When I’m rushing through life, I know I am absent. That feeling of rushing, of pushing against life, makes me suspicious. I feel the rush of a city move through me and I have to be hyper-aware to stay centered.
“What am I rushing for?” “What am I avoiding or afraid of?” I ask myself.
It’s easy to get caught in the rush.
In yoga, you develop the courage to stop. Stop all efforts. Look at what’s really happening. Feel what you’re really feeling. Yoga is not a practice where you strive too much. You cannot be too ambitious in yoga.
In yoga, we practice the opposite: relax and do nothing.
The purpose of the yoga asanas is to prepare and make the body flexible for meditation. In meditation, you sit in stillness for long periods of time. When you sit long enough, you start to relax. Being in relaxed states of stillness allows you to have new insights.
The purpose of all that sitting, doing nothing, is liberation.
Liberation from what?
Your ideas, your thoughts, beliefs.. your ego. YOU.
What are the first steps to having such realizations?
Relaxation.
Yes! Relax. Just be.
If you cannot sit in stillness for long periods of time, take time to rest and relax.
Do Sivasana (corpse pose).
Even this you will benefit from.
You cannot strive your way to liberation. There is nothing to attain. Nothing to get.
You relax, empty.
Surrender.
Realize.
Do the opposite of what you’re taught to believe.
(In traditional yoga, Sivasana, corpse pose, is an important aspect of the yoga practice.
It is the step to be taken first before meditation).
