Category Archives: Meditation

Sexy Yoga and Meditation

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Okay, I admit it, the word “sexy” didn’t need to be in the title of this post. I literally spent at least five minutes trying to figure out how to work the words “sexy” or “hot” in with the words “meditation”, to no avail.

I suppose that’s why meditation, or Patanjali’s Dhyāna, gets nowhere near the attention that Asana gets. It just doesn’t go with hot or sexy. I mean, when was the last time you saw a magazine headline with tips to “Last Longer Tonight”, and they’re talking about sitting on your cushion, closing your eyes, and concentrating on your breath? Yup, I thought so.

What’s funny is *both* Dhyāna and Asana are branches of the 8 Limbs of Yoga. What’s funny is we now have to say Yoga *and* Meditation. Oh well, that’s the all verbiage, I guess. And really, it’s better to just do it. Talking about swimming does not get you wet. (Like sexy… or… unlike sexy… or… oh, never mind.)

If I haven’t lost you yet, this post is intended for two things: 1) As a response to yet another exciting development in the world of Yoga and Polititics, and 2) To point out a couple of meditation trainings and resources if that strike your fancy.

Can Yoga be, uh… Sexy? What is Yogic, Really?

If you’re keeping track with the exciting world of Yoga and Business, Business and Yoga, recently, Judith Hanson Lasater wrote a letter to Yoga Journal expressing her confusion and sadness with the gratuitous nudity in the magazine’s ads. She said: “These pictures do not teach the viewer about yoga practice or themselves. They aren’t even about the celebration of the beauty of the human body or the beauty of the poses, which I support. These ads are just about selling a product. This approach is something I though belonged (unfortunately) to the larger culture, but not in Yoga Journal.”

Judith Hanson Lasater is not just any ol’ disgruntled YJ reader. She is one of the magazine’s original founders. And then Roseanne Harvey, who runs It’s All Yoga, Baby wrote about The Letter, and followed it up with an interview with Judith. Even Yoga scholar Georg Feuerstein came out of his semi retirement to write several blog posts about this.

Yeah, it’s gotten pretty, uh, exciting?

Amidst the noise, if you are new, or newish, or even oldish to yoga, you might be challenged with questions such as “What is yoga”? Or, “Is nudity yoga?” Or, “Can Capitalism and Yoga co-exist peacefully?”

I’m sorry to say that I don’t have the answer to any of these questions. (And I’m not sure that anyone really does.) Besides, defining what Yoga is is like defining what Love is, or Compassion is. As Judith said recently in a workshop: “Have you noticed how we can’t really define the things that are most important in life?”

So, like I said, you’re on your own with those inquiries. What I *can* tell you, however, that if you like yoga, you might also like meditation. Yoga is about learning about your Self. Self-inquiry requires meditation. Meditation is hard, it’s frustrating, it’s juicy, every once in a while you get it right. Yes, I’m describing meditation. And hey, if people can call web sites or iPhone apps sexy, I’m gonna call meditation sexy. And you, too, can do it.

Some Meditation Trainings and Resources

Recently my student Marco (hi Marco!) asked if I teach meditation. The short answer is no. The convoluted answer is yes and no. I teach primarily hatha yoga: the techniques of asana and pranayama. I sprinkle in stories, info, lores from historical texts, the other branches of Classical Yoga. In the poses I talk about things like observing where your body is in space, listening to the body’s feedback, focusing in something, stability, ease, etc. Those are things that Patanjali described as the ingredients leading to Samadhi, let’s call it Happy Place (that doesn’t involve roller coasters) for now. In my class, I prepare people for meditation.

However, I do not currently teach meditation. In my mind, one must meditate for a very long time to teach it, like, 10 years, 20 years, 40 years.

So, here are some great trainings that I personally do:

Shinzen Young’s Basic Mindfulness Home Retreat

This is a monthly home retreat usually lead by meditation teacher Shinzen Young on the second weekend of every month. I recommend you follow the Prerequisites, or that you have listened to his lectures The Science of Enlightenment first. Shinzen’s teaching is methodical. His techniques and vocabulary are highly developed, and quite frankly not for the faint of heart. If you are determined to learn meditation, however, I can’t recommend him more. Check out his CD: The Beginner’s Guide to Meditation.

The next dates for the home retreat are:

  • August 13-15, 2010
  • September 10-12, 2010
  • October 8-10, 2010
  • November 12-14, 2010
  • December 10-12, 2010

Beyond Sequencing: The Art of Meditation with Chase Bossart

Yoga teacher Chase Bossart will be doing a workshop at Shala Yoga of Portland in 2 weeks on August 20-22, 2010. From the website:

Meditation is one of the most important and potent tools in yoga. In many ways, it is the crown jewel of all yoga practices. Yet many people experience it as one of yoga’s most difficult and confusing tools. These difficulties, however, can be greatly reduced through proper sequencing of the meditation practice.

When properly constructed, a meditation practice gradually develops the attention and mental stability required to stay with the focus. This happens naturally as the practitioner moves through the different steps of the meditation. Learn the principles of proper sequencing of meditation practices and develop these skills through numerous practical examples. This practical ‘how to’ workshop will be useful for practitioners and teachers of all levels.

There you are. Go sit down and shut up. (Though, if your mind is anything like mine, it will be anything but quiet.)

Do you know of any meditation trainings or events? Do you have any personal favorite resources? Please let me know.

David Tolmie gave me this CD as a gift. This rivals any nude + yoga photography I've ever seen.

David Tolmie gave me this CD as a gift. This rivals any nude + yoga photography I've ever seen.

10 Days of Silence: Is a Vipassana Boot-camp For You?

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Last year, I went on a 10-day Vipassana mediation retreat. The word “retreat” may conjure up images of sandy beaches, blue ocean water, luxurious bed linens, and faraway lands. This was not one of those. I woke up every morning at 4:30 a.m. and sat for 12 hours a day on a cushion on a cold stone floor, trying desperately to focus on my breath, or something, *anything*.

My friend Aron Schoppert recently finished the same course, and he was awesome enough to do a long write up about it and agreed to let me publish it here. It’s a long piece, so I will put out some quotes and summary, and put the full article in PDF document for your reading pleasure.

Aron’s Story

I recently became a first-time participant to a 12-day Vipassana meditation retreat near Onalaska, Washington at the Northwest Vipassana Center, as taught by S.N. Goenka in the tradition of Sayagyi U Ba Khin.   I first became aware of Vipassana and the center back in 1997, but found the schedule and set of restrictions daunting with the potential for 100+ hours of seated meditation over the course of the 10 days of silence.  It is the only one of its kind in the northwest region.

Why He Did It

I was not seeking to fix anything, but knew that I could stand to benefit on some level.

Did it “Work”?

I feel very fortunate that Goenka started this movement and provides the teachings free of charge.   While this may turn out to be a short-sighted claim, I feel I will be forever changed for the better good because of it.    This is not to say that I don’t realize how easy it is to get caught back up with my old patterns and lose the bulk of said benefit.  There is more work to be done, and I plan to stay on task.   The benefit is too great.

… With Some Caveat

Despite the amazing amount of progress I made in the course of 10 days, I am not a complete advocate of Goenka’s retreat or teaching style.  There are a number of shortcomings and dangers in its application that I believe limit its potential or its goals in helping others… There are public, well-written critiques of Goenka teachings that I recommend reading before taking the plunge.

And Now for the Vipassana Elevator Pitch

Vipassana is one of India’s most ancient meditation techniques.   Vipassana is a word in Pali which translates literally to insight or seeing within.   It is described in the center’s brochure as the process of mental purification through self observation and introspection.

And Who’s This Goenka Dude?

S.N. Goenka is widely known as one of the foremost non-sectarian teachers, and it is important to note his 10 day course focuses on what many in the meditation world consider a highly selective form of Vipassana.  Vipassana is also known as “mindfulness meditation” where one looks within, utilizing all the senses.

Just Scratching the Surface

Goenka’s version focuses specifically on awareness of body sensations and his technique is arguably for simplicity, but this is not explained in the course.   Upon further research I found that his teacher, Sayagyi U Ba Khin, was documented in 1961 as saying that once awareness of body sensations is practiced, one may move on to the other senses.

Goenka, Here, There, and Everywhere

At the retreat, assistant teachers are present to help answer questions at the end of each day after they “push play” on Goenka’s pre-recorded video and audio instructions.  The version in rotation was created in 1991, and heard and watched at over 200 centers worldwide which Goenka insists upon to maintain consistency of the teaching.

Vipassana Psychology

Vipassana psychology (in simplified terms) breaks the mind into 4 parts, which I found helpful to understanding the breakdown of the technique.   Cognition or acknowledgement of the sense objects, Recognition or discrimination of the type of sense,   Sensation or the experience thereof, and the mind’s Response (sangkara), which is the sub or unconscious response to the actual sensation.

The crux of what Buddha learned was that the mind does not crave the actual sense objects, but the resulting sensations.   The technique allows one to retrain the associations of these sensations. In order to be successful, one must practice equal parts awareness and equanimity as you experience the sangkara.

Okay, Seriously, You just Sit Around All Day?

You could say that. Here’s the daily schedule.

4:00 a.m.                             Morning wake-up bell
4:30 – 6:30 a.m.               Meditate in the hall or in your room
6:30 – 8:00 a.m.               Breakfast break
8:00 – 9:00 a.m.                Group meditation in the hall
9:00 – 11:00 a.m.               Meditate in the hall or in your room
11:00 – 12 noon                  Lunch break
12:00 – 1:00 p.m.               Rest, and interviews with the teacher
1:00 – 2:30 p.m.                 Meditate in the hall or in your room
2:30 – 3:30 p.m.                 Group meditation in the hall
3:30 – 5:00 p.m.                Meditate in the hall or in your room
5:00 – 6:00 p.m.                Tea break
6:00 – 7:00 p.m.                Group meditation in the hall
7:00 – 8:15 p.m.                 Teacher’s discourse in the hall
8:15 – 9:00 p.m.                Group meditation in the hall
9:00 – 9:30 p.m.                Question time in the hall
9:30 p.m.                             Retire to your room; lights out

Critique of Goenka and the Retreat

While there were strong claims of non-sectarianism, and how scientific the technique is, most of the discourse is based around Buddhist tradition, mixed with jokes and anecdotes tinted with the lens of traditional beliefs.   In particular, expect to hear mentions of sentient beings in other planes, and information pertaining to how we can’t escape the poor decisions of our past lives.

I also was uncomfortable at times with Goenka’s frequent jabs at certain religion’s rites and rituals, which was completely unnecessary.   I would say at least 30% of the discourse material had little to no relevance to the technique and should have been edited out.

So, Is it For You?

I would not recommend this program if you have any kind of emotional instability and would seriously question attending unless you were comfortable re-living past disturbances and facing them on your own.  The environment felt very safe and supportive in a hands-off kind of way.

However, there is no trained staff, and I would go into this as if you were working in isolation.   I did find personal reports online of people being hospitalized, reliving forgotten child abuses and an example of someone bi-polar disorder spiraling out of control on the 10th day.

That is the power of this technique, and the fact that there is no real support system present made me question some of the dangers associated, even for myself.

Here’s Aron’s full write up: Aron Schoppert’s 10 Day Vipassana Write-up

My one advice? Be sure to have backup while you're gone without the internets for 10 days.

My one advice? Be sure to have backup while you're gone without the internets for 10 days.

A Moment of Living in the Moment

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I am writing this post with fast and furious fingers and sweaty palms, quite possibly from my morning coffee or the bright spring sunshine walloping all of Seattle right now. I am also experiencing a ginormous sense of overwhelm. Not overwhelm in the common sense of being eaten alive by to-do lists, but overwhelm in the sense of the feeling you get while standing in front of a vast blue ocean or a tall green mountain, and witnessing something very big and powerful.

Those of you that know me know that I am into this “sitting thing”. I usually say that “I sit”, and not “I meditate”, because sitting is a more accurate description of what really happens. I sit. And then I think about a hundred and one things that I should be doing, or the things I did and all the things I will do or want to do. It’s elusive, that quiet meditative mind.

And yet. And yet. Something interesting happened to me this morning. Shinzen Young talks about this phenomenon in his lectures The Science of Enlightenment. You do this thing called meditation. You *try* desperately to meditate. You pay good money to go on meditation retreats. When you come back and tell your friends what happen, they wonder if you’ve lost your mind for paying good money to go somewhere to “sit around all day”.

You might start to wonder the same thing. You might blow off sitting once, or twice, or altogether. Or you put it off, thinking, “I’ll do it tomorrow”.

But, by hooks or by crooks, by some miracle, or by some clever tricks, as Shinzen said, “if you can’t be disciplined, be clever.”, you sit, and you sit regularly, day after day, month after month. You start to see glimpses of what it means to live in the moment. You look at the world like a goldfish with that proverbial 3-second memory, or the proverbial curious cat that acts like it’s seeing everything for the first time, sniffing it, exploring it.

And boy, is it grand when it happens. It happens very fast, and it does not last.

But, no matter how fleeting, no matter how swift that moment comes and goes, it blows you away. All of the sudden, you start to understand that big word impermanence. You start to see the joys and the sorrows. I’m not even talking theory and hypotheses here. Those things happen right in front of your eyes, as if on cue. It’s very creepy.

(No, the irony does not escape me to reminisce the moment of “living in the moment”, but it must be captured and recorded somehow :D )

What am I trying to say? If you are engaged in this practice, this yoga thing, this meditation thing, this, dare I say it, getting in touch with your spirit thing. Trust the process. Really. Trust it even when you are weary and full of doubt. And get clever. Trick yourself into practicing when you least feel like it, on the cushion, on the mat, in the grocery line, or in traffic jam.

It will not give you a mountain of gold, it will not instantly make all your troubles go away. It will not automatically rid you of your destructive habits and general life shenanigans. It will not make you taller and turn you into a baller and give you a girl that you could call her.

I honestly can’t even tell you exactly what it will bring to you, because it would be arrogant of me to claim to know what *you* personally experience. What I can arrogantly claim, however, is that life is always coming together and falling apart at the same time. There will be so much joy, and so much sorrow. And there are no words to describe what it’s like, when you are in what they call the Witness state. Something this morning put me in an incredibly clear mind to see both, like a jolt of lighting or a flash of shooting star. To put it plainly, it scared me, it overwhelmed and amazed me, and it humbles me like nothing ever before.

I will say this, admittedly with a lot of caution and hesitation. I am beginning to see what Vyaas Houston talks about in The Certainty of Freedom.

In the meantime, I hope you dance.

Four by Four, Sit by Sit

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Alright, it’s March! That means the First Nikki Challenge 28-Day Sit-off Meditation Competition is ovar! How’d it go for you? As you recall the rules were minimal. All I asked was for you to sit. That’s it! 60 seconds, 60 minutes, it didn’t matter. The goal was to create a habit, and as all of us know, if the goal is too lofty, we won’t even get started at all.

Kudos to you if you took it the challenge. And a HUGE THANK YOU to our Sit-off sponsors: The awesome people who gave us a little incentive to do our work. Okay, now what, you’re off the hook, right? Actually, no one was ever really “on the hook” with anyone in the first place, really, except with ourself. And that’s the hardest person to hold accountable with, eh?

If you’ve enjoyed sitting, and enjoyed the “sitoff” spirit, fret not, here comes the iEvolve 90 day Meditation Challenge. Yes, that’s a whole whopping *ninety* days, not 28 puny days. Also, this challenge asks that you sit for an hour a day. From their website:

THE CHALLENGE:

Meditate 1 hour everyday for 90 days in a row. You can sit for 60-minutes straight, two 30- minute periods, or 4 15-minute periods. Whatever works for you. Either way, that’s 90 hours of meditation under your belt! Start Spring 2010 off right and re-energize your practice and your life with our 90 day meditation challenge.

As you know, I’m a huge believer of doing things in an easy, steady, sustainable way. So, I’ve decided to tweak the rules a little bit (“they’re more like guidelines anyway”). I’ve decided to use the divide and conquer strategy. I’ve also included Pranayama as part of the sit. Let’s call it MPx4, Meditation and Pranayama by Four sittings a day. An hour seems like a lot, but 15 minutes? We all have 15 minutes here and there to spare.

Every Day Is A Winding Road

The Challenge calls for 90 hours of sitting, that’s 5400 minutes. My take is you ought to account for mishaps in life, and you ought to be able to make up for them.

If you miss a day, add another day to the challenge. For example, it’s March 1, 2010 as I’m writing this, but you’re reading about this on March 2, or 3. Who says you have to finish May 28, 2010? Why not May 29, or 30? This can go too far, however. You might say to yourself, “I’m putting it off until January 1, 2011, yeah, that’ll be my New Year Resolution!”

So, why not set a deadline of the last day of Spring, which is June 20, 2010? It’s like those punch cards where you get a limited time to use. That adds a whole whopping 23 days to the 90-day sit, that’s like 25% more for the same price!

If you miss 15 minutes, add another 15 minutes. If you’ve only done 15 minutes today, add 45 minutes to your “Credit” column, and save it for a make-up day. DO NOT binge and purge. Well, do it if you want to, but I strongly advise against the dieter’s mentality of having “cheat days” where you go berserk with everything in sight. Don’t think, oh, I’m not gonna sit today, but I’ll sit for five hours this weekend. It doesn’t work in the long run. It’s unsustainable.

The exception, of course, is if you’ve signed up for a sit where you really will sit for five hours, then I think it’s cool. What doesn’t work is the old college habit of cramming. It’s 10pm and that 50-page paper is due at 8am tomorrow morning? No problems, I have a whole *twelve* hours to write. Yeah, that rarely ends well.

Okay, here’s a recap:

  • The challenge is to complete 5400 minutes of sitting, a combination of Pranayama and Meditation.
  • You must do each session for at least 15 minutes.
  • You’re strongly encouraged to sit for an hour a day.
  • You have from March 1, 2010 to June 20, 2010 to complete.

Bonus:

Are you a math/stat geek? Keep tabs and quantify on your effort. For example, you can record when you sit, and do a tally on whether you do more Pranayama or Meditation in the morning, or at night.

Any time's a good time for a spreadsheet!

Any time's a good time for a spreadsheet!

What do you think? Are you in?

When we take the meditation posture, we’re developing a posture and attitude of attentive openness to whatever arises, and this is actually a very brave thing to do. I think maybe we wouldn’t actually even begin on this journey if we knew how brave that is, to just sit, and open our minds, open our whole being, with attentive openness to whatever might arise.

Because in so doing, we’re actually opening ourselves beyond our usual habitual view of ourself and of reality. We actually don’t know what we’re going to see, and one of the first things that one gradually begins to perceive is that perhaps we aren’t quite who we thought we were.

…

We sit, and we just look, with an openness, as much openness as we can, and in so doing, we’re opening ourselves to letting go, or seeing through, or at least seeing exactly who we are and what we do. We’re setting ourselves up, you could say, for some of the ways, and eventually all of the ways in which we conventionally and habitually view reality, to let those fall apart, so it’s very brave. And this path, is considered the Path of the Brave Ones, which doesn’t mean we *are* brave, but it means we begin to cultivate our fearlessness.

- Pema Chodron, From Fear to Fearlessness, Session 1, Beginning the Path of the Brave Ones.

Those rules, they're more like guidelines anyway

Those rules, they're more like guidelines anyway

The Seed of Yoga

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This past weekend during my 500-hour teacher training, Denise Carrico came to talk to us about teaching yoga for people with cancer. Denise is a yoga teacher in the Integral tradition who has been teaching yoga for 20+ years and for people with cancer for 12 years at Seattle Cancer Lifeline in Phinney Ridge and 8 Limbs Yoga in West Seattle. She also leads free retreats for cancer patients at Harmony Hill in Western Washington’s Hood Canal.

Denise stressed the importance of empowering people who have been diagnosed with cancer who may have felt betrayed by their bodies and perhaps even other things, tangible and non-tangible. She then read a poem to us to demonstrate how to use imagery and poetry to do so.

I will not live an unlived life.
I will not live in fear of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,

to make me less afraid, more accessible,
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing, a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance;

to live,
so that which came to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom,
and that which came to me as blossom,
goes on as fruit.
—Dawna Markova

The next morning, on Sunday, our class read the Bhagavad Gita, and in chapter 10 of the translation by Eknath Easwarn, verse 39 read:

“I am the seed that can be found in every creature, Arjuna; for without me nothing can exist, neither animate for inanimate.” BG 10:39

This then reminded me of what Shinzen Young said in the very last minutes of his lectures in The Science of Enlightenment:

“When you let go of the need to know, then you will be able to see how space is produced from the activity of nothingness, and you’ll be able to also see how the activity of the pine tree arises as none other than yourself” – Sasaki Roshi, as quoted by Shinzen Young, chapter 12, the Science of Enlightenment

The image of the seed seems to be coming up a lot everywhere I look recently. How about you? What image do you find consistent in literature, yoga and otherwise?

Patience, grasshoppers, a seed will soon grow into a tree.

Patience, grasshoppers, a seed will soon grow into a tree.

Resources for Beginning Meditation

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Over the years, I’ve listened to and read a lot of books on meditation (because, um, you know, reading and thinking about something is almost like really doing it ;) ).

These are my top three books/audiobooks for Meditation for Beginners (and I do think we’re beginners for a very long time).

The beginner’s guide to meditation by Shinzen Young

I consider Shinzen Young my teacher for his clarity in vocabulary and ability to explain abstract concepts in concrete terms.

The beginner's guide to meditation by Shinzen Young

The beginner's guide to meditation by Shinzen Young

Introduces the listener to the tradition of meditation. Explains how meditation works, what different methods offer, and guides the listener through the practices. Includes a 3-part session for beginners.

Meditation for Beginners by Jack Kornfield

Jack Kornfield is a teacher that makes me smile and soften when I hear the sound of his voice, really gentle and soothing, but packed full of wisdom and authority.

Meditation for Beginners by Jack Kornfield

Meditation for Beginners by Jack Kornfield

Introduction to a form of meditation drawing on Buddhist practices. Covers: daily exercises; body postures and breathing; clearing distractions and cultivating awareness; the energy of love as a healing power; how to “make friends” with anger; the importance of forgiveness; how to focus healing attention on the body.

The posture of meditation : a practical manual for meditators of all traditions by Will Johnson

Many guides on meditation do not discuss How To Sit, but the proper posture is the base for any kind of meditative work, so this little book is highly recommended.

The posture of meditation by Will Johnson

The posture of meditation by Will Johnson

“Ordinarily,” Johnson opens his superbly calm little manual, “we think of meditation as an activity involving our minds, but in truth meditation is initiated by assuming a specific gesture with our bodies.” That gesture or posture is the cross-legged sitting familiarly associated with Buddhist meditation and consists of three elements: alignment, relaxation, and resilience.

The objects of these physical practices are to offer gravity the least resistance while in an alert yet resting state and to experience the subtle movements of existence. Johnson explains the functions of each element, offers instruction and advice on achieving each of them, and discusses how they may be carried into everyday life in a prose so limpidly intelligent that this book may become a standard text for beginning meditators. – Ray Olson, Booklist

How about you? What are some meditation resources that you have enjoyed?

SOS – Sit-off Meditation Competition Sponsors

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Have you heard of the Meditation Competition? Are you doing the Sit-off? If so, let these awesome business know and enjoy the generous discounts they’ve offered. Do you know a business who would like to and should participate? Are you one yourself? Please let me know and join in!

10% off at Village Green Yoga

I am proud to have the support of Jean Massimo, owner of Village Green Yoga in Issaquah, who has graciously offered 10% off of merchandise in the Village Green Yoga boutique for anyone doing the Sit-off.

Our eco-boutique offers functional earth-friendly clothing for yoga and life. We have everything from your favorite practice pant, to organic jeans.

We support smaller, ecologically conscious manufacturers including Blue Canoe, Shining Shakti, Bamboo Dreams (OR), Of the Earth (Bend, OR), and Inner Waves Organics (Maui, HI). We are proud sellers of beautiful, unique, and locally-crafted sriKaya jewelry.

Our selection of the finest yoga accessories includes Jade Harmony and Manduka mats and a wide array of books, DVDs, and CDs. We are an area retailer of Maui Jim sunglasses, which are both fashionable and designed to protect your eyes from sun, glare, and constantly shifting light from cloudy skies.

We also have gifts and goodies that include Shoyeido (some of the best incense in the world) and local favorites like Big Dipper Wax Works candles from Seattle, Hempmania bags from Bainbridge Island. Look and feel great while being kind to the planet!

10% off a New Client 2-Hour Thai Yoga Body Therapy with Liam Jones

What is Thai Yoga Therapy?

From Liam’s Thai Yoga Therapy website:

Thai Yoga Therapy is the healing art of the legendary ancient Traditional Thai Massage. It is also known as Thai Yoga Massage , Thai Yoga and Thai Massage. It is however not at all like the massage we know in the west. Massage is the closest English translation.

In reality it is a legendary Yoga Therapy and Ayurvedic healing art. It is an ancient, unique, energy-body work that can be deep, dreamy, and relaxing while releasing blocked energy and leaving the recipient in a more aware and energetically coherent and fluid state.

A free tea with purchase of a pastry at Wheatless in Seattle

If you have not discovered Kaili Mcintire and Wheatless in Seattle yet, you must, whether or not you have any dietary restrictions. Her coffee shop on 100th and Greenwood is a cozy place to bring your laptop and work with free wifi as well, and have I mentioned that the food is delicious?

It all started out of a medical need for me to eat gluten free foods. As a baker, I started experimenting with different flours and techniques to make gluten free foods and had a light bulb moment that I couldn’t be the only one with a wheat allergy.

I have developed gluten free alternatives for almost everything from quiche to pasta to pastry and enjoy making new products or improving the ones I have.

We offer the best of fresh gluten free breads, cakes and pastries that are high quality and delicious and taste just like or better than the traditional wheat counterpart.

$30 off a 90-minute massage with Sarah Moon

If you’re gonna sit, why not get sittin’ pretty with an awesome massage from Sarah Moon of Moon Rock Massage? She’s offering a very generous discount of $30 off, which means you get a 90-minute massage for only $60 bucks! What are you waiting for? Go sit!

Whether pain is from recent injury or for chronic pain management, Sarah focuses on providing relief with a healing touch and targeted self-care suggestions. Her style includes a mix of injury treatment, deep tissue, stretching, cupping and sports massage.

Extensive continuing education has given Sarah an in depth knowledge of anatomy and physiology, including extensive work in the abdominal/core region – perfect for anyone suffering from chronic low back pain.

Woohoo, incentives!

Woohoo, incentives!

Sit, Human, Sit! Good Human

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Last November, I announced a Meditation Competition–a Sit-off, if you will–as a response to the debate on Yoga Competition (or more accurately, Asana Competition).

It was a joke, that is, until now. I’m calling a Sit-off, and this time, it’s for real.

The competition is not who you think, though. We won’t have anyone judging your posture, how long you hold it, or the height of your cushion. We won’t care how coiffed your hair is, how cute your clothes are, or really, if you care to wear any at all. (And we certainly will not play Cotton Eyed Joe until your ears bleed while you attempt to reach samadhi.)

To blatantly rip off a famous saying, we have met the competition, and he is us. The only person stopping you from doing this is you and only you. I’m willing to bet that no matter how busy you are, you have 60 seconds to spare, to slow down, to watch your breath, close your eyes, and sit on a comfy cushion.

The rules

For all 28 days of February, 2010, sit. That’s it. No, really, that’s it. Just sit.

Sit every day. Sit for a minute a day, or 10, or 20. If you ask, what good will one minute of meditation do? You’re right, it won’t do *much*, but remember this one message from meditation teacher Shinzen Young: “one is infinitely more than zero.” The point is to start a habit, and like Mark Twain said, “Habit is to be coaxed downstairs a step at a time.”

If you need some structure, check out Tricycle Magazine’s Commit to Sit 28-day challenge.

28 Days and 28 Nights – Why 28

I’m doing this in February because it’s the month with the least amount of days. For the same reason that $9.95 seems cheaper than $9.99, and $9.99 seems cheaper than $10, committing to doing anything for 28 days seem so much less daunting than 30 or 31 days.

For those of you looking for more meanings behind 28, there are all sorts of interesting observations behind it.

You’ll Never Sit Alone

Some of us are more private about our work, others benefit well from support, encouragement, and a sense of camaraderie. So, if you’re on Twitter, simply tweet #sitoff. You can host your own tweetup, meetup, Sunday Sit, Sit and Knit, Sit and Sing, Meditate and Medicate (wait… maybe not that one).

And Now, A Note From Our Sponsors

What kind of competition has not “winners”, no scores to keep, and no awards? Ah, well, in the effort to rectify this shortcoming, I am looking for businesses who, in HR parlance, lend a hand in incentivizing, businesses who will offer some kind of discount for the participants of this challenge. For instance, a coffee shop could offer 10% off a latte (you know, so you can wake up a bit earlier or stay up a bit longer to sit).

If you are a business, whether local or online, please let me know if you’d like to be a part of this. The terms of the discount are entirely up to you. For example, if someone had to prove it with a note from their mom, or “Sit Ten Times, Get a Latte Free”, or, “Meditate for Your Martini” ™. Hey, you can even set up a Sit and Sip ™ corner in your store. See, the possibilities are almost endless.

If you know a business who would be up for this, please tell them and encourage them to join in. Please tell your friends, please tell your friends to tell their friends. Please mention this to your favorite coffee shop, barista, restaurant, bookstore, bakery, bartender. Really, the more the merrier.

Yes, this is 100% based on an honor system, but I have faith in it. Honestly, if you lie about whether you’ve meditated or not, you’re gonna have *that* much more to work through when you finally do take a seat. And, as the song lyrics goes, “Your cheatin’ heart, will tell on you.”

What do you get as a participating business? I will feature you on my blog. If you care about this sort of things, this site has a Google PR 3, which may help increase web traffic to your website. This is also a great way to attract more customers through word of mouth marketing.

And you’ll get that warm and fuzzy feeling knowing that you’ve helped someone who wants to meditate good and “wanna learn to do other stuff good too”.

Stop. Collaborate. Meditate. Sit, sit baby.

Stop. Collaborate. Meditate. Sit, sit baby.

An Open Letter of Grace

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One of my favorite authors, Bill Bryson, once wrote:

Welcome. And congratulations. I am delighted that you could make it. Getting here wasn’t easy, I know. In fact, I suspect it was a little tougher than you realize.

…

To be here now; alive in the twenty-first century and smart enough to know it, you also had to be the beneficiary of an extraordinary string of biological good fortune. Survival on Earth is a surprisingly tricky business. Of the billions and billions of species of living thing that have existed since the dawn of time, most—99.99 percent—are no longer around.

…

The average species on Earth lasts for only about four million years, so if you wish to be around for billions of years, you must be as fickle as the atoms that made you. You must be prepared to change everything about yourself—shape, size, color, species affiliation, everything—and to do so repeatedly… The tiniest deviation from any of these evolutionary shifts, and you might now be licking algae from cave walls or lolling walruslike on some stony shore or disgorging air through a blowhole in the top of your head before diving sixty feet for a mouthful of delicious sandworms.

Not only have you been lucky enough to be attached since time immemorial to a favored evolutionary line, but you have also been extremely—make that miraculously—fortunate in your personal ancestry. Consider the fact that for 3.8 billion years, a period of time older than the Earth’s mountains and rivers and oceans, every one of your forebears on both sides has been attractive enough to find a mate, healthy enough to reproduce, and sufficiently blessed by fate and circumstances to live long enough to do so.

Not one of your pertinent ancestors was squashed, devoured, drowned, starved, stranded, stuck fast, untimely wounded, or otherwise deflected from its life’s quest of delivering a tiny charge of genetic material to the right partner at the right moment in order to perpetuate the only possible sequence of hereditary combinations that could result—eventually, astoundindly, and all too briefly—in you. – Introduction, A Short History of Nearly Everything

After reading that, I usually laugh at the image of myself licking algae, and often get quite emotional and teary-eyed. It’s similar to that feeling that you get when you’re out in the middle of nowhere, you look up, and there’s the whole entire Milky Way spread out above. You feel so small yet so big, and you just marvel at the wonder of it all, and the fact that you are alive and that you can see this incredible sight.

In that spirit, this post is an expression of gratitude.

If you were to look at things from a certain perspective, it has been a very tough year for me personally. (I know most people don’t start counting a new year until January 1st, but for me, the new year occurs in November, my birth month.) I’ve gone through lay-offs, rejections, financial losses, physical injuries, family issues. After having lived on my own for so long, I moved back home, waving goodbye to my dear apartment and the carefree, blithe, “single girl in the city” lifestyle.

In theory, I should have slipped into some sort of depression, or at least periods of low self esteem and pity, given everything that happened, and given that I had been well conditioned to being on the other side of the fence: straight A student in high school, Dean’s list in college, groomed to be in a leadership, fast-track career path, etc.

Yet, for some strange reason, the opposite thing took place. I have been living rather, ecstatically, running around and loving, marveling at life like a goldfish who’s seeing everything for the first time, over and over again.

“Are you okay?”, friends would ask out of concern that I haven’t found a “jobby job”, and I would say, “Oh god, yes! I woke up this morning and went to the bathroom, and there was toilet paper! And a toilet that flushed! I went to turn on the shower and there was hot water! Isn’t that incredible? I’m *more* than okay. I’m like, so lucky to have what I have!” “Um, okay, really now, are you okay?”

I am okay, I am very okay, and I have to say, that I owe a lot of it to yoga.

Now, I know that I may sometimes come across as a bit irreverent, skeptical, cynical, a little disrespectful, even, of “this whole yoga thing”. I know that sometimes it seems like I’m not quite sold on any spiritual context of modern yoga. But, let me say it here and say it now, I am a staunch believer in the transformative and healing power of yoga, for which I could not be more grateful. (And besides, in my humble opinion, doubt is an integral part of a healthy belief.)

Before we go on, I want to emphasize that yoga did not, does not, and will not remove or eradicate any of life’s oopsies and resulting ouchies. It also does not make you numb to life’s realities and ignore your responsibilities. It can, however, help you live more fully in the moment, which is something that all those smart people, living and dead, have been urging us to do since the beginning of time.

“Things are more like they are now than they ever were before”

A little over a year ago, when I started my teacher training at Pacific Yoga in Seattle, little did I know that beyond getting bendy, I was going to be equipped with something akin to a flashlight for the dark and rugged sections of the hike. The flashlight may not tell me where to go and how to get there, but it surely helps me get a good sense of where I’m at, and what’s happening right now.

Right now, I have a father who’s almost 70, in good health, and driving my mom crazy with his landscaping projects. I have a mother who constantly tries to convince me that I need to eat more (of her food, of course), and who will come nudge me every night to set her up in a Restorative yoga pose. I have a brother who’s also my best friend and occasional drinking buddy, and who will come to me when our parents start to drive him crazy.

Right now, I have a boyfriend who is supportive of my dedication to yoga, even though he cannot possibly fathom why anyone would voluntarily go without the Internet for 10 days, and how on earth did I not talk during “Meditation Camp” (it was a Vipassana 10-day silent retreat).

Right now, I have my health. Today, all my cells have agreed to continue to be me.

Right now, I have been transmitted the teaching of yoga, and I have taken on the responsibility of giving it away in the role of a yoga teacher. These are the two things that I will never take for granted.

I think teaching is the most sacred, the most important thing in life. The subject doesn’t matter—yoga, bicycling, whatever —because it is not what you do that is important, but what you awaken in the other person. – Dona Holleman, from Yoga Journal September/October 1982

It is Wednesday, November 25th, 2009. In the context of yoga, I want to send out an enormous amount of gratitude from the bottom of my heart to all my teachers, mentors, peers, and students (who also teach me much more than they realize). I want to thank you, my readers, whomever you are, for coming by and getting to know me “mo’ betta’” virtually.

And of course, since yoga isn’t separate from my life, and my life isn’t separate from yoga, gracious thanks, too, to my awesome family and friends, old and new, near and far. You may not know it, but you help me practice my yoga, and you help me, you know, keepin’ it real. And I’d like to thank the Academy… oh wait, wrong speech.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Gratitude, I has it.

Gratitude, I has it.

Why I Do Yoga

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I am often asked why I do yoga, and I often say, “so I can sit”, an answer that often elicits laughter, the kind that you would get when you give a smart-ass answer to a serious question.

Admittedly, it’s a bit of a smart-ass answer, and on the surface, it might look like one of those cop-out answers one may say when one doesn’t feel like saying much, but in fact, there’s nothing lazy or facetious about it.

If you’ve ever tried sitting down to meditate for any length of time, you might find that there are all sorts of agitations going on, not just in the mind but also in the body. If my hips and shoulders are tight, and my back and knees hurt, there is little chance that I will be able to quiet down the mind. Yoga is a tool for me to condition my body for sitting.

Okay, great, so you do yoga so you can sit. But why sit?

Why I sit is a topic worth another blog post altogether, but I want to quote here my teacher Shinzen Young in the Science of Enlightenment. And for an impeccable CD by CD review of The Science of Enlightenment, check out my friend’s C4Chaos’ post: The Science of Enlightenment is Paving the Way for the Enlightenment of Science.

If you follow a path that doesn’t involve sitting still on a regular basis, you run the danger that you might be fooling yourself. You might think that your transcending of conditions is a lot more than it actually is.

Sitting still and not moving is a special activity. It’s the zero activity. It’s the activity of no activity. And against that milieu, you can really see to what extent you have transcended conditions. So it becomes a sort of barometer or gold standard that you can use to measure the degree to which your practice is allowing you to become a free person.

Because if you think that your practice is bringing you freedom, which is to say that it is showing you a happiness independent of conditions, then you can most clearly see that in the situation where all conditions have been taken away.

And you’re just sitting absolutely still with nothing, nothing going on, and how do you relate to that nothing, if you’re really becoming free, it’s gonna be heaven.

But, if after half an hour, an hour, or two hours, or four or five hours of just sitting still, you find yourself in hell, you can’t do it, you find a reason to rationalize the fact that you need to get up, then obviously you haven’t transcended conditions yet.

Nothing wrong with that. You’ve gotten a reflection, you’ve gotten some feedback, a real objective barometer of how free you are. And so, okay, you go back to your practice, and maybe six months later, maybe a couple years later, try it again. See if you can sit there, five hours, six hours, without having to move, without having to change conditions, and once again, you’ll get a real clear picture to what extent are you free from the the thoughts and feelings that come up as you sit there, and to what extent you’re not free, you’re identified with the thoughts and feelings.

A person doesn’t have to sit, I would never say that a person has to do a sitting practice to become liberated, but I would strongly suggest that sitting still and doing absolutely nothing is the quick and dirty easy test to see to what extent is the practice that you *do* do taking you to unconditional freedom.

I don't need no yoga to do this. Clearly much more enlightened than humans.

I don't need no yoga to do this. Clearly much more enlightened than humans.