You Can’t Open A Flower With A Hammer with Denise at Yoga Loka, Reno, Nevada: September 19, 2017
With the shift in tour routing due to David’s laryngitis, coming home to the Carson Valley hasn’t been the usual settling that accompanies coming home. As I sit on the mat the first wave of awareness brings me to the disquieting thought, “ I shoudn’t be here”.
According to schedule we are supposed to be in Napa. Ancient yogis are always trying to teach us the principle of ritam, or rhythm, meaning the flow of life has her own timing. The opportunity to practice leaning into the deeper Truth of ritam is in full swing at the moment and its way harder than handstand against a wall.
The surface I-shouldn’t-be-here-I-should-be-in-Napa is painful because wrapped in the should and should-not’s is the deep psychic wound that I don’t belong anywhere. So much of my early life was spent feeling out of place and different from the rest. My awkwardness in high school ingrained deep patterns of people pleasing just so I could sit with the popular crowd at pep rallies. A disconnection to a sense of belonging ultimately led to a bad drinking problem, where I learned the alignment of loneliness is one of the most painful places on the planet.
The reminder of these patterns resurfaced in the teeniest second of sitting down and on this unexpected tour break I’ve been loading up on yoga classes to shake off the cold shivers of low self worth. Buddha said, “In this body you can find all the demons, and all the gods”, and I sit today to melt the demon of disconnectedness. The medicine of a yin practice is useful. As Iyengar points out, ‘if you can’t connect with your big toe, how can you connect to God?”.
During class Denise brought to our attention not only to our hips, shoulders, and inner connectedness but also to one of the tulips she’d placed on the altar before class that has suddenly opened to full bloom.
Just like that it happens it seems. When the timing is right, the light comes in and reveals the Love and Purpose that embraces us that’s always here. We just can’t see it until we’re good and ready.
Sometimes on tour I wonder if I belong out here. I’m not a musician, I’m not a guy, I can’t carry a tune and I dance like a white girl. Closely related to a sense of connectedness is a sense of purpose and the wondering is in full roar after Denise’s class.
More grounded in my body and in my life, as I walk in the door David handed me this note.
It seems if we slow down enough, relax deeply, and notice what’s right here, right now, we find we are useful, we do belong, and we are all here to help each other walk the path of Truth that we are all in this together.