We have a fear of facing ourselves. That is the obstacle. Experiencing the innermost core of our existence is very embarrassing to a lot of people. A lot of people turn to something that they hope will liberate them without their having to face themselves. That is impossible. We can't do that. We have to be honest with ourselves. We have to see our gut, our excrement, our most undesirable parts. We have to see them. That is the foundation of warriorship, basically speaking. Whatever is there, we have to face it, we have to look at it, study it, work with it and practice meditation with it.
Chogyam Trungpa
When I was training to be a yoga teacher, one of the 6 purification techniques taught to us was Jala Neti ( also called Neti or Jaaneti). Purification techniques are sometimes performed as a way of preparing the body for a yoga practice. Whenever the neti pots came out, I disappeared, always needing to be somewhere else at that moment in time… I had many techniques to avoid it: the bathroom, the water fountain, the shop, anything but the Net. Pouring a saline solution up my hooter was really not for me and I have avoided it right up to today. I have got a steaming cold and, as a result, I now have sinus pain, so I have decided to give it another go. Talk about waiting until your back is against the wall! I rushed to the Sivanada yoga studio nearby and bought myself a ceramic neti pot and salt. I had to follow the one photographic image as the instructions were in German!!! Although I did not find it as unpleasant as some people describe, it was not as bad as I remembered. So I will us
I speak purely from myself here, but I find that when I fear facing myself, it's not because I don't want to acknowledge my undesirable parts. I am fully aware of these chunks of myself that are on constant display for the world. I fear success. I fear being able to do something. I fear my true artistic power (as an artist who is fearful of creating and therefore have a lot of materials and intentions, but nothing physical). I appreciate the above idea, but I use yoga to help me calm the fear to enable me to be aware of my potential and not fear success. For about a decade I couldn't do Bakasana. In fact, I just blogged about it. I linked back to your blog. Please let me know if you prefer I took it down:
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Thanks for the quote!
Fear is Fear...taking action and moving forward is always the key for me.The quotes are there for us to look at different aspects of ourselves...we dont have to agree with them all. Thank you for your comments :-)
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