Yoga Scandals, Light Chasers and Shadow Boxers - Part 1: Duality and Denial

Hello friends,

 

This week I feel the need to express some thoughts about recent press regarding scandals in the yoga community, in particular, regarding John Friend. The details of the scandals are not important to me, but the general reaction to them in the press more so. We are all flawed and beautiful as we walk this Earth together.

 

"Yoga and "scandal" seem to walk hand-in-hand these days. It's a "union of opposites" that's growing more comfortable with time." - Stewart Lawrence, Huffington Post

 

It saddens me to see a beautiful life art-form and science-of-life misunderstood and misinterpreted. But I guess that is what we humans tend to do. If we are a people that can crucify a holy man, we can also easily throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater.

 

Scandals in the yoga scene are nothing new. We could cite here pages of stories depicted in ancient yogic texts such as the Mahabharata and Ramayana that illustrate the twisted acts of human folly while on a spiritual path. Yet the media, spearheaded by journalists that are clearly not impartial reporters doing thorough research, seems to proudly point fingers at seeming rot at the root of the sacred, while conveniently ignoring the fact that scandals are created by imperfect humans, not the eternal divine.

 

Human ignorance is as old as man. When we lift up humans to the realm of gods, they are bound to fall. We do it to our movie stars. We do it to our politicians. We do it to our spouses and friends. And we do it to our yoga teachers and leaders. If we make someone an angel, they will eventually become a devil. If we lift them up, the force of gravity will make sure that they will come back to Earth so that we make peace with shadows.

 

As the Nazarene once counselled, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." We all cast shadows. There is not one person on the planet whose darker side does not dot the Earth in some way under the light of the sun and the moon. The higher up we grow from the ground, the deeper the shadow we leave behind, the more humility we must have to embrace the dark, and the more likely our ego will try to go awry if left unchecked.

 

We live in a word of duality and opposites. We can see from nature, that what goes up also comes down; that if there is night, there is also day; hot counters cold; that which opens can also close; that which resists can also flow. Why then are people so surprised to find that those in the limelight have darker sides just as we do? Why do we hold such high hopes for people to only have light and be without dark?

 

It does not matter if a person promises eternal life, attests to be the best yogi ever or preaches the way of the holy. If they are not a fully realized master, they will cast a shadow. Whether or not they are in touch with it or in denial about it, it is there. And it is up to us to use our discernment to see only part of the picture, or look deeper to see more fully.

 

At our core, unless we are fully enlightened, we all are uncomfortable in some way with our shadow. There are parts of ourselves that we do not like, and certainly that we do not want others to see. When we are presented with the possibility that we may avoid doing the work in our own dirty basements by following a shiny leader on a path to the promised land without turmoil, we sign on the dotted line and project perfection on a limited individual in an imperfect world. We are bound to be disappointed. Disillusionment is just the collapse of illusions that we needed to humbly see beyond in order to evolve. Disillusionment is an act of Grace.

 

From an early age, our culture teaches us to believe in saints and saviours that will take away all our sins. We are persuaded that our sinfulness will be cured by another's super powers that will magically remove them, while we lie back and avoid our responsibility for our own evolution. Like yearning children, we hungrily want to believe that some mystical big mummy or daddy will dissolve our pain and do our uncomfortable work for us. But we are not little children living in lack, but adult children of the divine who are fully supported to do our very important inner work and take responsibility for the shadows that we - no one else - cast and leave behind us. Yet we distract ourselves from our pain as we look to others for escape. We amplify their light, so that it may, for a while, free us from the darkness we fear.

 

I do believe that there are real Buddhas on the planet, true realized masters who have fully integrated their own shadow and live in the oneness of absolute, eternal love. But the light of pure consciousness is not a conditional light like that of day and night. The light we cultivate to embody in the practice of yoga is not about luminosity to outshine the dark, but about the ultimate dissolve of the ego's need for duality into the eternal substratum that is the essential underpinning of all of creation. We are limited humans with limited words, so we call that substratum "light". How can a finite word in a dual world ever capture the perfection of such a force? That is where mystical poets like Rumi take the floor.

 

Continues tomorrow with "The Light of the Satguru"

Ask Parvati 37: Feeling Under Attack - Part 3: Understanding and Compassion

PART 3: UNDERSTANDING AND COMPASSION

(Continued from "The Big Picture: It's Not Personal")

 

Here are some powerful thoughts I ask you to consider. Find a quiet place and allow yourself to go deeper with these:

 

"Everyone wants to be loved."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wow.

 

"Everyone wants to be loved. And everyone fears they will not be loved."

 

 

 

Think about that.

 

 

 

 

 

Think about that some more. Breathe it in. Let it resonate.

 

"Everyone wants to be loved and everyone fears they will not be."

 

 

 

 

Apply that thought to your boss. Think of him that way, just wanting love, fearing he will not be. Think of how you want to feel loved. Perhaps, you two are not that different.

 

 

 

Think of your mother that way, just wanting love, fearing she will not be. Try to feel the fear your mother has, and know you too feel the same. Perhaps, you are not so different. The love you seek is also the love she wants. The fear you have that you won't find love, is also the very same fear she has.

 

 

 

Think of your friends and other family members that same way. See the way they hope for love, the way they feel disconnected from love, the way they do love. Where is the love in all these relationships? In which way do you love? It may not be so much, perhaps, about how much love you get, but about what you give. When  you see yourself, the fears, the hopes, the desires you have for love in others, when you see you are not that different, then perhaps love blossoms, like a flower in the mud. We are left full, feeling connected, loved, even in the face of adversity.

 

 

 

Now think of yourself. Touch that place of "I just want to be loved, and I fear I will not be." It is deep stuff. It has been there likely a very long time. Perhaps it was exacerbated by your mother, or your father or someone else. But it is a wound you carry. No one made it. It is yours. If it is yours, then you can heal it. Since you are the one holding on to it, you can let it go. We hold onto wounds, feeling almost precious about them, as they form our identities and create who we are. As we grow, we must let go and move beyond these divisive states so we may emerge into wholeness. But this only happens as we understand the wounds we have, how they are born from ignorance, just as when another hurts us, their actions are born from ignorance. When we understand and have compassion for our ignorance, we will feel more understanding and compassion for the ignorance in others.

 

In my experience, we all have a deep place within where we fear that we will not be loved. Sometimes, around that raw and fragile feeling, is the feeling of vacant hopelessness. But this will not last. Beyond all these painful, dry, and desolate places is a fountain of unending love. The goodness of life is within even the most desolate times if we allow ourselves to settle in and open, patiently, to the flowering spring. The force of life emerges again and again, without compromise. It simply is. Beyond our fear of not being loved, is love. In our fear of not being loved, is love. Around our fear of not being loved, is love. The fear itself is love, as it shows us our very humanity, our potential for openness, receptivity to that which I would simply call Grace… the force that is beyond our ego's grasp and comprehension.

 

When we are willing to rest, in stillness, quietly, without fighting, with this fear of not being loved, we find tremendous creativity. It is in some ways the linchpin of the psyche that moves us from the grip of the ego into a place of oneness and compassion. Rest there and you will find love and all will change.

 

(Continued tomorrow with "Giving Voice and Making Changes")

Ask Parvati 37: Feeling Under Attack - Part 2: The Big Picture/ It's Not Personal

(Continued from "The Power of Patience")

 

We tend to take people's bad moods, emotional reactions, judgment, criticism and attacks personally. Of course, toxic energy directed towards us hurts. But it does not have to.There is tremendous power in not taking things personally. In doing so, we peel away the dramatic story that masks the moment to reveal deeper truths. When we let go of taking things personally, we ultimately see that everyone is wounded, everyone needs love and everyone is doing the best they can at any given moment.

 

Hurtful exchange and nasty comments usually happen so quick, that we hardly know what really has gone on. When we practice patience and take a bit of breathing room from a volatile situation, we can slow down the tape of our reactive mind and see the subtler pathway of our knee-jerk reactions. We can move our awareness inward and ask ourselves, "What buttons of mine did this person push? What did I feel? Why did I react like that? What about this did I find hurtful? Is there something else I could see that am not seeing?"

 

It is my belief that most people are just trying to get through their day with, likely, a whole lot of mental fog, swirling unhappiness and unresolved desires. When we are unconscious, we are very selfish beings, consumed with our own wants and needs that tend to eclipse our ability to perceive the happenings in our environment and the needs of others. To become sensitive to the world beyond our ego, and the needs of others, is a skill that is cultivated through spiritual awakening. If we were all more sensitive to the needs of others, well, our world would not quite be in the mess it is in!

 

That being said, I believe it is a rare thing that someone is deliberately malicious. There is a lot of unconscious malice, but deliberate hurtfulness requires a certain mental instability or insanity that is not, thankfully, that common.

 

This week, I had an experience that reminded me to not take things personally. Soon after I woke up and before I started my morning meditation practice, I took a peek at my emails. I rarely do that as I prefer to keep my mind untouched by external things and dive directly into the deeper space of still thoughts. But for some reason, that day, I did. I had received an angry email from an acquaintance, a spiritually dedicated practitioner who was also a fan of my blogs. She had accused me of stealing one of her social media postings and writing a blog entry about it. Her words were sharp and hurtful, accusing me of being unspiritual and dishonest. I was shocked. I had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. I had not even seen any of her social media posts recently.

 

I went to my morning meditation practice, admittedly, a bit shaken. As my mind settled, I felt it best to simply reply to her and say that I had no idea what she was talking about. After my sit, with the calm of my practice still fresh, I went to my computer with a calm and honest reply. My message was sent only with the intention to clarify any possible confusion and assumption. However, what came back were further irrational accusations and a request that I stop the "childishness" and admit my fault. Again, I had no idea what this person was going on about.

 

For whatever reason, one that only that person can know, my blog clearly had pushed one of her buttons and she was reacting. She had made me the source of her injury, rather than owning her own reactivity and inner wounds. I did what I could by voicing my truth. Her decision to not believe me was entirely her own, something over which I had absolutely no control.

 

With hindsight, I now feel a sense of inward, open warmth at the folly of the human mind, the depths of our attachments that make coiled ropes look like snakes so that we go running. I now also chuckle at how I had best add a disclaimer to all my blog entries: "All characters, places and events appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental." LOL

 

What I have come to conclude is that every drama has a hero and antagonist. It is what makes dramatic stories move forward in plot. If we wish to be free of life's dramas, we must free ourselves from seeing ourselves as the hero and others as villains; or ourselves as victims seeking a hero.

 

So when you next meet an antagonist in life's drama, take a moment to ask yourself a few questions to avoid taking their misery personally. Is it possible, for example, that the supervisor who got angry at you during your presentation had an argument with his wife that morning? He perhaps left the house fuming and took it out on the next available person: you. Who knows what his reasons were for acting hurtfully or why he did what he did. It however has nothing to do with you. He may need to communicate something which may or may not have validity, but his choice to do so in a way that causes pain is a choice he made that reflects the person he is. His choices do not reflect who you are.

 

I have quoted this before, which I feel sums up life relationships so beautiful: "If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.”

 

Everyone, like you, carries wounds around, deep childhood hurts that lay gaping until we inadvertently pour our own salty tears into them. We mean no harm. We bump into each other like diamonds in the rough, polished by life unfolding. It is healthy to try to see the good in others, that is, to see that each person is doing the best they can with the skills they have at this time. When we avoid taking things personally and rest in the bigger picture, our hearts will flower into the fullness of compassion and we will no longer hurt or feel hurt by our ignorance or the ignorance in others.

 

(Continued tomorrow with "Understanding and Compassion")