. The undertone of the card was that the recipient was lazy and had questionable hygiene and probably spent a lot of days on the couch with a beer in one hand and clothes that didn’t fit quite right. So, actually, not that magnificent of a Dad at all. The next 15-or so cards that I picked up didn’t get much better. One card even made a farting noise when you opened it! The general idea is that American fathers are golf playing, beer guzzling, lazy, farting and/or fart joke telling, overweight, fishermen with somewhat questionable parenting skills, but who mean really well. I was embarrassed for the state of fatherhood and my quick stop for cards turned into a rather lengthy exploration of what these cards reflected in terms of our expectations for fathers and the ways in which we feel it is appropriate to thank them.
Considering the fact that over 21 million American children are being raised in single parent homes and over 84% of these single-parent homes are being facilitated by mothers, it seems that having someone to buy a father’s day card for has become somewhat unique. To summarize, 26% of American children do not have regular contact with their fathers. From the cards on display, it would also appear that the fathers who do stick around, are fools. Perhaps, even worse than fools. These are unkempt fools who like to golf. Today, I received a promotional e-mail from Organic Bouquet that offered 15% off their selection of Father’s Day gift section. The gift section included some very expensive items like an olive tree, bonsai and a wall hanging of a brown fish that said “GONE FISHING.” The less expensive items were cookies in the shape of backyard barbecue foods. The discount could not be applied to any of the beautiful flower arrangements that this company offered for sale. No, the discount was on this ridiculous selection of man-gifts—-over-priced olive trees and hot dog shaped cookies.
Can you imagine? “Here honey, give this olive tree to Daddy—yes, he’s on the couch where he always is—-and, include this card of the fat man that makes a farting noise when you open it. He’s just going to be so happy!”
Honestly, if this is fatherhood, is it really a club you want to belong to? Sounds to me like a job with low expectations and no benefits. As a society, we need to re-imagine fatherhood so that it is a role that men can see themselves playing and that we aren’t embarrassed to ask them to play. In my role, facilitating Dynamic Childbirth workshops—–yoga-based childbirth preparation workshops for pregnant women and their birth partners—I meet a lot of men who want to be great partners and great fathers. As a matter of fact, I know that many of them ARE great fathers and are part of a movement to re-define fatherhood. Do some of them fish? Yes, they absolutely do! Do some of them drink beer, watch tv, play golf and occasionally make poor fashion choices? Yes, they absolutely do! Is this what defines them? No, absolutely not.
These fathers support their partners in pregnancy and childbirth. These fathers cook all the meals so mom can breastfeed all day and all night. These fathers wear their babies and sing them to sleep at night and know where the band-aids are and the pediatrician’s phone number. These fathers wake up at 2:00am and rush feverish babies with croup to the emergency room. These fathers teach their daughters how to go down the slide feet first and push their sons on the swing. These are fathers who share themselves and their interests with their children by taking them camping, to their favorite farmer’s market and the record store. These fathers play musical instruments, have a love of film, poetry, good books or an interest in horror movies—–whatever it is, they are interested in something and they show their children what is possible in the world from a different perspective from their partner. These fathers show their children that compassion, responsibility and generosity are excellent qualities in a man.
So, I’d like to thank my father for giving me the gift of music, adventure and for always making sure that I had the tools of the trade—a Swiss Army Knife, comfortable shoes and a calling card. And, after my son was born, thank you to my father for bringing food by every night so I didn’t have to worry about making meals. Thank you to my step-father for learning how to defrost breast milk. Thank you to my grandfather for loving my grandma so very much and making your children and family a priority. Thank you for being the one who didn’t mind if I wore tops that didn’t match my bottoms, for not liking my boyfriend, for helping me move in and out of countless apartments and college dorms and for picking me up from that party in the middle of the night because my ride was drunk and never, never, ever saying anything about it.
Thank you to all the fathers out there who we would be embarrassed to give these silly cards to. This Father’s Day, let’s forget the olive tree and the ridiculously-shaped cookies and make our own cards. Let’s create an Ode to Fathers that reflects their true gifts and the sacrifices and commitments that they make to be great Dads. May our collective Ode be a part of a revision of American fatherhood that is inspiring and meaningful.
References:
United States. Census Department. Custodial Mothers and Fathers and Their Child Support: 2007. By Timothy S. Grall. Census, 2009. 26 Feb. 2010 [http://www.census.gov/prod/2009pubs/p60-237.pdf].
I have had the great fortune of studying with and, in some cases, just been able to listen to, some people that I would consider to be genuine geniuses. My fortune has been so great, that it would not be possible to list everyone here. One of these people is David Harvey, who I met and studied with when I was a student at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York. David Harvey is a critical geographer and anthropologist with significant passion for improving the conditions of life for humans everywhere. Anyone who has studied Anthropology, or perhaps, any social science, knows that, it doesn’t look good for humans. Almost every ethnography documents some kind of suffering—-the kind that we inflict on each other, the kind that we inflict on ourselves and the tragedies inherent with war, famine, natural disaster, racism, disease and the list goes on. After six years of graduate work in Anthropology, I can tell you that the research consistently reveals that we aren’t that nice to one another and we don’t like to share. Therefore, it is of considerable joy to read the hardly lighthearted, yet somewhat hopeful, work of David Harvey. Specifically, I refer to his Spaces of Hope (2000). Basically, the news still isn’t good, but Harvey presents small flickering lights in the tunnel of human doom that provoke the reader to become a part of something bigger than themselves in the name of the greater good. The other risk of reading Harvey is that you have a song in your heart for Balzac, Marx and Benjamin even though you’ve never had the least bit of desire to read their work.
What role does Karl Marx and the body play in all this? Harvey (2000) suggests that Marx, “…from the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts onwards, Marx grounded his ontological and epistemological arguments on real sensual bodily interaction with the world (Harvey 2000: 101).” Here, Harvey quotes Marx (1964 edition, 143):
Sense-perception must be the basis of all science. Only when it proceeds from sense-perception in the two-fold form
of sensuous consciousness and of sensuous need–that is, only when science proceeds from nature–is it true science.
What is not discussed here is how, for many of us, we have lost our sense perception. Many of us dis-abled our tools of sense perception somewhere along the way and now we move in a most un-sensual way through the world separated from our bodies. We do not know hunger or fullness and spend a remarkable amount of time in some variation of the over-pose: over-whelmed, over-ate, hunched over, over it, over you, over and under—-trapped. One of the only sensations we recognize is discomfort. While this can be seen as negative, this discomfort is an invitation to return to a sensual state and to notice how we feel. For many adults, this discomfort encourages a first experience with yoga and many new opportunities for health and wellness.
If all you feel is discomfort, there are two things that you can understand that may be helpful:
1-As you are human, and your discomfort is part of your experience, you can now be open to a deeper sense of compassion for all other humans. I invite you to sit and feel your discomfort and know that you are not alone. We can use our own suffering as a connective link to all living beings.
2-No matter where you are and no matter what your circumstances, if you can feel discomfort, there is still hope! If you have remained sensual enough to feel this pain, then you can use these sense organs to feel non-pain. You can use the skills of yoga and movement to wake up these capabilities that you have for something different. Something better!
Here is a short exercise that you can do for as long as you like or as short as you like and wherever you are right now. This is the exercise of pure sound:
Take a moment to open your hearing senses and listen to sound without judgment. No, it isn’t easy when you’d like to throttle your neighbor for power washing his driveway each time you try to take a nap with your newborn. But, just for the sake of this exercise, hear the power washer minus the judgement. The same goes for hearing something lovely, like the song of the Cardinal outside your morning window. You might hear this lovely bird-song and suddenly wish that it would never end, or think of some other time you heard such a song or you might think that it is time to purchase more bird food. The idea is to just listen—-without the stories, ideas, thoughts and negative or positive judgements. As soon as your mind starts to wander from the pure sound, let go and return to a sensing of sound. Don’t get frustrated if this takes work. It is work. This work helps us understand the quality of our thoughts and how so very much of our experience is determined not by reality, but by what we are doing with it. The mind is constantly moving, but the more we can create some space between experience and thought about the experience, the more rested, relaxed and clear we are. Less angry, less in pain, but more sensual, more open and liberated from the confines of our memories and experiences.
REFERENCES:
Harvey, David.
Spaces of Hope. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000.
Marx, Karl
1964 edition, The Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844. New York
My web home page is the New York Times, and I would be lying if I didn’t say that the images of injured children, devastation and large numbers of bodies being scooped and dumped by trucks have not taken their toll on my heart-mind. This is a most challenging time for Haitians all over the world. This is most likely an understatement and one that I may never, and definitely hope to never, understand the true depth of. The New York Times has a list of organizations currently accepting donations and you can access it here: http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/13/haiti-disaster-relief-how-to-contribute/?scp=12&sq=giving%20and%20haiti&st=cse
I want to offer Yoga Matrika blog readers some links to organizations that are accepting donations:
UNICEF
http://www.unicefusa.org/?gclid=CLzslMOfp58CFWkN5Qodrxrk1Q
DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS
http://doctorswithoutborders.org/
PARTNERS in HEALTH
http://www.pih.org/home.html
Obviously, there is GREAT need and money is a type of energy that we can send directly to these organizations who can make sure that care is provided to the almost 3 million survivors of this most terrible earthquake.
There is a very important kind of Buddhist meditation that can be practiced by anyone, of any religion, any time, any place. Human suffering in Haiti (you can read this Human Rights report to find out more) did not begin with this earthquake and there is suffering all around you—sadness, hunger, violence, inequity, pain. While it is easy to focus on the pain and suffering that is shocking and remarkable, this meditation asks us to to focus on human suffering in general. This meditation gives us power to acknowledge our own suffering, to wish something better for ourselves and to extend this wish to everyone, everywhere who is experiencing suffering.
It can be overwhelming to accept that last week, before this earthquake, in Haiti, there were children being kidnapped (according to the Human Rights Watch report, as many as one kidnapping daily) and food riots as so many people were starving to the point of violence. The United Nations estimated in 2008 that there were 170,000 children employed in domestic labor and only 50% of primary school aged children go to school with only 2% of the population finishing high school. The reality is that there is great need and tremendous suffering in Haiti and around the world. Rather than turn away, we have an opportunity and an obligation to face this pain and draw on the strength of our practice to build compassion and create peace and beautiful wishes for all living beings.
STEP 1: Sit quietly in a chair or on the floor (if this is comfortable for you)
STEP 2: Notice the quality of your breath and do a scan of your body from your toes through the crown of your head, just noticing how you feel, any sensations in your body and places that feel open or closed.
STEP 3: Make a sincere wish for your own safety, happiness, health and well-being. You can use phrases such as: May I Be Free of Fear and Harm; May I Be Content as I Am; May I Be at Peace with What Comes. Or, you can just make an honest wish for yourself in your own words that is meaningful to you.
STEP 4: Extend this wish gently to all living beings starting with the people that you care about the most, see them all bathed in the light of your sincere wish. Then, extend this wish to all the people that you know, including neighbors, friends, colleagues, the person who serves your coffee in the morning. Then, extend this wish to everyone in your city, state and country. Take your time. Be honest in your wish and sincere in your desire that everyone be granted this wish.
Step 5: Call into your mind’s eye Haiti and the world. See the light and energy of your beautiful wish bathing Haiti and the entire world in a beautiful light. Be sincere in your wish that all living beings in Haiti be granted peace, health and freedom from pain and suffering.
This is different from prayer in that you are sending energy not from a higher being, but from your own heart and mind to everyone who might need it. Although our American culture has made a commitment to certain beliefs about time and space, this meditation teaches us that we are also humans with energy that knows no boundaries and we have power to release energy in ways that defy these artificial boundaries we have created or believe in.
To Haiti and to everyone in the world who is in pain, suffering, sad, lonely, thirsty, hungry or in need. Please know that there is a little woman and a strong community of yogis here in Pittsburgh who sit in the quiet power of our minds and send you light, love and happiness. May you receive our solemn wish for relief and may it give you comfort and strength as you move forward into life.
Written & Posted by Sharon Rudyk
Owner and Director of Yoga Matrika and Prenatal Yoga Pittsburgh
https://www.yogamatrika.com/
http://www.prenatalyogapittsburgh.com
http://www.sharonrudykyoga.info