Three rules of thumb I'd
be honored to share from my life to continually grow as a life-long student,
teacher and leader are:1) Pull from Everything you do, 2)Learn from Everyone you meet, 3) Do so Everywhere you are.
1 )From childhood
memories that creep in for seemingly no reason, to games you play or
movies you watch, to sitting in traffic, learn from everything you do. There is no wrong or
meaningless moment in life. Every moment is your teacher whether its
taste is bitter or sweet or a mixed bag. Reflect on past
experiences, be present for new ones, even the seemingly mundane or
uneventful, and frequently tap in to how it can teach you a lesson. There's a
catch, though: you must filter through the eyes of a judgment-free witness and
turn up the volume on objectivity. For example, how can you notice your mind
has moved to analysis of a past experience? Ask what you're remembering and
search the moment for what emotions arise. These can be hidden as pains
or tensions, specific body parts might be speaking, feel them!, obvious or
subtle facial expressions show up, see them!, your posture or concrete/specific
or even hard-to-name physical demonstrations show up, notice them! Then
from the evidence you gather on what you're feeling, take a lesson. And, the
beauty of noticing tension and pain is you can begin to release them. The same
is true for emotions. One example from my life, I kept remembering a quote my
old middle school principal used to say. "Make it a great day or
not, the choice is yours. " I then remembered getting angry by his
daily announcements, thinking how
preposterous, what hand is dealt to you determines your happiness,
i.e. my happiness, or so I
was convinced! As an adult, the anger that came up from this from my
childhood-self taught me to see how I didn't yet realize that attitude is a choice! By remaining objective, I could see
from a witness standpoint without getting deep into defending or judging why
the anger might have been wrong or unwarranted. I saw my past attitude and then
it was able to shift my current one. A thing I once did not understand as I do
today, which I once allowed to cause suffering and boiling rage because of a
sense of no control over my emotions, is now one of my favorite sayings. I use
this quote in my own life and teachings regularly.
2) To learn from everyone you meet means to see the value in
every being. They all have the potential to be great teachers, from
newborns, to pets, to kids and adults, and elders. Yet,
our belief that they can our can't teach us determines if we'll receive the
teachings. When I first got yoga teacher training in 2010, the subsequent
classes I took, I entered feeling annoyed, thinking the teacher wasn't
going to teach me anything new and their sequence would suck! That prejudgment
blocked me from enjoying the flow and from receiving the lessons and experience and teacher might have offered me. Another example, when I
first started working with infants doing one on one yoga at schools, I
had no idea they would be such great teachers. If they weren't
comfortable, they'd cry. If they felt happy, they'd smile. Babies
lacked the social etiquette we get growing up American to pretend to like what someone
is offering us. I started by trying to do the same exact routine with every
baby and half the time I'd fail. I felt rejected by some of the babies initially. I
took their behavior personally. I eventually learned from them that before work
can be done, they need to get comfortable much like the integration phase
of a yoga class gets us into the body. It had less to do with me and more
to do with them. To open, they needed comfort and grounding. It seems
obvious but I had to be present to their response to me and my own need to be perfect had to come second to solving them as
individual baby puzzles ( whose solution varied moment to moment and baby to
baby! ) They taught me that all people deserve to be seen in the present moment
and awareness (noticing their body language and responding appropriately) was
needed to provide them the appropriate environment and stimuli so I could do my
job. They taught me to let go of needing immediate results, too.
Hoping for instant gratification is a sure way to invite disappointment.
Also, that control of others is not achievable. It's not up to me how the baby
will feel/act/respond, so I have to let go of trying to force my way and find a
way that works now! Seeing the babies in the present moment and letting go of the
need for perfection and control help make them (the babies in this case, but
anyone in general) become reachable, teachable and touchable.
Initially, working with them was a knock to my ego before I saw that
results aren't always visible immediately and they may never be visible. I
subsequently learned to appreciate the small victories and breakthroughs and
let go of the times it seemed all I did was show up.
3) To learn from where you are,
first thing’s first, put down the device! Cell phones, tablets, and other
technological breakthroughs are causing break-downs in connecting to our
environment. So, rule of thumb for learning from your surroundings is to remove
your eyes from the screen. Turn it off or put it out of reach once in a while,
too, so that you aren’t wrapped up in sounds it makes or the urge to pick it up
again. Once this is achieved, look around! Use your senses and take in the
place you’re at. It’s amazing how I have been driving along a road I commute
regularly and ask myself, “how long has that been there?” This tells me I am
not paying attention to where I am all the time. It’s impossible to literally
always be tuned into your surroundings, but with practice you can be more and
more attuned. Yet, when we drive there is music, when we walk, let’s admit that
most of us are planning what to say next or playing on our devices. When we
cook, we are focused greatly on the outcome and not the enjoyment of the
process. When we eat sometimes we
swallow before we have chewed or tasted. Sometimes we hug and don’t even feel
it. I am not saying these things are
true for all people, all the time. I am simply stating that pausing to take-in
through our senses, to connect with a moment that is fleeting and unique, is rare.
It takes practice. It’s worth the practice too. Learning about your
surroundings is a great way to find new paths while biking or running. Opening up the through the senses, being with your environment makes it possible to relax and get grounded in what is. It’s a way to drop assumptions and start
noticing and responding to reality. If you miss what’s right in front of you,
you’re not alone. We don’t even notice when we are unconscious and zoned out because we are used to
living in this fuzzy half-connected realm of existence. Often times in my classes I have students
pause to hold a child’s pose or down dog for an extended period. I ask them to
notice what is moving through them now, to open their eyes and see what they
look at, to feel the grounding of the body parts against the earth, to taste
the heat in the air, to notice the qualities of their mind and fullness of
their breath. This is a connected moment. If we could all practice this off the
yoga mat now and again, we’d really be where we are. If we don’t stop to smell
the roses as we pass them, we never will. Connecting to the now is a practice. That
is why we can always learn from our surroundings at any moment. Then, on your
commute, as you drive by the same sights you always see, you’ll have really
seen them. Their beauty and flaws, and simply that they exist in that space.
Noticing doesn't build the buildings and fill the lakes, but it can show you them! and Viola!
Everywhere,
all the time, with everyone, doing everything and anything, you can learn, lead
and grow. By being tuned in, by giving space to the greatness in others no
matter their age or status, by stopping to notice where you are in the moment,
you invite learning, leadership and moments of teaching by example. It is not
like the practices are extremely difficult or out of reach. They simply take
dedicated and incremental doing (tapas,) focus, repetition (practice), and open heart and
a willingness to not be perfect. As with all things we learn, there is a time
of not knowing before knowing. In between there is shaky application of what is
known, but there is grace in this moment of taking a concept into practice and eventually into
embodiment. To strive to be a student and teacher and leader in any moment is
to risk being imperfect. Take that risk. In the vulnerability of it all, life
and freedom are there.
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