Surrender and Loving It 'Til You Know What It Is

I am in a large group of women artists who have driven up to the ridge of a mountain range and then down a very windy road to a secluded artists retreat program in northern California. All I want to do is stare at the dreamy landscape, watching how the golden green hills go back and back and back, disappearing finally into a fog bank which hovers just above the sea in the distance. I want to watch as the wind blows, the fog clears, and the misty outlines of the hilltops begin to glisten in the midday sunlight. I want to sit and sketch it, and fill in the colors I am seeing, and try to capture the dreaminess, the haziness of it all, the lack of precise outlines which gives it that quality of mystery that makes me want to keep staring.

But we have a schedule. There are ranchers and herders moving us along in this schedule, ensuring that we are on time. I help myself to a large lunch - two servings each of lentil soup and kale salad with some fruit on the side. My idea of a perfect meal. But my stomach feels slightly full after all that, and I am ready to rest and digest.

Having forgotten the schedule momentarily, I’m jarred when it is announced that we now need to move into another room for a “movement activity”.

I take my time walking there, hoping those extra few seconds will give my digestive system time to bring the food down a little more.

By the time I join, the circle has been formed and all the women are bouncing lightly on their bare or socked feet. This being one of only 14% of artist residency programs in the country who have a fully spring loaded dance floor, shoes are not allowed.

Ann Swanberg is the leader. I had experienced her work once before in a large church, where she presented her improvisational approach to life in a humorous show. We kept bouncing - this was Ann’s method for keeping us out of our thinking minds and in some other realm governed by the moving, breathing body - and we did a whole host of games designed to get us to drop our personalities by acting silly and free.

What I noticed is that my recent experiences with becoming present were done in the stillness and silent meditative movement of the Breema Center. Somehow in that setting, where I was truly not a personality and there was absolutely no imperative to show up as entertaining in any way, I could feel my own bodily presence. In this setting where everyone was asked to do something silly, there was slight pressure to be “silly enough”. As if stillness would not have been accepted there. But I don’t know because I just flowed with the energy of the room.

One of the more silent and inward-turning exercises of the day did capture my attention. She called it “The Infinity Box” or “Loving It ‘Til You Know What It Is”. The instructions went something like this: Reaching into an imaginary box from which anything is possible, allowing the “Body First” to lead the improvisation, follow the shape your hands spontaneously take as you reach in. As they emerge from the imaginary box, just be with them. Don’t change them or manipulate them into what you think they might be. Just breathe with the shape, feel it.

"Love it ’til you know what it is."

It was fascinating to watch the different shapes my hands took on when I allowed them to. Fingers apart and curved, palms facing up. Fingers together, joined at the thumbs and index fingers. Palms cupped, joined together, facing up. And then waiting. Breathing. Feeling. An answer or image always emerged. But sometimes I had to stay with it longer than expected. The final one I ran out of time on. So I sketched it, and it is permanently imprinted in my bodily memory. I am still wondering what it is.

It reminded me of painting. How the creative practice for me is staying with something long enough to find out what it is. Not to give up. Not to decide in advance that something’s “never going to work”. So often when I have mustered the courage or audacity or love to stay with it, to keep going, to keep loving it, something else so beautiful and magical emerges right on top of it all.

Chris Zydel sent out her newsletter yesterday too, and I happened to read all the way to the bottom. The article was about "Surrender". How surrender is not giving up or weakness or defeat. But rather a form of full presence. That in order to fully participate, there is surrender involved. As I write this, it occurs to me that the four “No…” principles from Breema touch on what kinds of surrender are involved - No Judgment, No Force, No Extra, No Hurry No Pause. Well that’s a lot to give up in order to get to presence! How often are we drowning in judgment, doing more than is needed, rushing around, or not acting because we feel stuck in hesitation.

Surrender is the sweetness of letting life lead. Of loving whatever life gives you until you know what it is. I am attempting to apply it to my body, my relationships, my work decisions, all of which I apply a certain amount of control, changing, and fixing to. I don’t really know the state of full surrender into acceptance. I am pointing towards it sometimes, but I haven’t sunk to the depths of that pool to say, “Huh. So this is it. I’d like to know how this feels. Really.”

Here’s what Chris had to say about surrender:

When a sunflower turns its face to follow the sun, that is surrender. When a seed planted in a rich soil breaks free of its encasement and pushes its way up to the light of day, that is surrender. When a wild mustang gallops wildly and joyfully across a meadow, that is surrender. When a baby tries to grasp a beam of light, laughing delightedly, that is surrender. When you look at a sunset and feel the peace of simply breathing in and out, that is surrender. When you enjoy a delicious meal, letting the flavors tickle your tongue, that is surrender. When you feel drowsy and begin to fall asleep, that is surrender.

In all these experiences you, or the horse or the sunflower are completely giving into what's right there in front of you. You are simply being in the present moment with what you feel drawn to do.

So in other words, surrender is something that happens daily, hourly, minute by minute in our lives. It's so very common and down-to-earth. It's in the most intimate fabric of our existence. And includes everything from the mundane to the ecstatic.

And tomorrow, with the start of the final Energy Gardeners' Club of the year, I am ready to apply the principle of Surrender. Making things happen is not about controlling in order to get what you want. Making is allowing.

Where are you reaching FROM?

A few weeks ago, on August 20, I read the news that BKS Iyengar, the renowned Indian yoga teacher and founder of the Iyengar Yoga tradition, had died at age 95. Immediately I was brought back to the many memories I have as a result of his teachings. My first California yoga teachers were trained in the Iyengar tradition. In their classes I was exposed for the first time to silent meditation and chanting. I remember as a student just managing to tolerate these first few minutes of ritual as I waited for "the real yoga class" to begin. What could these Sanskrit sounds possibly have to do with my physical strength, flexibility, and fitness, which is why I did yoga (or so I thought)? As soon as I read the news, I went to my bookshelf and pulled off my well-worn copy of Iyengar's book, Light on Life. Nearly every page is marked and notated, evidence of the way I used to read as if every book were homework that I would have to write a paper on someday.

The pages that the book fell open to were about extension and expansion in yoga poses. How when we reach and stretch, we often only think about the point to which we are trying to reach, but we forget about where we are reaching from. And as I pondered this, I realized that no matter how far we are trying to stretch, we are always reaching from where we are now. From the center of our being.

How often do we check in with how we are as we are doing something?

With the completeness of our focus on the outward gaze, how skilled are we at really seeing the inner place we are always reaching from? Do we know this place? Do we know how it feels? Do we really know it as it is NOW, or do we know it as a memory, a snapshot of some previous moment in time, or some interpretation created by our judging mind? Do we only see what we think other people are seeing - some image of how we're supposed to look?

Developing clear inner vision, and the capacity to really see where we are reaching from, is the core practice of being present. In the years since I started yoga practice, I have been exposed to many more forms that give the body, mind, and soul the opportunity to be together in harmony - improvisational music, whole body listening, Breema bodywork, to name a few. When this harmony is happening, we have the opportunity to see the world within our true selves. When we practice seeing into our true selves, we begin to know more and more where we are reaching from in any moment, even as we continue to reach toward something else.

Each day since Iyengar's death, I have read a few pages of the book again. I am grateful for the life he lived that enabled him to write those words on the page. And I feel gratitude for the life I am living that enables me to understand the meaning of those words beyond the page.

Where are you reaching FROM? And how can you practice seeing your true self with inward-looking eyes?

Join me in the Energy Gardeners' Club for some practice with the support of nature, sound, art, and a circle of safety and encouragement. Starting next Tuesday, September 9th in Half Moon Bay.

Trying To Squeeze Blood From A Turnip and The Power of No Force

Part of a series exploring each of the Breema Nine Principles of Harmony

Trying to squeeze blood from a turnip is a lot like being at war with reality.

What are the ways we use force against what is, in an attempt to make things the way we think (and thought is the key word here) they should be?

Does it ever really work? And at what price? When we use force, do we even know that our sanity, our inner peace, our body, exists? Or do we only see the blood we want so desperately to come from the turnip, or whatever we are applying force to?

If we see clearly, we first begin to recognize that we are not getting the blood we want, despite all the effort. If we continue to look, we might be able to recognize that there's a turnip involved, a turnip that is quite innocent, being a turnip. It has no blood to give. It's just being squeezed, and squeezed some more, harder and harder. You (the one who is squeezing) keep getting more frustrated, but the turnip is not doing anything different. Surprise, surprise, it's still a turnip! Your squeezing, your effort, your frustration, your attempts, have done absolutely nothing to change that.

The turnip seems puzzled. It seems to ask, "Why are you angry at me for being a turnip? Why are you frustrated that there's no blood in me to give? You are getting everything you possibly can from me, because I am a turnip!"

If we look really deeply, we might then see that it's not the turnip who has the problem. We are, at some level, insane for being attached to an outcome that does not - cannot - exist. Until we see all of this clearly there is no way we will let go of our grip on the turnip. We will keep squeezing and squeezing, until our hand gives out or our frustration gets the better of us. The turnip won't yield any blood, and it probably won't even change shape. But what will we be left with? A sore hand, and a broken spirit. Time spent in useless frustration, curses thrown at the luck we were dealt. And no blood.

Not a very fulfilling way to pass the time. Or a very good way to use the strength in your hands.

Working with the body, I've noticed that there is power in the hand when it receives. When you align your entire body, placing your hand in a position where, when it simply receives the weight of your body, it carries the entire universe in its palm. There is no effort in that moment. There is intention and presence in positioning your body to be able to receive. But once those intentions and alignments are in place, the rest is effortless. There is No Force.

However, there is tremendous power. In the moment of No Force, there is space for the power to heal, to release, to discover, to transform. When we let go of force, we merge with reality. Reality is kind, if we allow it to show us what we need to see.

No Force is a way to practice kindness toward yourself. The beneficiaries of No Force will extend beyond you, but if you need a reason to begin, begin with what is kind to yourself.

Precision, Gentleness, and Letting Go

In The Wisdom of No Escape, there's a chapter where Pema Chodron talks about three useful qualities for life and for meditation: precision, gentleness, and letting go.

I've been consciously living with the nine principles of Breema lately, and I've noticed how precision, gentleness, and letting go are a useful way to greet any practice, old or new.

For example, one of the Breema principles is "No Judgment."

When you begin to study and practice "No Judgment", the first thing you notice is how much judgment is in your mind already.

"No Judgment" brings your attention first to the judgment that's there. Which means, you begin to identify judgment as judgment. That's precision. You may notice as a new student of something, you like to be very precise. So every time you see your mind judging, you say to yourself, "Damn it, I'm judging again! Why am I so judgmental? I need to stop judging so much." And you feel the assault on yourself beginning to happen.

This is the moment when gentleness can enter in. You have an opportunity to practice gentleness, or to continue the assault. Gentleness gives you the opportunity to take a different attitude toward yourself, even as you see, with precision, what is going on. Gentleness encourages you to just see, without extra attacks or criticism or labeling. In other words, no need to judge your judgment. Be gentle with yourself as you begin to see clearly. Just see what is, with no extra.

Letting go is the final practice, and it is the result of practicing both precision and gentleness. Letting go is not something to achieve or do, but is a natural unfolding of both precision and gentleness practiced together. When you play with these qualities of precision and gentleness, dance with them back and forth, and then gradually see that they are both happening all at once, there is a feeling of letting go. Neither precision nor gentleness has to "win". There is no final state to achieve. There is no superior way to be.

Letting go is a sensation of relief. That it's not all such a big deal. That we definitely need to practice, but part of the practice is also to let it all go. Letting go is not a "Forget about trying, I'll just give up" kind of feeling, but rather a smiling recognition that no one needs to win or lose, not even the more or less enlightened parts of your own mind. It's a kind of relaxation into the present, a return to what is, and a feeling that our attached thoughts are not who we are. A knowing that our true essence is something much lighter, and also more timeless than any thought or practice.

No Hurry, No Pause: The Rhythm of Life

*Part of a series exploring Breema's Nine Principles of Harmony

The beauty of the present moment is that there is fast forward, no rewind, no pause, no stop. Only continuous play. The continuous supply of fresh moments, unlike any other that has occurred in the past, or any that will ever occur in the future.

Even when we repeat something we think we have done in the past, we are no longer the same in that new moment. We may want to relive an old memory again and again, try to freeze it, or reproduce it by carefully recreating the conditions surrounding it in our mind’s image. But a copy is a copy, having an original life of its own in the present moment when it is experienced.

We may want to fast forward through something unpleasant, uncomfortable, or confusing, wishing that it would pass through more quickly, so that we don’t have to experience what we fear or avoid habitually. We may wish to dictate the speed of life, the pace which is appropriate for experiences to happen.

But what if we were to rest in a state of “No Hurry, No Pause” – neither dwelling on pleasantness nor fleeing from unpleasantness? What if we maintained this tempo of “No Hurry, No Pause”, as we experienced each present moment in our lives? How might we experience it differently?

How might we change our attitude toward circumstances, if we practiced “No Hurry, No Pause”, becoming a little more resilient with ourselves when it comes to what we avoid, and a little less attached to what we consider pleasurable or ideal? What might we discover at the intersection of “No Hurry" and "No Pause”?

I get to experience myself at this intersection each time I do bodywork, whether it is Breema or traditional Thai massage. In that space of "No Hurry, No Pause", I find my natural rhythm, the rhythm of my body in relationship to the other body, the rhythm of being in harmony with all that is. I connect with my own body's breath, I feel the other body's breath, and somehow the breath of the universe begins to breathe us. I notice my mind sometimes wanting to hurry things along, other times checking my progress by wondering how much time is left, and even sometimes wondering if I should even try to do the next sequence. When I remember "No Hurry, No Pause" at these moments, all thoughts dissolve and my entire being becomes one with the natural rhythm that is always present....the rhythm of the music within us. The music that is always playing. No rewind, no fast forward, no pause, no stop.

Photo credit: http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/playback-lamps-your-missing-re-60728