Moving Beyond Duality

Goldilocks knew that things could be too hot or too cold but that something in the middle is just right! What was just right gave her a sense of contentment and comfort. Smart woman, that Goldilocks! Life is stressful in the extremes. People are quick to classify an experience, person, or thing as either good or bad. Either we like it or we dislike it. But really there is so much possibility in between the extremes. Yoga has taught me to find the gray zone of experiences and to acknowledge that things change. This awareness has given me more equanimity as I proceed through the day.

For instance, I reflect on things that I didn’t used to like. I didn’t like adho mukha svanasana (down dog pose) for the first several years that I practiced yoga and now I appreciate the feeling of expansion it gives me through my legs, trunk, and arms. Bakasana (crow pose) had been really difficult 20 years ago but now I find it and its variations easy. It is incredulous to me that I used to think I hated asparagus (thanks to the 1960’s canned variety served at our home) but now it is among my very favorite vegetables. None of these things changed, per se. Each of these things was always something in the middle – not hard, easy, likable or dislikable. What has changed is my perspective and my realization that everything is really on a continuum and always just right at some point in time.

I contemplate about what is a hard pose or an easy pose exactly? Isn’t it all relative to another pose? After working with ardha chandrasana (half moon pose) most students are relieved to return to parsvakonasana (side angle pose) although they had just struggled with that one before the balance pose! We often work with bakasana then parivrtta bakasana (revolved crow pose) and when we return to bakasana without the twist it seems just right - easier than it had before to everyone in the room.

I keep the studio temperature at 73-75 degrees for class. Is that hot or is that cold? Some students are a little chilled (as am I) when we begin class in a centering pose. But although the external temperature doesn’t change, most people are sweating after 30 minutes of standing poses. So was 74 degrees hot or cold? Can it be a temperature along a continuum that is just right to accommodate the practice?

I’ve invited students to find that just right state – not really tense and struggling but not really limp and disengaged – during our asana practice and to find that just right state of mind off the mat. Something along a continuum – not too extreme – seems just right and much easier to endure. Hopefully they will experience the same contentment and comfort that Goldilocks found when she found something not too hot, not too cold, but just right.

Choices

We are presented with choices every moment, some of which are better for our bodies than others. Although we can sometimes be overwhelmed by the number of options available to us, we always are in control of the choices we make when we eat something and when we select activities to fill our free time.

Some people choose to diet but I suggest they decide instead for the non-diet method of maintaining and losing weight. This means making choices all day long but it is a lifestyle choice that offers many options to feel satiated rather than denied food. People that maintain a healthy weight simply select the healthier foods each day. The choice is to reach for a candy bar or melon slices and berries when energy is low mid-day. People that use a healthy lifestyle approach to eating don’t alternatively gain and lose weight the way dieters do. They don’t migrate to the newest fad diet, reading about rules for the diet of the month. Instead they eat a lot of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Choices are numerous for snacking when the snacks are nutritious!

People that maintain a healthy weight over their lifetime choose a leafy salad as a side rather than fries when they dine out. Fried food is the food choice most associated with weight gain. Potato chips, sugary drinks including sodas and juices, red and processed meats, desserts, and refined grains are other food selections that are likely to lead to weight gain. Healthier options, particularly fruits and vegetables, can replace these less healthy options and reduce the chance of unwanted weight gain. A green leafy salad is an alternative side to French fries that offers more vitamins and less risk for weight gain. Vegetables dipped in hummus and plain stove-popped popcorn are alternatives to potato chips for a healthy crispier snack. Yogurt and nuts are healthy sources of protein and fats and consuming these foods is related to less lifetime weight gain.  If people do choose to eat red meat, they will want to choose to eat it less often and select lean meats, completely eliminating processed meats.

Counting calories and omitting selected foods based on fad diets has been found to be less effective in maintaining a healthy weight throughout life than eating healthier foods. Other healthy lifestyles correlated to maintaining a healthy weight are sleeping 6-8 hours a night, reducing television viewing, choosing wine if one is going to drink alcohol (although other alcohol is correlated to weight gain), and exercise (the more one exercises, the less weight one gains).

People have limited free time, but often choose to spend it in front of televisions. Healthier choices are to take a walk or a bicycle ride after dinner. Schedules are packed with obligations leaving little time to exercise. However, anyone can choose to use the stairs rather than an elevator when they enter a building. People often spend more time waiting for a parking spot to open up near the store entrance than the time it takes to make the healthier choice of parking further away and walking to the entrance.

It isn’t easy to maintain a healthy weight over one’s lifetime. But it is possible by making daily choices. Everyone is more in control of their choices than they realize. In fact, it is easier to control and maintain a healthy-choice lifestyle than to maintain fad diets. It is more liberating to know it is healthy to eat any of the colorful fruits and vegetables in the produce section than to think I need to limit myself to items on a fad diet list. And better, I get to choose.

The Many Meanings of Flexibility

People frequently comment on my flexibility. Often they refer to the way that my body can move and bend. Other times they refer to my attitude in accommodating unexpected obstacles and requests. I’ve found that life teaches each of us to be flexible. Often there is nothing else we can do but accommodate. Sometimes it is the weather, other times it is a business (especially an airline), and other times it is a significant other or colleague but each day we are required to veer off our planned course of action and be flexible and open to something else.

How willing I am to be flexible depends a lot on how committed I am to my original plan. But willing or not, I’ve got to budge. I believe that my yoga practice has helped me to be flexible – in both senses of the term. As I get on my mat and bend my body, opening hips, shoulders and hamstrings, I explore my flexibility both physically and mentally. I try to be open minded to what the asana (pose) will feel like during that particular practice. The same asana looks different from one day to the next. Even within the same day, my morning hanumanasana (monkey pose, or splits) and titibhasana (firefly) poses are never as deep as they are in the evening. But yoga practice teaches me to stay with the practice and accept the pose as it is at the time, regardless of the outcome.

Deciding to use yoga props is an example of using a flexible attitude to improve a flexible body. I might use a block one day although I didn’t use one the day before. Although the block itself accommodates physical flexibility, it takes flexibility of attitude to use a prop to experience the asana without ego interfering. For instance, it is easy to lapse into full-blown ego protection during a practice by telling myself “I can get into a full split without using a block so I won’t use one today”. But yoga has taught me that the practice of staying in the moment, using my breath to transition between and to stay in poses is what is important. Coming into an expression of any pose beyond what my body is willing to provide at that time has potential of straining a muscle or ligament, causing an injury. Repeatedly coming into an asana incorrectly or holding it with poor alignment because I haven’t prepared my body for the pose might make me prone to a painful and limiting tendonitis. None of these injuries is worth forcing a deeper expression of a pose than is available at the time. So it serves me well to be flexible in accepting the pose as it is available during that practice without expecting a certain expression of that pose.

Yoga practice requires that I stay with the process, without attachment to the outcome. This practice is important for proper alignment, awareness, and injury prevention on the mat and it also serves me well when life requires me to be flexible in attitude when I’m off the mat.