Detachment from Sorrow and Pain - Your children are your best teachers

For the first time in a while I had an amazing conversation with my father. Over the years I have learnt so much from him, but today I felt for the first time that I had enlightened him about something that he has been struggling with for years.

My father is blind and has been for the last 34 years. It was a tragic incident and I inherit those problems (Retinal Detachment). It was in that tragedy that my whole family was uprooted from India to move to North America for a better life. My dad never gave up - he worked despite his handicap for the best for his children but blindness prevented him to achieve everything he wanted in his career. He took early retirement, once his children were educated and set in life.

He lived a hard life as a youngster, first surviving one of the biggest earthquakes in Quetta (in Pakistan) in 1936 as an infant and then faced tremendous hardships as he and his family were uprooted from Quetta and moved to India in 1947, while India was divided by the British into three countries. He had a vision for his future and he worked for it, and educated himself, studying sometimes late night under a street light in a park. His life has been a constant source of inspiration for me.

While life seemed so settled and good, he still faced the trauma of blindness. He never received mobility training; so he remained dependant on my mother to hold his hand. He faced the death of my mother with great courage and a major heart surgery. What has kept him going is his utter dedication to his daily 4 hour practice of meditation, which includes chanting. But despite all this he has trouble detaching from pain and sadness. He seems to be not satisfied and is constantly troubled by his failed eyesight and he keeps thinking he still has some light. In that hope he lives, but alas that hope is just hope.

The reality is that he is able to function well and fine at home but he feels helpless. He is also devastated with recent events of my life. While I detach from the destruction in my life, he is constantly in pain and sadness by what that has done to our family. It was not in the master plan - life seemed so smooth and happy. He gives me hope but he himself feels hopeless which in turn torments me.

So today as he called me to wish me safe journey, he expressed his sadness and pain. I finally had the courage to speak up and say "why can't you just detach from this sadness, detach from my pain, and what I may be going through? What good is the 4 hour meditation?" I think those words simply summed it up for him and I think he realized that the only thing he can remain attached is hope, and the positive things he has in life. He has to detach from the pain, or he will never be happy.

I also realized that my kids do the same with me - when my 6 year old simply reads my face and says "daddy, can you please smile every time you look at me". She never forgets to remind me and it instantly brings the smile on my face. I realize how equally thoughtful and insightful your children are. Never underestimate them and never take them for granted as your private property. These were the words of a very thoughtful person. I will never forget what this person had to say. " Your children are not your property and you can't divide them or use them as such - they are not your little hostages!" I learnt an important lesson from this person. I broke down and cried.

I think your children are your greatest teachers. They are as thoughtful and intelligent as you may be; despite your age and experience. It is not your right to use your children as emotional pawns. They love you unconditionally and they will give it you unconditionally. Love your children unconditionally, teach them, take care of them - but also be open to their feelings , listen to them and learn from them and don't deny them the love they deserve from others, just because you may no longer love those people anymore. Let them go, let them be the person they need to be, free them from your own emotional chains, they will only love you more for that, but never love you any less. I guess that is in itself a form of detachment, while you remain so strongly attached to them.

With these thoughts I am off to Pune, India. I will hopefully detach some with the distance from my pain. I will miss my children every day while I am gone. They are my two little yoginis and I know they love their dad unconditionally no matter what, just as I love my dad no matter what.

Namaste

The yogi

Back on the yoga practice track this week

I had a busy week. I finally got back in the groove. I have been on a roll. Monday was advanced class with Nina. Wednesday evening was a gym class with Nuvana. Friday afternoon I taught Surya Namaskar to the kids class at school. 30 of them all at once. It was my last class before summer break. They made a thank you card and then did a puppet show with yoga poses. It was fun. All of them including their teacher are true yogis. I felt on cloud nine. We will back again in September.

Two hours later there was a personal yoga session at Nuvana's house. Given my trouble with hand stands we worked on chest opening poses and arm strengthening. The stress and the lack of practice had collapsed my chest and work was needed to push. We did several arm strengthening poses starting with dog pose and then variations of chest openings. At the end she asked me to try the handstand again. I did much better. I could kick up higher and my shoulders and arms felt much stronger. We will be focusing on this for weeks to come. That is the magic of Nuvana. She is simply the best.

Its Saturday morning - another class with Nina. Today's class like Monday night's advanced class was one of the best classes I have attended this semester - maybe the best ever. I like restorative poses - its something I enjoy doing and got a plenty of it at RIMYI in Pune this April. Many of my private session with Nuvana are similar. They are a great way to relax your mind and at the same time stabilize your emotions and your blood pressure.

Nina's theme was out of the last few pages of Light on Life by Guruji. Asana's for emotional stability - how appropriate! Asanas for balancing your head with your heart, balancing emotions with intelligence. We started with a restful Adho Mukha Svanasana with the forehead on a block. We spent several minutes in that pose. It was followed by a supported Uttanasana. This really allows your mind to relax and is excellent for managing and controlling high blood pressure. This was followed by a 5 minute shirsasana. I HAD NEVER DONE 5 minutes, but the relaxed approach and focus on keeping myself up helped me stay for 5 minutes. Combination of balance and wall support helped. These poses according to Guruji are to calm the mind.

The next sequence included Viparita Dandasan on chair, Chair Sarvangasana, Nirlamaba Sarvangasana, and supported Halasana, followed Setu Bandha Sarvangasana - my favorite restorative poses. Yes there were weights on my thighs. All these poses were done in an extended manner, with Nina setting the timer. These chest openings were to balance the heart intelligence. The next three poses were to balance the heart with your mind, that included Upavista Konasana, Badakonasana, supported Paschim Uttanasana using the chair or bolster, and then Viloma Pranayam (sitting or in raised Shavasana pose) and then ending with Shavasana.

My week of yoga is not over yet. Tomorrow there will be another on hour class in the morning at the gym with Nuvana. I have rekindled my yoga practice and I am committed to keeping up with it. My next few blogs will hopefully have more pictures and videos of my home practice where I will show some of these restorative poses. So if you are feeling stressed, lethargic or demotivated that your practice is not what it was - its never too late to restart. Get up and get to class and then repeat the practice. Practice makes perfect.

Namaste

The Yogi

Managing pain and suffering in your life

Written and adapted by "The Yogi" from various sources including B.K.S. Iyengar’s “Light on Life"

We often focus on the past or the future to avoid experiencing the present, because the present can be painful, full of hardship and difficult to endure. The pain and hardship is actually there as a teacher because life is filled with pain, hardship and struggle. In the struggle alone, there is knowledge. Only when there is hardship do we see the light – the light at the end of the tunnel. Pain and hardship is our guru that shows us this light!

As we experience pleasures with joy, we must also learn not to lose our joy when the pain and hardship comes. As we see goodness in pleasure, we should learn how to see good in pain. Learn to find comfort in discomfort. We must not try to run away from hardships but make every effort to move through and beyond it. This is the cultivation of tenacity and perseverance, the stretching and pushing of ourselves with calmness. This is the spiritual attitude towards life, the essence of Yoga. While we don’t actively seek pain or hardship, we should not run from this inevitability that is part of all growth and change. By facing pain and hardship head-on, we learn to balance and adapt to the world that is always moving and unstable and we learn how to become tolerant to the permanence of change and difference.

Endurance and patience is needed to convert an unbearable pain and hardship into a bearable one. The act of bearing is an acceptance of adversity and suffering in our life and allows us to overcome such suffering. It resolves our anxieties and helps us get on a path where our life gets better, more fulfilled and the light at the end of the tunnel appears closer and brighter. It leads to inner peace and freedom giving optimism that life can only get even better.



Namaste!

Enjoy this video...

"Acquiesce" to Pain -- today's mantra!

Monday evening was a challenging class for me, though I thoroughly enjoyed it. The poses were difficult, so the next day I was in pain and extremely sore. I was walking funny as my left glute was particularly affected. Therefore I decided to make an appointment for massage with Jeremy this evening. So here I am on the massage table, being pulled, kneaded, stretched, pressed and crushed. And each massage stroke would result in more pain.

I felt it was making it worse until I had another "eureka moment". I recalled something I had read in "Light on Life" by Mr. BKS Iyengar a while back. It was a chapter where he discussed "pain" and "surrendering to pain". It had particularly struck me, as life is full of painful moments. So I "acquiesced". I let my mind surrender to all the pain in my body, which included my particularly sore glutes and quads and back. Suddenly I felt a new appreciation of the pain. Then the calmness sunk in and I started breathing. I finally relaxed to really experience the massage while letting go of the pain it was causing me!

In that moment, I realized my body had simply re-awakened. It had "oxygenated" and the cells in my muscles were regenerating. The soreness and the pain was simply a catalyst. Jeremy commented that the muscles were not as tight as the last time a few weeks back. They were sore but they seemed to handle the pressure better.

So "acquiscence" is the new word I re-learnt today. Acquiscing to pain is not just a great way to learn difficult yoga poses but to deal with pain in life as well. By acquiescing, we let the pain and all it manifests in our life to take its course. We give ourselves room to appreciate those painful moments and in that process we build new strength to learn to bear such pain. An appropriate thought and frame of mind, as we learn and re-learn all those difficult back-bends and difficult asanas. I appreciated Guruji's words in his book more than ever. I deal with stress and pain all the time. Acquiscing to it is probably a better way to deal with pain, more so than fighting it.

Namaste