How Yoga Works

Thoughts after reading How Yoga Works by Geshe Michael Roach:

p.284, A pose is perfect only when you are doing the very best you can--gazing steadily, breathing sweetly, and thinking of how it will help someone else.

It's comforting to me when Ajit teaches Busuku's boys.  He is not handicapped, but handicapable!  I cannot do many of the yoga postures but I am doing the best I can and that's "good enough" or even better--that's the goal.  The opportunity to build strength or improve through practice is exciting but where I am today is PERFECT.  I also think I am helping others through my "weaknesses."  If I am comfortable with where I am today, I invite others to feel "good enough" too.

p.284,  instant brilliant faith of the young
p.213, "I love to teach children," I said.  "They are wonderful students.  Very open-minded to new ideas, even very big ones."

I have worked professionally with children for over 20 years, and I am so excited to teach "how yoga works" with kiddos for my next adventure.  This endeavor will build a better world.  Much like the vision of the Crown Prince and Queen Mother in rearing the Prime Minister with the common people, I too believe what kiddos learn in youth they carry into their adulthood, influencing their decision-making and priorities. It is a wonderful opportunity to work at the ground level.  To help establish a strong foundation for future structures.  A school system recently allocated personal handheld devices for high school students and then  middle school students.  I wonder if these devices had been first shared with elementary students if there would be as many issues with the implementation process?  Primary teachers may have laid a foundation for students to incorporate this tool in their learning in a more responsible and productive way.  Building a house from the ground up seems common sense, but sometimes we go for a more glamorous, quick fix, an achievement of a short term goal.  The building process takes perseverance, dedication and commitment   It may be costly in time invested .  .  . but I think it is an investment well worth the effort.

p. 38, You can't rush it, you see.  Fixing your back is not like fixing a broken chair--just pop in a new piece and sit on it.  It's more like straightening out a young tree that's been growing a little crooked.  

I liked this illustration of "cultivating your practice over an extended period of time."  With the advent of the microwave oven, ATMs, fast food restaurants, and other technologies, we are groomed to be impatient and not-so-good at waiting.  We also tend to look at a problem singularly instead of wholistically--I'm not sure if I'm making up words here--but we do not address the connectedness or the worldview.  If I am working with a kindergartner who is having difficulty listening and following directions in class, and then I hear his single parent works before he goes to school and is too tired to do more than put the child to bed when he gets home .  .  . I've got more to work on than helping a child be successful at school  .  .  . I like the idea of starting small, planting seeds, holding steady, watering, weeding, practicing patience and contentment, building and growing over time.

p.247, "These ideas--I can't accept them.  I mean, they go against .  .  . they go against what well, just what everybody knows; and what everybody says.  And of them, they are just, you know, old-fashioned, I mean.  Modern thinking has gone way beyond them."

Now this totally cracks me up since the setting for this story is 1101 A.D. .  .  .

p.366, It is a commitment to be content with what we have .  .  . None of the great ones who followed this path before us--none of them, over the centuries--possessed perfect circumstances either.  And so they just worked hard with what they had available to them, and they reached their ultimate goals."

I remember a Bible song from my childhood, "well, it was different back them .  .  .  remember they were only just men!"  There are no perfect circumstances.  We have to start right where we are, making the world a better place, one seed at a time.  We are each uniquely designed to garden in a way only we can do it.  Finding balance in all parts of us, our physical and emotional states, our work and play.  Cleaning up, moving on, letting go and being content with today.

I appreciated the style of this book because I think we learn best through story.  Although, I don't understand everything I've read, I know the seeds are planted.  I know that continued practice, study and helping others will nurture what's been planted.  I am thankful and contented.  I am sitting on my front porch, breathing, soaking in the sun, enjoying the journey and the miracle of the garden.