Category: Yoga

Shavasana

August 7, 2012 / Tom

A slight breeze swept across the flow of sweat that had covered my body.

The sweet torture of the work magnified even the slightest movement of air across my skin, highlighting the beauty of nature’s hand in every corner of my Being. Inhaling deeply I set myself to another set, another round, and the sweetness of the work my body was doing to cleanse my mind and renew the understanding of this, my physical self.

No judgments beset me as the sweat poured off of me to the ground below. Surely the grass beneath me found the salty taste of my work not to its liking. Surely the Earth would reject the bitter effect of my labor even as the Universe within embraced each and every moment. Surely as my muscles strained and my body shook in the heat of the Sun all that is in this moment would see a value to it all. The Universe knows Itself in such a challenge; when utter devastation wreaks creation, where utter chaos offers itself to the beautiful order of things.

Chaos is nothing more than the mind playing tricks with what it cannot understand.

Beyond the human mind chaos does not exist. This I see in the effort I am in as my mind creates havoc in the burn and the stretch while the Universe simply allows it to be. It is as it must be everywhere but in my mind, and as the Soul’s river works there flows a beautiful sound that suggests I am alive. The stillness after the effort allows me to hear that river flow majestically through the forest of my mind into the valley of my Soul. Out of chaos comes order, and out of experience we find there is no chaos at all.

As I gazed upon the Earth in this pose I noticed everything. I saw a tick crawling toward my firmly stationed hands as my sweat rains down all around it. My mind screamed “get away!” as I focused on this predator. It’s hungry. It needed nourishment just as I do. It smelled the sweetness of my blood through the air and it thirsted for a bountiful meal. My mind suggested that I was too good to be this lowly being’s meal. It could hurt me, it can could me pain. Who taught me that? Certainly not the Universe. Certainly not the tick. No, someone somewhere along the way taught me that ticks were horrible beings, that they must starve if we are to survive. Maybe it was through them that I learned the same thing about people.

I can remember having ticks pulled off me as a child, and burned. I remember wondering if they felt pain as the flame enveloped their tiny being. They looked so ugly, yet so delicate as they perished, my blood still coursing through the body I saw. Somehow I was one with them, and they one with me. We were inseparable, and as they vanished from this place a part of me vanished with them. Yes, there was a remorse in this cycle of nature that only a being who could see it would feel. This tick was just doing what the Universe demanded. It had no choice, it had no alternative. I did.

I raised my head and look at the trees in front of me, the approaching tick no longer a concern. If it could get me it could have me, and is I should see it I would remove it and let it go on its way. Yes, I had a choice, and my choice would be to not harm anything in this moment, not even the grass now supporting my weight. The Universe had decided to challenge me in many ways during this asana, and in one challenge it was to push the envelope of my mind toward acceptance; to make order out of the chaos. I smiled as I changed poses in time with my breath, the sweat now heading in the same direction but from a different place. I looked up at the cloudless sky and felt myself go there, following my outstretched hands to the very ends of my understanding.

“I am alive.”

I noticed birds soaring high overhead as I melt into the pose. A hawk circled high above me, perhaps believing I am nothing but a next meal. What did it see? A man working to hold a pose in the high heat of a summer day? A man struggling to understand himself in the valley of his life? A dead man not quite in the knowledge of his end? I wondered as I wished I could talk to this magnificent bird of prey. Tell me, my friend, what do you see when you look at me from your perch in the sky? What do you see when you see any of us men scurrying aimlessly about? How could you help me be more like you and less like me?

I switched back in time with my breath. My mind seemed to be screaming at me that there must have been a million ticks now aiming for various part of my body. In the pose I settled the drunken monkey back to more meaningful tasks. I could feel the sweat run down my head and drip off my face. I could feel it run like a morning dew down my arms which were now supporting all of me. I could sense nearly ever stream, every drop, every bead of me run down like water from a stone. My mind suggested that the grass was screaming at me to get away from it. How it hated the stringent taste of my work. How it despised holding my weight where I deemed it must. My Soul suggested something different. The grass beneath me loved me more than my mind did. It accepted my sweat with joy. It took on the weight of my struggle with an acceptance my mind could never fully comprehend. The grass wanted the experience of me even as much as my mind seemed to reject it. Yes, the yoga here wasn’t just me and my body, or me and my Soul, or me and my mind. It was a simple understanding that everything is yoga, everything is united and only separated by the drunken monkey those who killed ticks taught me was the only thing that mattered.

“I am alive.”

Switching to the other side and gazing back up at the sky I noticed the hawk had flew away. Or perhaps he never existed to begin with? All I knew is that he was no longer there. Maybe he had decided that I was not among the dead or dying yet, and that there were easier things to munch on. Perhaps in his yoga he had seen that his needs could be met elsewhere, or everywhere, or nowhere. Either way, I followed my outstretched hand once again beyond the bright blue sky into the space. I could almost see the light come out of my fingertips and flow freely out there, toward a place I so wanted to visit. I wanted to see what the Sun saw, but I also wanted to see the Sun as just another dot in the horizon.

I wanted to know the entirety of this place and the smallness I could see that allowed me to understand the enormity of who I was.

Someday, but for now my body screamed at me to end my practice, and to find peace in the work I had done.

Shavasana.

The Parable of the Sinful Donut

August 22, 2011 / tomgrasso

I learn so much from simply sitting back and observing. Today’s observation/lesson/experience comes from one of my oldest and dearest friends in this lifetime, and it is one that speaks so much to our times as well as to my relationship with the world around me. This friend, whom I have been friends with for about 35 years, simply stated something so obvious in the moment that it is often so blatantly lost in that moment. My friend’s message was this:

Life is like a box of donuts. Take time to enjoy each one for its special flavors. And never eat the whole dozen alone. Yeah Monday!! (As I eat a cream cheese frosted brownie.)

A true gift from a true friend! Allow me to share this experience and understanding as well as the inspiration it provided in the form of a story.

♥ ∞ ♥

Once, a man studied a religious book, and took instructions from others who were considered masters of the same book. He lived his life according to the teachings of this book, and tried mightily to adhere to each of the principals the book described and in accordance with the teachings of the masters. Regardless of how he felt about something, he followed the instructions and teachings of his masters and soon he became the book rather than a man who knew the book. He felt as the book told him to feel, lived as the book told him to live, and thought what the book taught him to think.

In one instance, the masters taught him in great detail how horrible apple fritters were. According to the teaching apple fritters were abhorrent, unnatural, and needed to be treated like poisonous tumors on the essence of humankind. The man never had experienced apple fritters before, but he knew from what he was taught how horrible they were as well as how horrible people who ate them were. He based his entire thought process on a notion given to him not from experience, but from the words and teachings of others. Eternal damnation surely awaited those who ate apple fritters.

One day the man saw a woman eating an apple fritter at a donut shop. It was obvious she didn’t read or believe in the book or its teachings. The woman looked so happy in the indulgence and so content in each bite. Yet the man could not get over his revulsion at the act. He frowned at her in distaste, and instantly felt anger at her joy. He could not understand how this woman could actually eat something his religion taught was so sinful. He wanted to stop her, and teach her the “right” way according to his book. Even though he couldn’t pinpoint the reasons if asked, he hated her joy in doing what was “wrong”, and completely disregarded her happiness in the process. For her part, the woman was so happy, so much in joy that she didn’t notice the man’s disdain for her.

What the religious instruction taught, from both the book and the masters who taught it, wasn’t love. It was judgment. It was anger. It was the natural reaction to ideas of wrongness. To make matters worse, the instruction taught him how to wrap those ideas in a shroud of an egoic idea of what love was. According to the instruction, you needed to change someone you loved to be “righteous” and show disdain for them until they saw things “rightly”. Otherwise, eternal damnation and fear were the answers.

As the man left the donut shop, he was in a terrible accident. Seeing this, the woman put down her apple fritter and ran to his aid. She was a doctor, and as the man lay there wounded she tended to him. Her love had not vanished, her joy had not vaporized. Rather, she simply exercised it in caring for a man who was a total stranger to her. She had no ideas of this man’s worthiness and no conditions attached to her aid. She simply worked actions of love that stated their intent to relieve his suffering.

The man was in agony. Although only moments before he had great disdain for this woman, his suffering and her attention to it allowed him to see the love in her. His anger was replaced by a different form of suffering which was replaced by pure, unconditional love. He realized that this beautiful woman helping him in his time of need wasn’t the cause of his anger. She had just been doing what was natural for her, what felt good for her, and what brought her great joy. She wasn’t hurting him, threatening him, or wishing him any harm, yet his ideas of her created a great anger. Those ideas, and his attachments to them, were the true cause of the anger he felt.

After he recovered from his injuries, the man returned to the donut shop. The woman was in front of him in line and didn’t notice him. As she ordered her apple fritter, the man looked at the cashier.

“Allow me to pay for that,” he said with a beaming smile.

The woman turned, smiled, and gave the man a hug. “Thank you”.

“It’s the least I can do for my hero,” he replied. “I may not like those fritters, but I love the person who does!”

The man had learned that any idea that is contrary to joy, love and happiness wasn’t an idea worth holding onto. Not only did those ideas create great anger in him, they prevented him from seeing the love he could have felt toward this woman. Now he no longer focused on what the book told him, or what the masters taught, he focused on what his own experience taught him and the joy, happiness and love those experiences inspired. He became the Writer of the Book, not a reader of a book.

He had become a true Master.

Have You Practiced Your Smayate Pose today?

August 5, 2011 / tomgrasso

First, I have to blame Diane Ferraro and Tanya Lee Markul at elephant journal for this post. If you hate it, well, it’s all their fault. If you love it, well that’s their fault too. Both of them created an inspiration in me that I had to get out as quickly as possible. At my age, if I waited any longer I would probably forget it and that would have been a travesty!!!

While engaged in an “internet conversation” of sorts with them regarding my horribly inflexible body and the values of yoga came the inspiration for what seems to be a must do daily asana that simply cannot be found on any chart, website, or book within my reach. I Googled it, went quickly through my various yoga books, and can’t remember ever having it taught in any yoga class, DVD or manual I have ever seen. So, I wish to patent it.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, lithe gurus and rigid oak trees alike allow me to introduce to you what I feel is the fundamental of all yoga poses. It is one that you can do anywhere, anytime, in any position and at any skill level. It is the first one you should do when you awake in the morning, the last one you should do as you drift to sleep each night, and the only one that you should do hundreds of times a day. It is also one that can have an immediate impact on anyone around you, and it is a pose they can copy with minimal instruction.

I’ll call it the “Smayate Pose”. What’s a Smayate pose? Well, get your pens and paper ready because notes are mandatory and a test WILL BE given at the end. Failure is not an option.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, allow me to show you in various forms what the proper Smayate pose looks like. Warning: The following yoga pose is being demonstrated by trained professionals. Neither myself, Diane, Tanya, or elephant journal is responsible for any injury, pain, suffering or trauma caused by your attempt to do this at home.

Well, here it is:

Smayate Pose

Ok, sorry about the resolution, but even in this fuzzy example you can see the pose in its full effect. Now, before you get focused on my son’s arm formation around my neck, or theorize about any mudra that may be going on, look more closely. See how the lips curl

Anyone can do the Smayate pose!

upward on the two of us? See our relaxed eyes? See a certain amount of power in our presence?

That, my friends, is the Smayate pose. It’s a freaking smile people (Smayate is Sanskrit for”smile”)!!! The easiest and least recognized pose in the universe, given to us before any other, is also the most effective and beneficial pose we can do. And get this…come closer as I need to whisper this secret delicately and quickly into your ear while asking you to take a vow of silence. Closer, come on, you can do it…

EVEN A NEWBORN INFANT CAN DO THIS!!!!!

Yes, we should all be masters of this pose by the age of 3, and if we aren’t we need to trade in our original teachers for new ones because they aren’t doing their jobs!!

Smayate can be done anywhere at any time!

Ok, since my last question to the Universe I shared with my friends was “Can Inflexible, old muscleheads be Yoga teachers” I am please to once again suggest to you all that the Universe has answered me in an resounding “YES!!!!” The first pose I aim to teach you, my students, is my patented Smayate pose. The best part is that I won’t charge you a thing to learn it. You simply have to subscribe to my blog, to elephant journal, find me on Facebook, or become a devotee yourself by focusing on the JOY in your life. It doesn’t take a Master to find joy in one’s life, it takes a student. Enjoy being a student even as your light shines on others.

Thank you dear Universe for whispering in my ear once again. Once the ringing stops I will be able to hear what the rest of the world is saying, doing, and singing. Mostly, though, I am thankful for the kind of Masters I get to meet on a daily basis whether in my physical path, internet path, or whatever. I bow to you!

Here is a short video proving that Smayate is so easy even an infant can do it while eating his smashed bananas.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nkf08N50ows]

As you can see, it’s very easy and takes very little effort. You won’t need any mat, straps or blocks (unless, of course, they are your “thing”). In fact, you may be feeling the effects of the Smayate pose even now!

Now, take a few extra moments and enjoy the various Smayate poses I have taught below and in this post as demonstrated by the various Masters who have spent a lifetime studying it. Feel free to add your own, and to share with everyone you can!

PEACE!!!!

Chocolaty Smayate Pose

A Pose so simple even my dog has mastered it!!

Smayate Variant #1 (Dork Pose)

Can Inflexible, Old Muscle Heads be Yoga Teachers?

August 3, 2011 / tomgrasso

Chaturanga for the flexibly challenged

To see me do a downward facing dog is to see the Hunchback of Notre Dame looking for a fallen quarter. I’m not sure what to call my triangle pose, but the word “triangle” isn’t exactly an accurate description. What some call a yoga workout, I would call a comedy routine with me as the headliner.

Surely I am being a bit hard on myself. After all, it was only a year ago that I thought the ad on elephant journal for “hot yoga teachers” meant

What about "used to be hot" yoga teachers?

you had to be hot to be a yoga teacher. It was about two months back when I decided it was time to be able to actually scratch my own back. The time had come for me to bring my spiritual practice into my physical practice.

The interesting part to this is that I am actually pretty strong. I have lifted weights my entire life, building up an impressive number on nearly all strength lifts. In the nearly 30 years of most continual weight training, I never stretched and never put much importance on flexibility. I wasn’t injured often, and frankly never had the nagging pulled muscles that others I knew (who did stretch) had. “Stretching is for sissies” was my motto.

I used to box when I was in my early 20’s. My trainers used to scream at us for lifting

Shavasana Anyone? (Source: cagepotato.com)

weights. “Weights make you tight”, they would yell, as they tortured us for touching the iron. They would follow that up with “and stretching is for sissies”, just to make sure we got the point that stretching would be unnecessary if we just didn’t touch the weights. Still, I couldn’t stay away from the iron, I loved the way it made me feel and look. Ah, the ego and its wacky ways of getting you to see the world!

Today, I find myself laying crumbled on the floor after an hour of yoga saying “weight lifting is for sissies”. I mean I have done some strenuous workouts in my day, but nothing

Warrior Pose AGAIN?

like the types of postures Vinyasa Yoga has put me through. It’s pure torture, particularly if you push yourself like you do with iron. True, the “no pain, no gain” motto, that once defined my workouts, is completely obsolete today, but there is still an inner drive that pushes me beyond where I think I can go. For some, that may seem appropriate, but for me, in my understanding, it is something I need to work on.

My question to whoever will answer is “can inflexible, old muscleheads be Yoga teachers?” Maybe I can’t be a “hot” yoga teacher (it still makes me laugh), but can’t I provide others with some insight while they help me gain my body back? Can’t I become flexible and flowing despite my obvious inflexibility and lack of grace?

Are there others out there who have come from the same place?

Ok, I get it. I said “question” and have asked four. It’s just that my yoga instructors are all so flexible and lithe and I am so rigid and “blobby” (my word, not theirs). Is there

This is a dumb idea...(Source: http://www.sportsjokecafe.com)

a place for guys like me in the yoga teacher world? You can’t fault a guy for asking. After all, I feel like a football player, leaving the field wondering if he can teach ballet. The idea seems ludicrous but the idea is still there gnawing at me like a hamster on an acorn holding a barbell.

Anyway, I will continue to practice. I do love what it does for my body and how I feel afterward. I feel stronger as a result. I can only see me continuing the practice because of what it does for me physically, mentally and spiritually. My meditations are awesome after a sequence, they spring alive in the union yoga itself provides. Of course I realize that asanas are just one-eighth of yogic practice, but it is the one-eighth I have been ignoring all my life.

I look forward to any responses out there. Be well, find peace.