It has BEGUN.

 Okay, I know, I know...here I am in freakin' YOGA SCHOOL, you would think that this blog would be jam-packed with goodies and insights and funny stories, but the truth is, I am EXHAUSTED.

Truly.  Truly.

I started on Friday night with a class and then a several hour orientation, in which we played introduction games (ugh), did some chanting, met our mentors (more on that later), heard some stories, got our super-special "Lotus College of Yoga" binders (that's right, college.  I'm in Yoga College, yo.) and got to take a look at our truly terrifying schedule, which I will describe in more detail later.  All in all, totally exhilirating and inspiring...just to be back in my beloved NY studio, which I have missed so dearly, and to be embarking on this adventure with teachers I love and adore...it's too good to be true.

And then we jumped right into the fire.

Today and yesterday were 8 hour days...I can't even begin to tell you how much new information is currently swimming around my skull, seeking out a resting place.  Both days have been scary and exciting and passion-filled--what a total gift it is to be taught by people who are so passionate about what they do--and who approach teaching truly, truly, truly as an ART form.  We have talked about Picasso and Proust and Twyla Tharp and a myriad of others--we have talked about inspiration in the form of poetry and painting and music and architecture--all of the things that make me fall in love with this practice over and over again for its openness and universality and deep creative potential.

And we've talked, of course, about moving. And the body.  And the breath.  And what it means to teach...which I still have not wrapped my head around.

But if you think 8 hours a day/5 days a week is a lot...it's not even the tip of the YS iceberg.

First of all, this week, we're going 7 days...friday to friday, and then all the rest of the weeks will be weekends off (hallelujah!).  Second and third and fourth and fifth and sixth of all...in addition to our class time we are also required to:

Attend two additional (1.5 hour) classes/week.

Write about those classes, and turn in write-ups on a weekly basis.

Keep a daily journal. (Does a blog count?)

Maintain a daily personal yoga practice which explores and incorporates everything we've been learning.  (this part is no joke...our personal practice is getting a lot of emphasis and it is where we're supposed to be doing the deep learning, and there will be no fudging on the at-home practice.)

Complete weekly written homework--also no joke--this is hours-worth of written and exploratory work every week.

Meet with a mentor group every week.

Meet with a study-buddy every week.

Be vegetarian.  (um.... oops.)

Did I leave anything out?  Sleep.  Eat.  Make occasional phone calls home to boyfriend.  I think that about covers it.

So...please forgive me if I'm not as vocal here in Shanti-town as I want to be...I will do my best to keep you all updated, but just know in the meantime that I'm thinking of you...and sweating.



Um, did I mention it's 11,000,000 degrees out in New York right now?

What I'm Doing Today...

Paul Willis, Inventor

I have had this extra-large extra-heavy Manduka mat (the cadillac of mats, people) for many months now, but have not, until now, had any way to carry it, except slung under my arm.  Boo!  I have been lamenting this fact for nearly as long as I've had the mat, but not doing anything about it because I just can't bear to shell out the $50 for the mat bag that will fit this behemoth. 

This is where the I'm-the-luckiest-girl-in-the-world part of this post comes in, because...my dude took one look at my mat, made a trip to the hardware store and by the time I was home from class had built me the masterpiece you see above.

Not only was this solution only $10, it is also so cool and industrial and unique I can barely stand it.

And made with love.  Siiiiiigh.

Why Not Just Let Go?

Yesterday, while having lunch with a dear friend of mine, we stumbled into a conversation about "letting go", the culmination of which was a totally brilliant analogy, made by said friend, that actually resolved for me a burning inner conflict that has been bouncing around in me for years, literally...years. (I will  include genius-like analogy at the end of this post).

I housesat for this friend not too long ago, and while there took the liberty of perusing her bookshelves, upon which I found the following book. Cheesy title, I know, and the guy who wrote it is named "Guy", also cheesy, but my friend owned the book, and said friend is a voracious reader, and ivy-league educated to boot, so I trusted her judgment and set to reading.

This book begins with a story about an archeologist.  This archeologist has spent his whole life looking for this one ancient temple (full of treasure or something), which no one has ever been able to find.  And one day, after years of searching, this archeologist gets a hot tip.  This temple, it's rumored, is buried in a mountain which the archeologist is going to have to tunnel through in order to reach said temple.  And this archeologist, being the adventurous type, decides he is going to do just that.  But the tunneling is really hard. It's not a very stable environment and things keep caving in and he has to rebuild his tunnel over and over again. But he is determined to find this temple. So he digs and digs, it takes him months but he's just--he won't give up. And one day he gets to this point where he's too far in to turn back, and everything in the tunnel starts to cave in around him. All he can do is use whatever energy he has left (after months of digging) to throw himself up against the tunnel's center support beam, which stops the caving, but also means he is literally holding the tunnel together all by himself, with the force of his body. And as he's doing this, a thought occurs to him...as he's there, trying to hold the tunnel together with his bare hands, trying not to DIE...and the thought is:

"Why not just let go?"

And of course he thinks this is a crazy suicidal thought, but he can't stop thinking it...it's pretty persistent. So, deliriously tired from trying to hold this tunnel together, he does...he just...lets go. And everything starts caving in around him and he's pretty certain that he's just signed his own death warrant. But he hasn't--he doesn't die. And when the dust clears and everything settles he looks up, and there, right above him is the roof of the temple he's been looking for. He had been inside it the entire time--tunneling through the very thing he'd been searching for!

Now, I don't know if my re-telling is nearly as effective, but when I read that story I was so moved...I recognized it in a visceral way...that feeling of holding everything together, just trying to dig and manuever and keep the structure intact, while all the while there is this little voice saying, "why not just let go?" I recognized it. In my bones.

And my friend who I was lunching with and I got to talking about this book, and we had felt the same way about this opening story (she and I are similar in many ways--both of us carry a bit of the overachiever in our DNA) and so we began to talk about it--about this mysterious "letting go"...about exactly how it's done and what it means. A subject I never tire of exploring, but which always, for me, meets the same impasse.

The way I see it there are two camps, on this subject of letting go--one which says, you know, the whole DEAL is about letting go...that all of spiritual practice is really just about relaxing, and that the letting go is king. And then there's another camp which says, no no, it's all about ALIGNING--it's about lining up with "the divine" or whatever you want to call it, and that it's an active process, one of figuring out what you want and then lining up with that desire in order to find liberation. To me these things feel in contradiction, and I find myself swinging from one to the other...neither ever feeling totally comfortable. Never quite sure if I'm supposed to be doing less or doing more.

And this is where my friend's brilliant analogy comes in.

First let me say that my friend is a gifted actress and singer, and over the last several years she has become more and more devoted to her singing, practicing every single day, and so it's not surprising that right now her vocal work is the lens through which she is veiwing the world.

"Singing is the only way I can think to explain this." She said.

(Surpriiiiiiiiise, surprise).

She said that you have to have energy in order to produce sound...you can't just sit there with your mouth open and wait for music to come out...you have to engage...you have to move air from one spot in your body to another and that has to be active, and conscious. BUT, she said, you also have to relax the right parts of your anatomy in order to produce the sounds you want. If your vocal chords are tense, they aren't going to be able to vibrate, and if they can't vibrate, they won't produce clear sound. There has to be an openness, in your mouth and your head, in order for the sound to be rich.

So, she said, it's definitely not possible to produce with apathy...but you also have to relax, and the things you have to relax are usually the things that people habitually tense.  For her, she said, the letting go is really about learning to let go of the things you hold on to which get in the way.  That archeologist still had a quest...he was still actively seeking something, with energy...but what he didn't realize is that he didn't have to do ALL the work himself. And she, my dear brilliant friend, if she attempted to force the vocal chords do what they so naturally do without her input...she would never be able to produce beautiful sounds.

I don't know if I found this explanation so enlightening because she used something I don't do, singing, as the form through which to explain, but I thought it was one of the best explanations I had ever heard about this sweet-spot/middle-ground of both doing and not-doing. Doing, without over-doing.

And it made me think of yoga, and of how this play of muscularity and openness is constantly happening--how the body is constantly in dialouge--you're seeking out the pose, you're seeking out the pose and then you find it and in order to let it sing, you have to release into it--and that's the real moment of connection. Your body is lined up, but you are letting go of everything that is unnecessary...because if muscles are being recruited that aren't required, you'll feel it, and you'll feel it in the form of tension or aggravation or just plain ol' pain.

And same goes for singing.

And same goes for...everything.

It's not about just reeeeelaxing into some lump of goo on the floor, it's about doing with trust--trusting that your body knows what needs to be done (or your vocal chords or your heart or whatever it is) and that you do not have to do all the work yourself. You do not have to hold the entire tunnel together, and in fact, if you do...you're probably going to miss the exact thing you're looking for...

This is the Space I Take.

My teacher training starts in a little over a week, and I am busily reading my assigned books (oh, to have assigned reading again, thank you o' gods of structure) and taking as many classes as possible so that the sudden upgrade to 8 hours of yoga/day, 5 days/week doesn't kill this faithful blogger.  I am so looking forward to it, I can't even tell you! (But I will, over and over again, you can be sure.)

But that is not what I want to talk about today! Today...today I want to talk about space. 

Not personal space, not outer space, not even spa-cious-ness...but the space that one takes up in the world.  My thinking about this has been percolating for awhile, and was inspired by a little leap my practice has taken over the last weeks, a leap that was instigated by (how appropriate!) my legs. 

My legs...my strong-on-the-outside/weak-on-the-inside legs...able to hold me in chair-pose, propel me skyward in balance poses of all stripes, make me queen of warrior poses, but also able to make me tremble like a child in hanuman, and scream injustice at any kind of wide-legged seated pose...they have been a repository for both grandiosity and extreme humility.  I have been trying to open my hamstrings for going on 5 years, and my progress has to be measured in milimeters. 

My inner thighs are, it seems, the most powerful grounding force on my easily-inflatible ego.

This has been a cause of frustration for me, as you can imagine, but I have tried to work slowly on those sensitive parts (been forced to, really, as a too-quick opening of my hamstrings makes me burst into incomprehensible sobs) and this month my slow work has begun to pay off. 

That's right people, I had a hamstring break-through.  (This is not to be confused with a hamstring tear-open...a much more painful and less yogic kind of breaking).  And like all breakthroughs--or at least every one that I've ever had--it came, not via a NEW kind of teaching, but via a teaching I must have (am certain I have) heard thousands of times but never actually HEARD...until now.

I finally, finally, have learned to E  X  T  E  N  D.

Now, here's the thing...when you have tight hamstrings or groins or inner thighs or, like me, all three, it takes every bit of will and grit in you to move into poses that tax these areas.  These parts vibrate, they quiver, they quake...they're sensitive, like bright electric rods, and for me they are places of great vulnerability.  And because of this (and unbeknownst to me until now) I have had a tendency to hug in and pull away from the opening of them, more than to extend into it.  My hamstrings feel like two taught rubber bands ready to snap...you want me to stretch them tighter?! I don't think so, oh well meaning teacher.

But what I have discovered is that to extend, does not mean to stretch.  It doesn't mean to over-do, to clench, or to exaggerate.  Extension has a sweetness.  It's like an early morning stretch.  Extension is energetic, it's subtle, it happens deep within the tissues and from end to end.  And, it feels not like struggle, but like sweet relief.  Imagine to stretch is aerobics, to extend is ballet.  To stretch is spandex, and to extend is silk. 

I'm not sure what did it for me...maybe it was all the attention that one of my teachers is paying to feet lately, maybe it is all the attention I've been paying to my pelvis and to the grounding of my lower body, maybe I'm just sick of thinking about my shoulders...all I know is that one day in class I decided, in some hamstring stretch or another to really and truly "extend through my heel" (an instruction I have gotten a half milliion times) and low and behold,  not only did I find an extra inch of length from hip to heel, but a call and response of delight and release rippled through my extended leg.  And it did not feel effortful...it felt natural.  It felt, in fact, like what my tender hamstrings had been calling for all along...not a pulling away, but a reaching out.

How many times and in how many ways will this same lesson be illustrated?  How many times must I learn to recognize resistance and then give in? 

But this feeling...this sweet silken extension began to have repurcussions throughout my entire body.  Where else can I extend?  I wondered.  How much more space can I take up? Where else am I shrinking back instead of filling up?

And the answers began to come in strange places.  In class, yes, but also in the world...I began to notice, in certain situations, a physical pulling in and down--particularly when I am nervous or uncomfortable--in situations as simple as standing in an elevator among strangers, or as complicated as walking past a group of ogling men--there is a shrinking.  And the physical shrink, the dipping down of head or rounding of shoulders or clenching of stomach, it was communicating, I could suddenly feel, to my nervous system--I'm small, I'm scared, I wish I were invisible.  As if by lowering my eyes and dropping my head I could somehow disappear, or at the very least, take up less space.

So I began to try and bring extension to these moments, and the words for it came immediately.  "This is the space I take up in the world." I heard a small voice say.  "I am taking my space."  And in response my head lifted, my shoulders dropped down my back, my stride strengthened--eye contact was made.

"This is the Space I take."

And as I began to do this...to notice when I was beginning to shrink down and away, I started to feel more...well, just MORE.  Bigger.  Brighter.  Visible.  Those of you who know me personally know that I'm not exactly, um...quiet.  But I can be timid...and I can definitely make myself small in certain situations.  And to challenge that tendency is, while tender (just like those vibratory electric hamstrings) is also a great relief.  I just have not noticed, until now, that what is being asked for is not a muscularity...not a holding or pulling away, but just the opposite.  The tenderness wants to be reached out to...it wants extension.

Silk, not spandex.

Shanti-Town Takes Beautiful Pictures!!!

This is it, everyone, we did it!!

The First Official Shanti-Town Yoga in the World Photo Contest-a-thon

was a huge success!  I got so many beautiful submissions, as you'll see below...what a gorgeous expression of yoga in the world...I love to see the practice expressed in this way, by yogis and non-yogis alike.  Thank you so much to everyone who submitted...your prize will be emailed to you forth-with.

Readers, as you look through these, remember that the assignment was "yoga in the world"--expressed in whatever form or fashion is most meaningful to the individual participants, which means it most definitely did not have to be a picture of a "yoga pose", but rather an expression of unity or beauty or serenity or whatever other adjectives represents YOGA to him or her. 

I have so loved seeing these all come in, and though I was not going to pick a "winner", one photo came in that was so exactly in the spirit of what I was asking for, and so eloquently presented by the submitter, I just had to give it special recognition.  The winning photo gets its own special post below...be sure to check it out, it's pretty awesome.

Thank you, Shanti-towners, and thank you My Yoga Online, for making this all possible!

And the Winner is...

Gary Winter!!
Long-time reader of Shanti-town, diligent student of yoga, playwright and all-around great guy.  Read below for his amazing description of yoga...one of the best I've ever heard.  Congratulations, Gary!!

"I don't have any photos of me doing yoga-and if I did I assure you I wouldn't show them to anyone--but when you said I could submit a photo of something that embodies the spirit of yoga I thought of this picture of my father and uncle after a day of tuna fishing in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn (my uncle was a boat captain).

For me yoga is about the blissful calm after the storm of intense physicality, and I can feel that in these two guys.  After a day of hauling in these fish, I love the sense of calm and pride on their faces and in their posture. Fishing is all about activity and quiet; sometimes the activity is long and hard, and you long for the calm, and when the fish ain't biting there is too much calm and you long for activity, but still, there's nothing like being out on the water and staring at the horizon."

- Gary                     

So beautiful, Gary.... I love this so much!