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Not a Hurried Pace but a Balanced Life

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Mono Lake CA
Creative Commons License photo credit: FunnyFence

The impulse that comes to me more often these days is a concept of balance and living life in the moment – doing the things I love right now which requires that I practice loving every thing that I do.

So I am not in a hurry.

Life is unfolding at a rate of speed that is perfectly designed to allow me a few moments of concentrated devotion to each task that the day brings forward from out of the diversity of rich interests that inhabit my life.

And I trust the unfolding plan. Its graceful flowing pattern is so far beyond my own ability to manage things. And that leaves me able to simply do what’s in front of me to do now and trust that it is the right next thing to be done for my overall good.

This is the way to achieve a balanced life.

Intention and Surrender Through Yoga

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In my daily practice, I’ve been exploring the balance between alignment and surrender … or using the vocabulary of yoga – between tadasana (mountain pose) and shivaysana (corpse pose).

In my opinion, these two asanas are the two most important postures of all!

Tadasana is generally the first asana taught in beginners yoga. It is standing, feet parallel and hip distance apart, with knees and hips aligned over the ankles and spine straight … eyes looking forward, chin slightly down, so that the neck is aligned with the spine. This is a posture that is all about finding right alignment.

It has been known for thousands of years in the ancient traditions, such as yoga and the martial arts, that when the body is brought into correct alignment, the flow of life sustaining and nourishing energy is facilitated. I have experienced the power of right alignment for myself and cannot emphasize it enough.

Shivaysana is a posture that every yoga tradition generally uses to end the practice session. It is one of lying, completely relaxed on the floor – on the back, legs and arms placed straight on the floor in a natural position of rest, with palms facing up. This is the posture of surrender – of “let go” and release.

My practice consists of moving back and forth between these two energies – that of alignment with Tadasana and surrender or shivaysana. My daily goal is to bring the balancing of these two energies into every act, thought and word.

When I align my body and intention with Universal Source energy … That Source Energy can more easily flow through me and help me discover blockages. Once a blockage is found, I ask for support from the Universe in finding and exploring the mental concept associated with that blockage.

Blockages simply imply a misalignment. Physical alignment can greatly alleviate the suffering created from mental/emotional blockage.

Once I’ve explored the body beliefs, (an example might be “my body betrays me” or “I am sick” or “my body is repulsive”) – most often by using Katie Byron’s inquiry process, I then surrender that part of my body by consciously relaxing it as completely as possible. The levels of surrender amaze me! The more I let go, the more let go I experience.

This process has been unbelievably helpful in freeing my mind AND body from the baggage carried for so many years.

Clearing Core Beliefs Energetically

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This morning while doing Qigong, I was paying attention to the felt-sense differences in energy as I moved my hands over (Without physically touching) various areas of my mid-body. I noticed that there was a definite difference between the energy on my right versus the energy on my left side of the body. The right felt thick and sort of heavy – sticky … I began to pull the dark energy, using my intention and imagination to visualize the dark energy being pulled up and out as I moved my hands.

As I worked to balance the area through moving the energy I began to get in touch with the story lodged there …. It’s a story about being sick. I seemed to me that I was feeling, through my hands, the accumulated cloying heaviness of a deep-seated belief that says, “I am unwell and not able to truly heal. Total health is not possible for me ….”

As I continued to silently move my hands, mixing and balancing the yin/yang energy, the Observer Self moved forward to “meet” the story. Not judge the thought, mind you, but not automatically assume it’s true, either.

“Is that true?” “Do I absolutely KNOW that I cannot experience complete healing?” “Where does believing that idea take me?” “How does that color the way I see myself and the world when I believe that thought?”

I began to hear other, sort of “subsidiary”, thoughts rise to the surface – ideas that were similar in frequency structure – I’ve realized before that beliefs sort of tag on to other thoughts that are similar to themselves… They have their own simple intelligence – after all energy IS alive and thoughts are an electromagnetic life force… They are attracted to a central idea of like ilk; they congregate around it and feed off of the “core” belief… until the mental space becomes completely clogged with that particular energy type.

Before we know it, we’ve taken on that whole mental stream, believing it blindly and seeing it everywhere we look. We have decided it’s just “the way it is”. We can only see in the world around us that which reinforces and verifies our particular belief structure.

The thoughts I heard come up were ones like, “It’s inevitable … it’s only a matter of time before I get really sick again …”

Another tag-along thought was, “I don’t deserve to be well. I have to pay with my health for all the poor choices I’ve made in the past”

And then there’s this commonly heard story … “I’m old and old bodies cannot stay well – my body is not strong enough – it’s too late, I’ve waited too long to do anything about my health.”

Do I absolutely know that any of these ideas are true?

As I questioned these thoughts, I turned my intention to healing the imbalances on the right side of my body. I could feel the heaviness dissipate.

“What would it be like to be free of such limiting thoughts?”, I asked myself.

Immediately, I began to get visual and visceral hints of the freedom and lightness that detaching from those beliefs offers. I choose to go there.

Helping Others

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If we are called to become advocates or activists for those who are suffering, we do so. We do it from a place of consciousness, rather than from the perspective of seeing ourselves or them as victims, however.

Serving in that way may be part of our own personal work; it may be part of the dance we came to do in exploring the balance between supporting others and healing ourselves; between compassion and pity.

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