Putting yourself first

Photo credit: spaceodissey/ Flickr Creative Commons

I think in our culture, we often believe that putting ourselves first is selfish, egotistical, wrong. This in spite of a lot of big talk about "looking out for number one." (Talk which is usually problematic in other ways, but I don't want to go there right now.) We give so little respect and value to our own needs, our own lives. We put the needs of our loved ones before our own, and we put the needs of our jobs: the needs of our superiors, our subordinates, our peers and our clients before our own. Maybe we realize that this is not working, and we try to put aside a portion of each day for self-care, or we try to assert our right to say no.

I've been thinking about this a lot because I've been on a journey, the last two years, of learning to say yes to myself. Like so many things, it's a little easier said than done. The how and when to put your own needs first is difficult. It's not that you want to ignore the needs of others. It's just that you need to be well and balanced yourself in order to truly give and support the others around you. Too few of us in this culture are well and balanced these days, in my opinion. I know this because when I meet someone who is, that person stands out.

I wanted to pass on a teaching from one of my teachers, Susan Marcus. (Susan has so much wisdom to share, and I'm excited to see her own studio, Studio Peace, coming into being. Check it out.) Last week in class, it seemed like everyone was hurting in one way or another. Susan took the opportunity to talk about how injury reminds us that we need to respect and care for our bodies. Then she said, "I often think that if everyone took care of themselves the way women do when they're pregnant, how much healthier we'd all be. Just think about what would happen if we all took as much responsibility for our own lives in our bodies as we do when we have another life within us."

I'm at the age where a large percentage of my friends are either pregnant or have just had a baby, so I've seen it happen. Women get pregnant, and they stop drinking so much coffee. They stop drinking alcohol and/or smoking. They start eating their fruits and vegetables, they take their supplements, and they start drinking enough water. They work less overtime and they're dedicated to making time for their yoga class.

Why are we willing to make profound life changes to protect the life of our child, but we are not willing to make the same changes to protect the body - the one and only body - we were given in this life? Why are we not willing to make those same changes for ourselves, when they improve our happiness and our sense of well-being? I'm saying "we" here because I'm just as guilty as the next person. Stop drinking coffee?

So I've been playing with this idea a little bit. There's this spark of divinity in this body. This body is all it has. How can I care for it? It makes it a little easier not to make excuses, a little easier to step onto my mat every day and eat my veggies and drink water and meditate. The life within me. The light within me. Ahimsa applies to me, too.

What does it mean to "do yoga"?

You cannot do yoga. Yoga is your natural state. What you can do are yoga exercises, which may reveal to you where you are resisting your natural state.
~ Sharon Gannon


In theory, practice and theory are the same. In practice they are not.
~Yogi Berra

Recently I was reading Lulu's post entitled "Can Anyone Really Say What Spirituality Is?" over at her Oceans and Avocados blog, and then I surfed over (as one tends to do these days) to the Eco Yogini post that inspired it. They got me to thinking about how my own view of yoga is similar and different to theirs, and also a little bit about both my practice and my research of late. Eco Yogini describes the point of yoga as being spirituality and discusses the differences she feels between her spirituality and what is traditionally taught in yoga. I guess I am coming to see the point as Sharon Gannon describes it in the quote at the beginning of this post. Yoga is a set of tools that we can use to reveal something about ourselves and how we relate to the world. That can be spiritual - it is for me - but it is also deeply personal, emotional, and it can be both a mental and physical journey too.

Lulu poses the questions: Who decides what spirituality/ zen/ yoga are? and What if the definitions don't work for you? These are important questions. There is a vast range of beliefs and practices that have sprung up out of every spiritual tradition, including yoga, and I think this is indicative of the fact that every set of tools does not lead every person to the same destination. What makes intuitive sense to one person, another person may be unable to connect to. When one person follows the practices of her teacher, she may discover an entirely new insight and there we have another school of practice. I am amused to be quoting Yogi Berra here but he makes an excellent point here in a way only he could: theory and practice are not the same thing, and one never replaces the other. The Buddha said this in another way: Doubt everything. Find your own light. He didn't want anyone to take his teachings as the Gospel, but rather for each to do his own practice and figure out what it is that he has inside.

Many people think of yoga as the practice of asana or postures, as a way to lose weight and stay in shape, or as a way to reduce stress. Patanjali said that Yoga is to still the patterns of consciousness [so that] pure awareness can abide in its very nature. The full system of yoga has eight limbs and is a fully formed way of living including both ethics and lifestyle practices that go far beyond asana. For my personal practice, this is very important. In the past two years, I have had periods of time where I've focused intensely on asana and this has had tremendous physical, emotional, mental and spiritual benefits. However, I have also had periods where I've focused more intensely on pranayama (controlling the breath) or meditation or various ethical principles. Each of these practices has also had intense physical, emotional, mental and spiritual outcomes for me. I very passionately would defend the idea that these are no less "doing yoga" than asana practice is, and in fact simply doing asana does not equal "doing yoga" for me.

However, right now I'm doing research and designing curriculum to bring some of these yogic practices - asana, pranayama, meditation - into educational programs to help international students manage stress related to studying in a foreign country. Through this work - and through reading about people's experiences in blogs such as those I've mentioned here - I am slowly becoming less of a purist. To me, the benefits of any one of these practices are so profound that to do it, even in isolation, can deeply transform a person's experience of a difficult situation. So who am I to look down on someone who doesn't follow the "whole system"? If a person won't do yoga because their religious beliefs prohibit it, who am I to withhold the secret of the three part breath from them? If someone goes to yoga class to work out and it makes them feel better, who am I to insist that they get spiritual? Meditation by any other name is still meditation. If I don't formally sit in meditation but I do take a moment on the bus to let my thoughts settle and follow my breath, who are you to judge my practice?

I know that not everyone will agree with me. There was a time when I might not have agreed. But these days, I'm thinking of ways to bring the benefits of yoga to more people. And if that involves teaching "stress management" or "deep breathing" or "quiet time" then so be it. The world will be a better place if more people connect with their breath.

Namaste.

Guest House

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

-- Rumi