Heart Full - Light up your heart

Posted by chai on October 8th, 2008 in yoga

“We all breathe”, she said, “on the inhale …. I am you…. on the exhale …..you are me.” It’s a yogic concept I suppose, that when you inhale, it’s more than oxygen you’re breathing in, but energy, the environment, the breath of someone else.

It’s easy to forget that we’re so deeply interconnected. It’s easier for us to categorize each other, Democrats or Republicans, apathetics, liberals, New Yorkers, Southerners etc,.. But on other nights, we’re just people who like to eat out on a clear, Fall, New York night. Sharing a table, making recommendations on menu items, and laughing at how far off the center we are.

They say that New Yorkers don’t care, that we keep our heads down and mind our own business, sometimes we may even bump into each other, and not bother to apologize. Tonight, at Republic - an Asian fusion restaurant located off of Union Square, I had dinner with my friend Heather. At Republic they seat you in bench like tables that somehow channel Zen rather than lunchroom cafeterias, though in both cases, you have two swing a leg to get sit and stand from the tables.
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Posted by chai on October 2nd, 2008 in balance, dharma, myths, yoga

It was someone’s birthday, our instructor seemed excited that the birthdayee was spending it in her class. She smiled, “it’s wonderful … it fits perfectly with my dharma talk”. I assumed this meant she was going to talk about the wonder and the miracle of life, always an inspiring topic, but nothing new. I closed my eyes, ready to meditate on the beauty of life. Instead, she spoke about Halloween, or ‘All Hallows Eve’, as it was formerly called. All Hallows Eve and All Saint’s Day, is a time, when we as a culture turn our attention to the other side, the spirits. The spirits during these holidays, wander perhaps a little longer and a little more freely than they do on other nights of the year. Interesting … but still not quite getting it.

Some of these spirits are what various eastern cultures call “hungry ghosts”. I’d heard of hungry ghosts growing up, I had always just assumed these ghosts were noisy, not too friendly, and ‘hungry’ in a sense for our soul. Not so, she explained that these spirits had a head as small as the top of a needle, and mouths even smaller than that, but with stomachs unimaginably large, gigantic. These were hungry ghosts, ghosts who could not satisfy their hunger, because their mouths were too small to nourish them. These people had been greedy in life, and this was the form to work out that karma.
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Posted by chai on September 23rd, 2008 in yoga

We come to class, we roll out our mats, and follow our breath to find our center. This is the ideal. I usually get to step two, rolling out the mat. From there, it’s only a matter of time before I’m distracted. Hopefully, its the effort I’m putting in to sustaining the pose that’s distracting me, or maybe my determination to hold on that extra breath, and take my practice to the next level. But usually it isn’t. Sometimes, I’m distracted by the thong in full view, in front of me because the pants on the girl dip too low when she sits. Plummer style.

I’m bothered by this conundrum — should I tell her, I know I’d want to know! I figure, it’s OK, only I notice — since only i have the “backseat”. But then a man rolls out his mat next to me, and … as I predicted, he notices too, and now I feel REALLY obliged to tell her, but I don’t. Instead, I chew over this for what seems like hours. Thoughts like this, throw my practice off center. I chastise myself, I shouldn’t be so easily distracted. It’s not about how others look, or even how I look, this is my time to focus inwardly, and see what’s true.
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Posted by chai on September 15th, 2008 in balance, breathe, reviews, yoga

Pure Yoga, possibly the largest yoga studio in New York City, had a reputation even before it opened. Housing 6 studios, 80 classes a week of every imaginable kind of yoga, it’s an emporium not unlike Equinox, the zen central for work-out-aholics.

Its’ simple beauty is breathtaking. The well placed wood works, creamy colors, and babbling water fixtures, evoke calmness and balance. It’s not just classes offered here, clients can drink tea and graze peacefully in a central lounge, that is more than 10x the size of my two bedroom. They’re also personally assessed by experienced yogis who help them create a customized development plan. When it finally is time to go to class, mats are laid out with geometric precision, a puffy towel and cork block greet each practitioner. It’s 5-star luxury for a reasonable (Manhattan) membership price $140 /mo and $95 activation fee…. Activation fee, I hadn’t heard that in years, not since I signed up for Equinox.
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