Dear Yogis, 

I’ve been practising LIFE STYLE YOGA  professionally for decades now.  I do hatha, but I complete the picture with “Eat, Breathe, Move and Live” as the basics, not just asana.

We are going through a pandemic, however, there will be another, there may even be round 2 of this one (watch Bill Gates on TED TALKS) .  The best thing you can do is prepare your immune system.  Shutting your doors and hiding in your toilet paper fortress will not be helpful.

For most people contemplating starting a health lifestyle, changing their morning routine no matter how unhealthy, is usually the biggest  stumbling block.   Today the Universe is speaking to you – and the  lockdown has opened up some space for this – don’t waste this opportunity. This is a chance to get into the habit of starting each day for health. This enhances your immunity but also re-programs you internally for positivity so your whole life will change. It starts in the morning.  This is how your body is programmed.

With the lockdown in place it is easy to rationalise sleeping in.  It is easy to excuse randomly working all hours without a plan and without a goal.  It is easy to begin to feel anxious, depressed, deprived and all of the other emotions and feelings that loneliness, or imposed change can trigger. Especially eating… All of this weakens your immunity, and saps your motivation.

My LIFESTYLE YOGA prescription? Gradually (not too gradually) swap all the little habits that weaken your immunity and sabotage your health, for new habits that activate your inbuilt ward-off and bounce-back functions. Starting first thing.  Wake up early, do your yoga, have a shower, take the supplements, have breakfast.

Getting up early is the most powerful medicine for mind, body and spirit and it’s free. I was looking at morning habits of great writers.  The ones who had really made a difference, won Pulitzers, been best sellers.  They were the ones who got up early.  Now you may not want to get up at 4am like Oliver Sacks and others, but how about 6.30am instead of 9am.   Take charge of your morning, you’ll be in charge of your health, your day and your destiny will follow.  You will be in charge.  It is a good feeling.  My cat wakes up at about 5.30 and sits on my chest.  It is hard to ignore and she doesn’t have a snooze button.  She is pretty much in charge, but as she is a Princess and a yogi I just give-in.  Anything else is a wast of time.

Bye the way – I think that getting used to “real life” when the restrictions are lifted will be a challenge too – start your wellness regime TODAY.

 

Keep safe, Stay well…  NAMASTE – JAHNE

GOOD MORNING YOGIS

How can we put material things in proper perspective in what we call reality – a world of school fees, dental bills and football workshops? Or like me, how do you decide whether to buy a dishwasher, oven, or neither.  I am in the “lucky” position that because of my yoga training in particular, my sense of worth is not tied to the money I may have, my job, or my status (or a new dishwasher).  In the world we live in there is a tendency to define people by what they produce, or what they have.   To become Biblical, Adam and Eve made the decision amongst plenty, to provide for themselves. They mistrusted  the Goodness of The Universe (God),  believing that something was being held back from them.  Independence comes at a high price, especially when it is a rejection of the idea that everything is perfect as it is, and when we trust, everything will be provided to us.

Simplicity means a return to a position of dependence.  I can have a dishwasher, or an oven or anything else as long as it is just that.  As long as it fills a necessity and I am not confused about my acquisition.  It won’t make me a better person, it will just give me more time, the question is “do I need more time or should I learn to use my time better?”  To give it a position higher than a timesaver,   is to make an idol of it.  Greed and the need for more should not dictate our position. We must recognise that material goods are not for the benefit of just me, but for the benefit of everyone.  I can rationalise the benefit of a dishwasher.  I can say that it will benefit everyone and I can give you reasons, but really, I am just sick of doing the dishes.  To grow, I have to learn how to do the dishes in a way that will make the task not just useful, but meaningful in a yoga way.  When these things are no longer an issue a change will occur.

Aparigraha, the fifth of the Yamas asks us to be happy with what we have and not take more than we need.  In the Bible the promise of material blessings was a conditional promise.  It was not a blank cheque.  “If you are willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the land” (Isa.1:19).  We can see that there was a strong emphasis on the inward nature of simplicity (which some might call obedience) and that conditioned all the promised provision.  There is always a connection between obedience and blessing.  Like Karma – “Do the right thing and you will be rewarded” – “What goes around comes around”.  There are many ways to say it.

Simplicity, compassion and gratitude are at the heart of yoga.  Not down-dog, up-dog and handstands etc!  The asanas prepare the body for the bigger learnings, they put our body and our mind in the right place to be ready to consider the larger issues and to develop wisdom and skilful living.  Beautiful asanas are not the goal of yoga.

To discover HOW AND WHY YOGA WORKS (Pt.1), please go to www.myyogabooks.etsy.com

STAY WELL AND STAY SAFE.  Namaste JAHNE

GOOD MORNING YOGIS –

In our present culture, we have come to believe that “more, more, more” is better.  The LUST for affluence is accepted and seen to be good, add to this the pace of everyday which leaves us feeling fractured, lost and fragmented and you have a recipe for unhappiness.   This breathless rushing to “the next thing” leaves us breathless, and uptight and frequently overwhelms us.  We have thought that there is no way to get off the wheel, however, the universe has been tuned in, and the wheel has been taken away.  The rat is left but not the race.

The simplicity imposed by Covid could liberate us from these frustrations of both having or not having, and allow us to see material things for what they are – GOODS to enhance life, not to oppress your life.  Simplicity does not mean “poverty”.  Whilst we stay in our homes, we must remember that we actually live in a time of unprecedented poverty and starvation on a scale never before seen in history.  About 500 people die PER HOUR from starvation, and millions more live on the edge of extinction, homeless, malnourished, desperate.

How can we respond when our own responsibilities seem to grow overnight?  We race through days overburdened with meetings, deadlines and obligations.  Worrying and trying to align ourselves with the strictures imposed on us by the challenges of Covid.  This is an especially hard problem for people who are trying to do right.  In simplicity we can enter the deep silences of the heart for which we were created.

If you came to yoga and meditation in the hopes of finding “four easy steps to simplicity” I am afraid I will disappoint you.  Yogic simplicity lives in harmony with the complexity of life.  Thomas a Kempis said of compunction of heart “It is better to practice that to know how to define it”.  Simplicity is a Grace and a discipline. We perhaps have an idea of what simplicity looks like, and we have been trying to fit ourselves to that.  What we DO does not give us simplicity but it does get us into the condition where we are ready to receive it.  It is like playing the piano, or driving a car – it is difficult until it becomes easy.  One day after considerable practice, patience and effort,  we get into the car and we just drive… the car has become part of us, and we have become a part of the car in that way it is not just about externals.  We have changed.

To achieve simplicity, we affirm both the goodness and the limitation of material things.  Material things are good, but it is a limited good, and misery arises when we try to make their acquisition the meaning of our life.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer before he died at the hands of the Nazis said “to be simple is to fix one’s eye solely on the simple truth of God at a time when all concepts are being confused, distorted and turned upside down”.  

We live in “interesting” times.  To live well, read the Yamas.  They are the guideposts to simplicity.

KEEP WELL, KEEP SAFE, BE HAPPY.  Namaste JAHNE