First of all, I’m REALLY looking forward to filming the online Yoga videos which will be available for download soon.  I’m planning on filming one class a week.  This way, we’ll be able to share the practice of Yoga with one another wherever you are or live.  I’m REALLY looking forward to it.  It’ll be very interactive, so you’ll be able to write in with your questions, thoughts, feelings, etc.  And, I will respond and write back in any way I can to support you in your Yoga journey, whether it’s about a pose, or anything in your life.  I’m so grateful to be able to share this experience with you.  It’s like a dream come true to be able to connect to those of you, who I may not have ever been able to connect to in this world, if it weren’t for the incredible interconnecting-phenomenon of technology.  We are so blessed to be living in the times we are living…

Yes, there are issues in the world, but there is so much Goodness.  And, the Lightness and the Darkness, I learned tonight, are actually one and the same.  Well, I felt this and knew this already, but I had it reflected back to me in a fabulous animated short-film called Day & Night.  Day & night are friends.  Both ,are essential aspects of knowing the Light Divine within each of us or the guiding Light of Truth, Love, Consciousness, Compassion, Forgiveness, Understanding.  As we continuously surrender and live with those qualities in our heart…the light within us and all around us grows brighter and brighter and we get to share that love with everyone in our world and the world around us.  As Teresa said tonight, everything is a learning experience.  (and we are all teachers and students to each other) If you read the last post, Rod Stryker talks about this very thing.  We can awaken Light, the fire, from all of our experiences in life if we are willing to see the Goodness in everyone and everything.  Even though it’s sometimes hard…we must keep looking for it to find it.  Through oil spills and all.  There is a teacher in everything and we are learning, one step at a time.  (It was in my training with Rod, that I ever heard  it described that Yoga is when the pairs of opposites cease to have impact. As we realize Yoga, we are no longer drastically swayed side to side by this seemingly dualistic nature of the world.  Duality dissolves…good/bad, light/dark, success/failure, pleasure/pain, joy/sorrow, etc.)  There’s a fascinating article about that here. 

“Ignorance is a fundamental inverted confusion which mistakes prakriti for purusha, the false for the true, the impure for the pure, and the painful for the pleasurable a persisting malaise which might have been difficult to comprehend in the past but which is now a familiar condition in contemporary psychology. Springing from fundamental ignorance, egoism (asmita) confuses the potency of the Seer (purusha) with the power of sight (buddhi). Attachment (raga) is the pursuit of what is mistaken to be pleasurable, whilst aversion (dvesha) flees from what is believed to be painful. These two constitute the primary pair of opposites on the psychological level in the field of ignorance, and all other pairs of opposites are derived from them. Clinging to phenomenal existence (abhinivesha) is the logical outcome of the operation of ignorance, and once aroused is self-sustaining through the inertia of habit, so that countervailing measures are needed to eradicate it, together with the other kleshas.

Through ignorance (avidya) there is an obscuration of the cosmic Self (purusha), a fundamental misidentification of what is real, a persistent misconception which carries its own distinct logic within the complex dialectic of maya.”-http://www.yoga.com/ydc/enlighten/enlighten_document.asp?ID=81&section=9&cat=90

This is the invocation they say at the beginning of every Anusara Yoga class:  Om namah shivaya gurave, which means, I offer myself to the Goodness within the heart, the eternal teacher.  It also means I see the Goodness within everyone and everything including myself.  Supposedly, Anusara is the most widespread style of Yoga practiced on the planet.  That means hundreds of thousands of people, and actually millions (because, of course, even people who don’t practice Anusara Yoga say this mantra) but, many, many people are increasingly saying this mantra everyday.  That’s powerful.   These mantras are timeless.  There is an awesome explanation of the Om Namah Shivaya Gurave mantra on this website.   There’s also some really good information about mantras on this website, as well, an explanation of them, their significance, etc.   I have heard they were bestowed upon the planet by celestial beings.  They invoke universal sounds which, when spoken, cause one to awaken to the vibrational quality of whatever the mantra invokes.  The Sanskrit word shanti, which means, peace, invokes the vibrational quality of peace.  Sanskrit was a seen language, otherwise known as the language of the Gods.  The quality of peace has a specific vibrational quality.  And the word shanti awakens the vibration of peace within us and all around us.  Everything in the Universe is vibration.  So, we can see how this language is a Universal language because it is a vibrational language.  Therefore, it unites us with the vibrations of the Universe.  Perhaps, these timeless mantras were intuitively received by great sages and rishis thousands and thousands of years ago. 

How do we realize the reality of our personal transformation, i.e. from darkness to light or unhappiness to happiness, from chaos or confusion to peace?  Through being able to experience ourselves through a shared collective experience, which gives us the perspective to see how we’ve grown from the past into the present.  We realize we are waking up through this ever-present mirror of reality.  Without one another, there would be no way to realize our oneness and our collective co-creative experience which is unfolding with each breath we breathe.  How can I know I’m waking up if there is no mirror to reflect back my awakening?  Reality, and every experience in it, including every person, is our mirror that reveals to us our awakening.  So, keep meditating and keep loving everyone.  Your enemy is your greatest teacher.  Love fearlessly through the great mystery and dance of Life and dance fearlessly and freely with it.  There is nothing to lose and nothing to fear, but fear itself.  As the very wise man, FDR, said, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  When I was at the pipe ceremony, Silver Ra, said something powerful to me.  He had me look into this large crystal that he had placed at the center of the circle as part of the altar.  He told me to look into it at a very specific angle and I would see a rainbow.  He said that’s the reason why he got it or it was given to him.  He said, there was a time in his life where he felt like his heart had potentially been broken, and so, he got that crystal as a reminder that heartbreak is really an illusion.  I told him I had also felt like my heart had potentially been broken, the loss of my father, and, the loss of an intimate relationship at the same time.  Feeling devestatingly hurt and abandoned, not by my father, but by the person I had thought loved me and would be there for me no matter what.  And, yet, I know I needed all those lessons to grow.  I found this quote from a post I wrote a couple of months back.  Of course, I’m also my own teacher, too, sometimes, well, really all the time.  The guru in everyone is inside of me and vice versa.  I am you and you are me. 

“People get into a heavy-duty sin and guilt trip, feeling that if things are going wrong, that means that they did something bad and they are being punished. That’s not the idea at all. The idea of karma is that you continually get the teachings that you need to open your heart. To the degree that you didn’t understand in the past how to stop protecting your soft spot, how to stop armoring your heart, you’re given this gift of teachings in the form of your life, to give you everything you need to open further.” – Pema Chodron

“Something has to die in order for us to begin to know our truths.” – Adrienne Rich

“Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness“- Chinese proverb

I went to see Toy Story 3 tonight, which was awesome.  Before Toy Story 3 came on, is when they played the short animated film called Day and Night.  It was one of the most clever, fascinating and spiritually inspired animations I have seen.  I loved it. 

“The short film covers the events that occur when Day meets Night. Being of two diametrically opposed personalities, they do not trust each other at first and get off on the wrong foot. But as they discover the positive aspects of each other’s qualities, they bond and form a friendship — enabling both to grow as individuals. As the sun sets for Day and rises for Night, they trade identities and part on good terms.” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_&_Night_(2010_film)

And, actually, what happens is they become one.  There are a couple of lines in the film and I just learned, as I was searching for information about it, that it’s the voice of Wayne Dyer.  The director of the film incorporated the ideas taken from Dyer’s lecture in order to show that the unknown can be mysterious and beautiful, and doesn’t at all have to be something to fear.  (or, maybe doesn’t have to be feared, at all)

“When Day, a sunny fellow, encounters Night, a stranger of distinctly darker moods, sparks fly! Day and Night are frightened and suspicious of each other at first, and quickly get off on the wrong foot. But as they discover each other’s unique qualities–and come to realize that each of them offers a different window onto the same world–the friendship helps both to gain a new perspective.”-http://www.drwaynedyer.com/news/view/hear-wayne-s-voice-in-a-new-pixar-film

All of this reminds me of the last relationship I was in, the one I was so devestated to feel like I had lost.  But, I didn’t and haven’t lost it.  And, I will continue to love fearlessly, because that is all I can do.  Did I feel hurt?  Yes. But, was I hurt?  No.  I was opened.  My heart longs to love.  So, love I will.  However God and Guru guides me to and lets me.  I am open to the unfolding and the journey.  Though there is a growing new love in my life now, still, I will continue to love those I’ve loved deeply however it’s best for that to look or be.  I will continue to know the evolution of love within me and all around me with everyone I love, because, it is all One.  There is only One Love expressed through the hearts and minds of everyone.  And, that love is the love we come to know and express from inside of us.  As we gradually heal and let go of the judgments that separate us, we can open to knowing that love with everyone and loving everyone as we love ourselves, unconditionally.  Everything is a reflection of us.  That is why the Bible says, be ye transformed through the renewing of your mind.  I have gone through countless experiences over the last year that have challenged me to release my judgments and see with a new mind.  Even when it wasn’t easy, I continuously practiced loving, forgiving and being compassionate and what I realized, was I was really forgiving myself.  All of my judgments, perceptions, paranoias caused the reality I experienced, and they were actually places and perceptions in myself, much of which was about myself, that needed to heal.  And, of course I had a lot, because it was the most intense love I had experienced in my life.  It was the love that was most electrifying, fascinating and, also, scary.  Because it was the night to my day.  So, I realized the practice has been to renew my mind, continuously, until, the reality I am experiencing, whether that’s in my relationship with my former lover, or anyone in my life, reflects the truth of the love that’s in my heart and mind.  Ya, I had a lot of judgments, opinions, etc. about things I liked or didn’t liked.  But, the Truth, was and is that I loved and always will them.  No matter what.  It’s harder and harder for me to understand how anyone could ever stop loving.  I think that’s just something people tell themselves they have to do sometimes because they are afraid.  Afraid of being hurt or whatever the fear is.  When we have loved, how could it ever be possible to stop loving or to pretend like that love doesn’t exist?  To hate or to not love someone is unnatural.  I realize, for me, there is no way I could ever stop loving.  To love is to live.  It is the poetry of life.  The Divine alchemy.  Silver Ra also said something else that really resonated with me.  He said we often think we need to let go of those shadow parts of ourselves, meaning, the things or people that felt like some part of our darker nature.  But, the exact opposite is true.  He said those are the places we must go into in ourselves for that is where the flow of our heart, the creative potential of our being as a dancer, a lover, a singer, an artist, a poet…all the songs our soul longs to sing…flow from that place…that’s the place where we become alive and inspired…the place in ourselves that feels dark or like a shadow, or that person we love that has us feel those places in ourselves, that is exactly the place we must uncover, because of course, that is the place that longs to know the love within us and all around us and in all hearts…the one love.  As I wrote that, it just made me think of the poem by Hafiz.  This is why we must meditate.  So we can be still to let the love flow into us.  The love is ever-present, everywhere.  It’s in all of us and everyone.  It’s in your enemy and your friend.  It’s only the maya, the illusions of the mind that separate us from it. 

For
God
To make love,
For the divine alchemy to work,
The Pitcher needs a still cup.
Why
Ask Hafiz to say
Anything more about
Your most
Vital
Requirement?
-Hafiz

And, of course, Rumi says:

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.~ Rumi

And, the awesome Michael Franti says this in his song, Never Too Late, which I love, definitely one to download.

Don’t fear your best friends, because a best friend would never try to do you wrong.

And don’t fear your worst friends, because a worst friend is just a

best friend that’s done you wrong.

And don’t fear the night time, because the monsters know you’re divine.

And don’t fear the sunshine, because everything is better in the summertime.

But it’s never too late to start the day over, it’s never to late, pick up the phone.

You know it’s never too late to lay your head down on my shoulders,

it’s never too late just come on home.

Don’t fear the water, because you can swim inside you within your skin.

And don’t fear your father, because a father’s just a boy without a friend.

And don’t fear to walk slow, don’t be a horserace, be a marathon.

And don’t fear the long road, because on the long road you got a long time to sing a simple song.

But it’s never too late to start the day over,

it’s never too late, pick up the phone.

You know it’s never too late to lay your head down on my shoulders,

it’s never too late just come on home.

Don’t fear your teachers, because if you listen you can hear music in a school bell.

And don’t fear your preacher, if you can’t find heaven in a prison cell.

And don’t fear your own self, paying money to justify your worth.

And don’t fear your family, because you chose them along time before your birth.

But it’s never too late to start the day over, it’s never too late, pick up the phone.

You know it’s never too late to lay your head down on my shoulders,

it’s never too late just come on home. Hold to your children, hold to your children, hold to your children, let them know. - Never Too Late, Michael Franti (you can listen to it on this website!  I love that song!)

How fabulous is this?  Someone just emailed me this today.  So, I’ll leave us with this, for now.

She Let Go

“She let go. Without a thought or a word, she let go.

She let go of the fear. She let go of the judgments. She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head. She let go of the committee of indecision within her. She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons. Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go.
She didn’t ask anyone for advice. She didn’t read a book on how to let go… She didn’t search the scriptures. She just let go. She let go of all of the memories that held her back. She let go of all of the anxiety that kept her from moving forward. She let go of the planning and all of the calculations about how to do it just right.

She didn’t promise to let go. She didn’t journal about it. She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer. She made no public announcement and put no ad in the paper. She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope. She just let go.

She didn’t analyze whether she should let go. She didn’t call her friends to discuss the matter. She didn’t do a five-step Spiritual Mind Treatment. She didn’t call the prayer line. She didn’t utter one word. She just let go.

No one was around when it happened. There was no applause or congratulations. No one thanked her or praised her. No one noticed a thing. Like a leaf falling from a tree, she just let go.
There was no effort. There was no struggle. It wasn’t good and it wasn’t bad. It was what it was, and it is just that.

In the space of letting go, she let it all be. A small smile came over her face. A light breeze blew through her. And the sun and the moon shone forevermore.”
- Ernest Holmes 

We love who we love.  Doesn’t mean we’ll get involved and we may not ever be in a relationship again, but I won’t stop loving, as a spiritual friend and partner, that’s all I know.  As Gary Zukav says, we can have many spiritual partners in life, more than just our spouse.  A spiritual partner can be someone we work with (co-worker) or a friend, it doesn’t just have to be a significant other.  My definition of a spiritual partner is anyone you are co-creating for Good with in your life and the lives of everyone around you.  And, your hearts and minds are aligned with that intention.  We all have many loves who have been in our lives, not just lovers, but again, friends, and of course family.  (But, my last partner was the one I was afraid to love because I was afraid I would get hurt.  The one who, unknowingly, taught me to be liberated from the fear of loving and to love, even when it’s scary or there’s a fear of being hurt.  What I found, throughout the apparent duality or day & night of our personalities, is that we really do have the same intention in mind, to love and know the one love that exists with us and everyone, however God gives us the ability to know that love between us, even if it’s just as friends.  I’m grateful to be able to be connected to anyone I’ve loved in our life.  I no longer believe in the idea of disconnecting from a past love.  Finding healthy space and boundaries?  Yes…but no love is past, all love is in the present and here now with anyone we’ve know or experienced love with, because, of course, again, the Love is inside of us.  My heart longs to love all of those I’ve loved and love.)  They are all loves and all love grows into one love in time. 

I turn it all over to the Light and the Dark and let God lead the way.  I no longer attach myself to any destination with anyone I love, I simply surrender to the Flow, for it is all One, and God will continue to open me to experiencing that love that is expressed within me and all around me, with whoever I’m meant to be with in my life.  The Love lives inside and I will let my heart open and let it flow.  Now I understand what my friend Kate meant, when she would always say to me, you’ve gotta just follow your heart.  Om namah shivaya gurave

And, of course, Happy 4th of July, el Dia de Independencia.  What significance it has this year for all of us, being liberated in our hearts and minds, the Spirit within, to live and dance freely.  I hear fireworks…I love it!

  I love these quotes.  I realize I’m increasingly falling in love with, Mary Oliver, a fabulous writer.

“Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.

To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.”— Mary Oliver (Wild Geese)

“Instructions for living a life.
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.”
— Mary Oliver

“I tell you this
to break your heart,
by which I mean only
that it break open and never close again
to the rest of the world.”
— Mary Oliver (New and Selected Poems: Volume Two

“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it is over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.”— Mary Oliver

“It is better for the heart to break, than not to break.”
— Mary Oliver

“Sometimes I need
only to stand
wherever I am
to be blessed.”
— Mary Oliver (Evidence: Poems)

And, one of my favorites:

“You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
call to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.”
— Mary Oliver

“Said the river: imagine everything you can imagine, then keep on going.”
— Mary Oliver

You can read many more of her wonderful quotes and writings here, many of which I’m reading for the first time myself, as well.  I’ll be spending part of my day today immersing myself in her words.

This song by Reba has been resonating with me recently, too:

Keep On Loving You Lyrics – Reba McEntire

Love takes the patience of Job
That’s what my Mama always said
Faith is the belief in something more than what you know
That’s what the Good Book says
You gotta play the cards you got
Who knows what fate is holding
At times you gotta go without knowing where you’re going

That’s why I keep on lovin’ you
I keep on lovin’ you
Through the baby don’t leave mes
And never will agains
And I promise tos
I keep on lovin’ you

Lord knows we’ve had our share of fights
Our sleepless nights, our ups and downs
We’ve had plenty and then some of baby
I’m gones and turnarounds
Sometimes I swear it might be easier to throw in the towel
Someday we’re gonna look back
Say look at us now

That’s why I keep on lovin’ you
I keep on lovin’ you
Through the baby don’t leave mes
And never will agains
And I promise tos
I keep on lovin’ you

Keep on lovin’ you
Through the I take it backs…I didn’t mean it like thats
I’d never hurt yous…
Oh, I keep on lovin’ you

I keep on lovin’ you…I keep on lovin’ you
Through the I take it backs…I didn’t mean it like that
I’d never hurt yous…Oh, I keep on lovin’ you

And, the classic by the Indigo Girls, Closer to Fine:

Closer to Fine-Indigo Girls

I’m trying to tell you something about my life
Maybe give me insight between black and white
The best thing you’ve ever done for me
Is to help me take my life less seriously, it’s only life after all
Well darkness has a hunger that’s insatiable
And lightness has a call that’s hard to hear
I wrap my fear around me like a blanket
I sailed my ship of safety till I sank it, I’m crawling on your shore.

I went to the doctor, I went to the mountains
I looked to the children, I drank from the fountain
There’s more than one answer to these questions
pointing me in crooked line
The less I seek my source for some definitive
The closer I am to fine.

I went to see the doctor of philosophy
With a poster of Rasputin and a beard down to his knee
He never did marry or see a B-grade movie
He graded my performance, he said he could see through me
I spent four years prostrate to the higher mind, got my paper
And I was free.

I went to the doctor, I went to the mountains
I looked to the children, I drank from the fountain
There’s more than one answer to these questions
pointing me in crooked line
The less I seek my source for some definitive
The closer I am to fine.

I stopped by the bar at 3 a.m.
To seek solace in a bottle or possibly a friend
I woke up with a headache like my head against a board
Twice as cloudy as I’d been the night before
I went in seeking clarity.

I went to the doctor, I went to the mountains
I looked to the children, I drank from the fountain
There’s more than one answer to these questions
pointing me in crooked line
The less I seek my source for some definitive
The closer I am to fine.

I went to the doctor, I went to the mountains
I looked to the children, I drank from the fountain
There’s more than one answer to these questions
pointing me in crooked line
The less I seek my source for some definitive
The closer I am to fine.

We go to the bible, we go through the workout
We read up on revival and we stand up for the lookout
There’s more than one answer to these questions
pointing me in a crooked line
The less I seek my source for some definitive
The closer I am to fine
The closer I am to fine
The closer I am to fine