var EmailArticleWindow; function email_article_popup() { var url = '/blogs/email/exchange/22567'; if( (EmailArticleWindow) && (EmailArticleWindow.closed != true) ) { EmailArticleWindow.location.href = url; } else { EmailArticleWindow = window.open(url,'EmailArticleWindow',"scrollbars=1,resizable=1,height=300,width=300"); } }
In Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert chronicled her search for solace as she journeyed alone to Italy, India and Indonesia. While we can all be inspired by her book or the movie, most of us can't afford to hop on a plane and land in exotic locations to examine our lives. The good news is there's an equally effective and affordable way for the rest of us to do some soul-searching.
The yoga of writing is a practice of self-study that combines sitting, walking and writing meditation with hatha yoga postures. It is a way of slowing down to observe the ebb and flow of our lives. By regularly being alone with our thoughts and feelings, we can really begin to know ourselves. We can experience that our journey and personal transformation can be just as exciting as what we've read in books and seen in movies. It only takes meeting ourselves in this moment, starting from where we are and letting each of our stories and truths surface from the simple acts of sit, write, stretch.
In Gift from the Sea, Anne Morrow Lindbergh eloquently stated the importance of being alone by recognizing that "the world today does not understand, in either man or woman, the need to be alone...that actually, these are the most important times in one's life when one is alone. Certain springs are tapped only when we are alone. The artist knows he must be alone to create; the writer to work his thoughts; the musician to compose; the saint to pray."
Solitude offers us an opportunity to fall back in love with our lives. Quietude gives us the joy of knowing that we're moving in the right direction, always. By breaking away from our busy schedules to be alone and to conduct reflective writing, sitting, walking and stretching, we become better listeners to our inner voices. These are activities that we - and we alone - can perform. No one can live our lives for us. Therefore, it's important to practice paying attention to ourselves.
The yoga of writing, in essence, is the art of being alone - whether you're in Manhattan or Mumbai. It offers a way to continually return and relate to yourself. You turn off the TV, computer and cell phone to quiet the outer world. You tune into the inner realm by putting pen to paper and body to mat in an attentive, compassionate manner.
With regular practice, meditation shifts from being a process to a relationship with yourself, your surroundings and others. It gently puts self-inquiry in action, dropping you into a space of inner dialogue, allowing for personal wisdom and peace to arise.
Tuning into the moment in this manner helps you to sincerely embrace your existence, understanding that your story is both unique and universal. When you explore what is swimming inside you, in the vast ocean of the Self, you reel in reflections from your life. Sometimes you get junk and other times gems. Whatever it is, it lives in you and needs to be recognized and released.
Natalie Goldberg said in Writing Down the Bones that "our lives are at once ordinary and mythical. We live, we die, age beautifully or full of wrinkles. We wake in the morning, buy yellow cheese, and hope we have enough money to pay for it. At the same instant we have magnificent hearts that pump through all sorrow and all winters we are alive on this earth. We are important and our lives are important."
And as Socrates so wisely pointed out, "the unexamined life is not worth living."
Writing and yoga are uniquely designed for human beings. Trees, birds and turtles are unable to perform such tasks. We need to wake up and deeply experience this Truth, this life.
To learn more about the yoga of writing and how you can begin a personal practice, click here.
Photo by Oliver Hammond via Flickr.
posted by Chintana on 10/11/2010 2:20 pm | COMMENTS (0)
View the original article here
