What Makes Up A Foundation of Hope? (mostly the blessings & music) April 28, 2024
Posted by ajoyfulpractice in Baha'i, Bhakti, Changing Perspectives, Donate, Faith, Healing Stories, Hope, Karma Yoga, Lent / Great Lent, Life, Love, Music, Mysticism, One Hoop, Pain, Passover, Peace, Philosophy, Religion, Riḍván, Suffering, Tragedy, Volunteer, Wisdom, Yoga.Tags: Ari Levine, Bruno Mars, Counting the Omer, Dr. Viktor Frankl, Great Lent, Matisyahu, Matthew Miller, Palm Sunday, Passover, Philip Lawrence, Riḍván, Ridvan
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Many blessings to everyone, and especially to anyone observing Great Lent (& Palm Sunday)! “Chag Sameach!” to everyone celebrating Passover and/or Counting the Omer! “Happy Riḍván!” to those celebrating “the Most Great Festival.” Happy National Poetry Month!
“Sometimes in my tears I drown
But I never let it get me down
So when negativity surrounds
I know someday, it’ll all turn around because
All my life, I’ve been waitin’ for
I’ve been prayin’ for, for the people to say
That we don’t wanna fight no more
There’ll be no more wars, and our children will play
One day (one day), one day (one day)”
— quoted from the song “One Day” by Matisyahu (written by Bruno Mars / Philip Lawrence / Ari Levine / Matthew Miller)
Please join me for a 65-minute virtual yoga practice on Zoom today (Sunday, April 28th) at 2:30 PM. Use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or by emailing myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Sunday’s playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify. [Look for “04242024 PRGL Stories”]
MUSIC NOTE: I slightly changed this playlist, but the remix does not affect the overall timing of the class music. Again, the before/after music is slightly different since I could not find “Oneness” on Spotify.
“A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth—that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which a man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of human is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for the brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when a man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way—an honorable way—in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment.”
— quoted from “I. Experiences in a Concentration Camp” (pgs. 35-36) in Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es).
You can still click here to Kiss My Asana Now! (Or, you can also click here to join my team and get people to kiss [your] asana!)
Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
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Going Forth With Peace and Power (mostly the music and links) April 10, 2022
Posted by ajoyfulpractice in Bhakti, Faith, Hope, Lent / Great Lent, Music, Peace, Religion, Suffering, Wisdom, Yoga.Tags: Anne Lamott, Chaitra Navaratri, Delores Huerta, Palm Sunday, Pope Francis, Ram Navami
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Many blessings to all, and especially to those celebrating Chaitra Navaratri and Ram Navami or Palm Sunday or observing Great Lent! “Ramadān Mubarak, Blessed Ramadān!” to anyone who was observing the holy month of Ramadān.
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“Jesus shows us how to face moments of difficulty and the most insidious of temptations by preserving in our hearts a peace that is neither detachment nor superhuman impassivity, but confident abandonment to the Father and to his saving will, bestows life and mercy.”
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– quoted from 2019 Palm Sunday homily by Pope Francis
Please join me for a 65-minute virtual yoga practice on Zoom today (Sunday, April 10th) at 2:30 PM. You can use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or (for a slightly faster reply) you can email me at myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Sunday’s is available on YouTube and Spotify. [Look for “Palm Sunday”]
Check out this Palm Sunday post from 2019 or, if you’re more interested in today’s date, check out these posts about Delores Huerta (born today in 1930) and Anne Lamott (born today in 1954).
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
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Down the Rabbit Hole, on April 12th April 12, 2020
Posted by ajoyfulpractice in 7-Day Challenge, Abhyasa, Art, Bhakti, Books, Buddhism, Changing Perspectives, Depression, Donate, Faith, Fitness, Gratitude, Healing Stories, Health, Hope, Karma Yoga, Lent / Great Lent, Life, Loss, Love, Meditation, Music, Mysticism, One Hoop, Pain, Passover, Peace, Philosophy, Poetry, Religion, Science, Suffering, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Vairagya, Wisdom, Writing.Tags: asana, Bhagavad Gita, COVID-19, Easter, Erwin Schrödinger, Eugene Wigner, Exodus, John 3:16, KISS MY ASANA, Palm Sunday, Passover, quantum mechanics, Sarah Kendzior, Shemot, yin tang, Yin Yoga, yoga
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PLEASE NOTE: This post involves a theoretical discussion on non-COVID related death.”
“People ask me how I find hope. I answer that I don’t believe in hope, and I don’t believe in hopelessness. I believe in compassion and pragmatism, in doing what is right for its own sake. Hope can be lethal when you are fighting an autocracy because hope is inextricable from time. An enduring strategy of autocrats is to simply run out the clock.”
– from Hiding in Plain Sight by Sarah Kendzior
“As spring is nature’s season of hope, so Easter is the Church’s season of hope. Hope is an active virtue. It’s more than wishful thinking….. My hope in the Resurrection is not an idle hope like wishing for good weather but an active hope. It requires something on my part – work. Salvation is a gift from God for which I hope, but Saint Paul told the Philippians to ‘work out your salvation with fear and trembling’ (2:12). My hope in the resurrection and eternal life in heaven requires work on my part.”
– from A Year of Daily Offerings by Rev. James Kubicki
Serendipitously, I received two texts from the same Austin suburb last night. One was from a friend, sharing the quote above. The other was from my brother, asking why people were celebrating the same thing at different times. The quote sharpened my focus. The question brings me to you.
Even though he didn’t ask the question in an all encompassing way, I am going to answer his question here in a broader sense, and in a pretty basic way. On Sunday, April 12th, Western Christians are celebrating Easter, Orthodox Christians are celebrating Palm Sunday (the Sunday before Easter), the Jewish community is observing Passover and there are some people in the world celebrating both Easter (or Palm Sunday) and Passover. When you consider that this observations and celebrations are occurring all over the world – and keep in mind different time zone – it can get really confusing. Hence my brothers question.
As you remember, Passover is a commemoration of the Exodus story, which is the story of the Jewish people being freed from slavery in Egypt. The Jewish liturgical calendar is lunar-based and therefore Passover happens at a slightly different time each year on the Gregorian (i.e., secular) calendar. According to all four canonical Gospels of the New Testament, Jesus spent the last week of his life preparing for Passover (and what he knew was coming in terms of the Crucifixion and Resurrection). Three of the four indicate that what Christians (and artists) refer to as the “Last Supper” was actually a Passover Seder – so we are back to a lunar calendar, although it’s a different lunar calendar. Orthodox Christians operate under the old-school Julian calendar, so now we have a third timeline.
Just to add a little spice to the mix, consider that, dogmatically speaking, the concept of a Messiah originates within Judaism and includes specific qualifications for how the Messiah would be identified. According to the Christian paradigm, Jesus meets the qualifications. According to most Jews, he does not. Most modern Christians focus exclusively on the New Testament and observe holy times accordingly. Some Christians, however, also follow the observations commanded in Deuteronomy and Leviticus.
Got it? Be honest. If you need a scorecard, I’m happy to provide one – especially since I’m about to go down the (metaphorical) rabbit hole.
Whenever I think about Easter, the waiting that happens on the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter, and the moment when the rock is rolled away to reveal the empty tomb, I think of one thing: Wigner’s friend taking care of Schrödinger’s Cat.
For those of you not familiar with physicist Erwin Schrödinger’s thought experiment (or paradox), it goes like this. The (imaginary) cat is closed up in a box with an unstable radioactive element that has a 50-50 chance of killing the cat before the box is opened. According to quantum mechanics, there is a moment when the cat is simultaneously alive and dead. This is called superposition and it could be considered the scientific equivalent of non-duality. When the box is opened, revealing the state of the cat, the superposition collapses into a single reality. (There is also the possibility that opening the box changes the percentage, but that’s a whole different tunnel.)
Physicist Eugene Wigner took things a bit farther by adding a friend. According to the Wigner’s thought experiment, instead of doing the experiment, the scientist leaves it all in the hands of a friend and waits for a report. Now, there is the superposition inside of the box and there is a separate superposition inside the lab, which means the wave (or superposition) collapses into a single reality when the box is opened (creating reality as the friend knows it) and collapses again when the (imaginary) friend reports to the scientist (establishing the original scientist’s reality). Let’s not even get into what happens if the friend opens the box and leaves the lab without reporting back to the original scientist, but has a certain expectation – i.e., understanding of reality – about what the scientist will find in the lab. Through it all, the cat exists (and ceases to exist) within its own reality. It never experiences the superposition others experience. It just is.
That state of being, existing, takes us back to Passover, and eventually to the Resurrection of Jesus.
“’And know also, Arjuna, that as the Divinity in all creatures and all nature, I am birthless and deathless. And yet, from time to time I manifest Myself in worldly form and live what seems an earthly life. I may appear human but that is only my “mya” (power of illusion), because in truth I am beyond humankind; I just consort with nature, which is Mine.’”
– The Bhagavid Gita: A Walkthrough for Westerners (4:6), by Jack Hawley
“And He said, ‘For I will be with you, and this is the sign for you that it was I Who sent you. When you take the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.’”
– Shemot / Exodus 3:12
“God said to Moses, ‘Ehyeh asher ehyeh (I will be what I will be),’ and He said, ‘So shall you say to the children of Israel, “Ehyeh (I will be) has sent me to you.’””
– Shemot / Exodus 3:14
In the Exodus story, the Jewish people are slaves in Egypt and G-d commands Moses to go to Pharaoh and demand they be released. Moses takes his brother Aaron along and then, when their show of power doesn’t convince Pharaoh of the authority of G-d, everyone is subject to nine plagues: blood, frogs, lice, wild beasts in the streets, pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, and day(s) of darkness. Remember it’s not only Pharaoh and the Egyptians who suffer. The Jews, who are already suffering the hardship of slavery, also have to endure these additional hardships. On the evening of the tenth plague, the death of the first born male child, the Jewish families are told they are to smear lambs blood on their doors – so their households will be passed over. They are also commanded to celebrate and give thanks for their freedom – even though they are still slaves.
Yes, it is a little mind boggling, but what passes as the first Passover Seder happens in Egypt and during a time of slavery. Considering Pharaoh had changed his mind before, they had no way of knowing (with any certainty) that they would be freed immediately after the tenth plague. See where this is going? In that moment, the Jewish people are simultaneously free and not free.
Furthermore, Rabbi David Fohrman, quoting Shlomo Yitzchaki, the medieval French rabbi known as Rashi, points out that when G-d initial speaks to Moses and Moses asks for G-d’s identity, Moses is told three times that the One who speaks is the One who will be with Moses and the Jewish people always. Regardless of what they are experiencing, Rashi explains, G-d will be with them. This is the very definition of compassion, which literally means “to suffer with.”
“’Whenever goodness and “dharma” (right action) weaken and evil grows stronger, I make Myself a body. I do this to uplift and transform society, reestablish the balance of goodness over wickedness, explain the sublime plan and purpose of life, and serve as the model for others to follow. I come age after age in times of spiritual and moral crisis for this purpose.’”
– The Bhagavid Gita: A Walkthrough for Westerners (4:7-8), by Jack Hawley
Jesus (during his time), and future Christians, are kind of in the same boat. In the last week of his life, he is betrayed, crucified, dead, buried, and resurrected – and he simultaneously is not. However, most of that is semantics. What is critical is the dead/buried, and resurrected part. In those moments, even right after the tomb is opened and there is some confusion about what has happened, Jesus is essentially Schrödinger’s Cat – and Christians, as well as non-believers, are either the original scientist or the friend.
Yet, when everything is said and done (stay with me here), this is all head stuff. What people are observing, commemorating, and/or celebrating right now, isn’t really about the head. Faith never is. It’s all about the heart. It’s all about love. Specifically, in these examples, it all comes back to G-d’s love expressed as compassion.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
– John 3:16 (NIV)
“’Strange? Yes. It is difficult for most people to comprehend that the Supreme Divinity is actually moving about in human form. But for those few who dare to learn the secret that is I, Divinity, who is the Operator within them, their own Self, My coming in human form is a rare opportunity to free themselves from the erroneous belief that they are their bodies.’”
– The Bhagavid Gita: A Walkthrough for Westerners (4:9), by Jack Hawley
Please join me today (April 12th) for my first every Easter Sunday service/practice, 2:30 PM – 3:35 PM, on Zoom. Some of the new security protocols are definitely kicking in so, please use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems. The playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify.
If you are following the Orthodox Christian calendar and would like a recording of last week’s classes, please comment or email me.
If you are interested in combining a physical practice (yoga or weightlifting) with the Counting of the Omer, you can purchase a copy of Marcus J. Freed’s The Kabbalh Sutras: 49 Steps to Enlightenment.
A LITTLE YIN… & A LOTTA YANG
For more ways you can practice pragmatism and self-compassion, please join me and a special guest for “Lung Health and How We Cope Right Now ((viewing COVID-19 through Traditional Chinese Medicine and YIN Yoga),” a discussion on the importance of the lungs in our overall wellbeing as well as how to just friggin’ cope right now. The conversation will include a brief overview of Traditional Chinese Medicine and YIN Yoga, as well as a brief Q&A followed by a little YIN Yoga.
If you are struggling with your physical or mental health, if you’ve always been curious about “alternative” medicine, and/or if you are missing your yoga practice, this special one hour event is for you. Please join us on YouTube, Wednesday, April 15th, 3:00 PM to 4:00 PM,
Also, mark your calendar for April 25th – the beginning of Kiss My Asana!
Speaking of Kiss My Asana…
Founded by Matthew Sanford, Mind Body Solutions helps those who have experienced trauma, loss, and disability find new ways to live by integrating both mind and body. They provide classes, workshops, and outreach programs. They also train yoga teachers and offer highly specialized training for health care professionals. This year’s yogathon is only a week long. Seven days, at the end of the month, to do yoga, share yoga, and help others. By participating in the Kiss My Asana yogathon you join a global movement, but in a personal way. In other words, you practice yoga… for 7 days.
Kissing My Asana is pragmatic and compassionate!
You don’t need to wait until the end of the month, however, to consider how you might participate. Start thinking now about how you can add 5 minutes of yoga (or meditation) to your day, how you can learn something new about your practice, or even how you would teach a pose to someone close to you – or even to one of your Master Teachers/Precious Jewels.
To give you some ideas, consider that in past years my KMA offerings have included donation-based classes and (sometimes) daily postings. Check out one of my previous offerings dated April 12th (or thereabouts):
30 Poses in 30 Days (scroll down to see April 12th)
A Musical Preview (scroll down to see March 12th)
A Preview of the April 12th Practice
AMEN, SELAH ###
PASSION & PEACE: 2019 Kiss My Asana Offering #14 April 15, 2019
Posted by ajoyfulpractice in Lent / Great Lent, Religion.Tags: Forward Fold, Jasna's Yoga, KISS MY ASANA, Mind Body Solutions, Palm Sunday, Passion of the Christ, Passion Sunday, Passion Week, Uttanasana
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The (slightly belated) “practice preview” below is part of my offering for the 2019 Kiss My Asana yogathon. I encourage you to set aside at least 5 minutes a day during April, to practice with today’s theme or concept as inspiration. You can practice in a class or on your own, but since the Kiss My Asana yogathon raises resources as well as awareness, I invite you to join me at a donation-based class on April 27th or May 4th.
I also challenge you to set aside a certain amount every day that you practice with this concept/theme in mind. It doesn’t matter if you set aside one dollar per practice or $25 – set aside that amount each time you practice and donate it by April 30th.
Founded by Matthew Sanford, Mind Body Solutions helps those who have experienced trauma, loss, and disability find new ways to live by integrating both mind and body. They provide classes, workshops, and outreach programs. They also train yoga teachers and offer highly specialized training for health care professionals. By participating in the Kiss My Asana yogathon you join a global movement, but in a personal way. In other words, you practice yoga. Or, as this year’s tag line states…
do yoga. share yoga. help others.
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Om
sahana vavatu
sahano bhunaktu
Saha viryam karavavahai
Tejasvi navaditamastu
Ma vidvishavahai
Om shanti shanti shantih.
Conscious, subconscious, and unconscious mind /
on every plane of existence
May we be protected
May we be nourished
May we work together with great energy
May our study together be brilliant and effective
May we not hate or dispute with one another
On every plane of existence peace (within us), peace (all around us),
peace (to and from everything we encounter)
– Teaching Peace Chant (translation courtesy of Richard Freeman)
“Let us go forth in peace.”
– Final instruction in the Divine Liturgy
In many yoga traditions, the physical practice begins and ends with a chant or mantra. There are mantras that trace the teaching lineage of the tradition as well as a mantra that honors Patanjali, the author of the Yoga Sutra. Because of the way they end, several mantras are referred to as a şantipat. Pronounced “shanti,” the first root word means peace. It is not uncommon for people to think that the last part (pronounced “pot”) means path – and as it establishes how you want to move forward you could consider it your way or path. However, pat means “falling” or “going,” and these types of mantras are usually translated as “the falling down of peace.” They could also be translated as “going in peace” – which mirrors the final instruction in the Divine Liturgy and one of the last things stated before the Procession of the Palms in some Palm Sunday services.
In the Western Christian tradition, Sunday, April 14th marks the end of the Lenten Season and the beginning of Holy Week. Palm Sunday, also known as Passion Sunday or the Second Sunday of the Passion, is the Sunday before Easter Sunday. It is a time when Christians are getting ready to commemorate the last days of Jesus, the crucifixion, and the resurrection: in other words, the Passion of the Christ.
Passion (noun): 1. [mass noun] strong and barely controllable emotion; 1.2 intense sexual love; 1.3 [in singular] an intense desire or enthusiasm for something; 2. (the Passion) The suffering and death of Jesus.
Origin: Middle English: from Old French; from late Latin passio(n-), from Latin pati- “suffer”
– from Oxford Dictionaries
All four (4) canonical Gospels in the Christian New Testament refer to Jesus returning to Jerusalem, for an observation of Passover. Remember, historically speaking, Jesus was a rabbi focused on getting his Jewish community to be better and more devout Jews. So, he comes home for Passover, but he does so in a way that is quite memorable and jubilant. He rides in on the back of a donkey, a symbol of peace (as oppose to riding in on a horse, which would be seen as a symbol of conquest or war). As he enters the city, it says people welcome him and honor him by laying down palm fronds and sometimes their coats in the middle of the road. (And all of this happens after he raises Lazarus from the dead.)
As part of a Palm Sunday service, Christians will display palms throughout the church and have a Procession of the Palms. Children wave the palms. Similar branches will be used in areas where it is hard to come by palms – leading the day to be called “Yew Sunday” or “Branch Sunday.” The palms waved on Palm Sunday will be burned down to ashes, blessed, and then the ashes will be used for the following year’s Ash Wednesday observations – which kick off the Lenten Season.
Theologically speaking, Jesus was aware of his destiny: the temptation, betrayal, and suffering that would all lead to his crucifixion and resurrection – all intended to usher in an era of peace. He attempts to prepare his disciples for what’s to come, but they are not prepared to go forward in peace, at least not in the way the faithful may be prepared today.
“Jesus shows us how to face moments of difficulty and the most insidious of temptations by preserving in our hearts a peace that is neither detachment nor superhuman impassivity, but confident abandonment to the Father and to his saving will, bestows life and mercy.”
– excerpt from 2019 Palm Sunday homily by Pope Francis
When referring to Jesus’s return to Jerusalem, many Christians will refer to his “triumphant” return. In his 2019 Palm Sunday homily, however, Pope Francis focuses on Jesus’s humility and his ability to surrender to God’s will. Pope Francis said, “He shows us this kind of abandonment by spurning, at every point in his earthly ministry, the temptation to do things his way and not in complete obedience to the Father.”
Even if one is not Christian, there is a lesson in this message and an opportunity for svadyaya (self-study). Consider how you show up when you are challenged and/or things aren’t going your way. Do you show up in a way that alleviates suffering or in a way that creates more suffering?
Eastern philosophies, like yoga and Buddhism, view suffering as imbalance in the natural state of being (yoga and Taoism) and/or the result of attachment to (craving / desire for) a particular outcome (yoga and Buddhism). We all want things to go “our way” and yet more often than not things go in a different way. If we can’t let go of “our way,” we suffer. To find balance and to alleviate suffering, one must detach and practice non-attachment until it becomes a habit.
But, let’s get back to that experience of peace.
“So the redeemed of the LORD will return and enter Zion with singing, crowned with unending joy. Joy and gladness will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee.”
– Isaiah 51:11, Berean Study Bible
“From an attitude of contentment (santosha), unexcelled happiness, mental comfort, joy, and satisfaction is obtained.”
– Yoga Sutra 2.42
Isaiah is considered the first of the “Latter Prophets” in the Hebrew Bible and the first of the “Major Prophets” in the Christian Old Testament. Much of the “Book of Isaiah” contains details about what people can expect from and how they can recognize the Messiah or Savior. For Christians, Jesus fits the criteria and, therefore, brings them joy and peace now and in the hereafter. (Isaiah 51:11 and 52:7) It is not only a message that is brought; he also brings salvation (or the promise of salvation).
Consider, for a moment, how much easier life is if the hard stuff is being surrendered to a higher power.
In the second section of the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali also talks of peace and joy. He particularly indicates that if someone diligently practices the external restraint (yama) of non-harming (ahimsa) then the people around them will give up hostilities (YS 2.35). Furthermore, he states that practicing the internal observation (niyama) of contentment (santosha) then “unexcelled, happiness, mental comfort, joy, and satisfaction.” (YS 2.42)
Consider, for a moment, what happens if you accept what is in the moment and surrender everything to the moment.
FEATURED POSE for April 14th: Forward Fold Pose (Uttanasana)
Palm Tree Breathing is a sequence of poses from Jasna’s Yoga that I include in certain practices; sometimes for physical and energetic reasons, sometimes for symbolic and emotional reasons, sometimes for all of the above. The sequence consists of two (2) poses in repetition – Mountain Pose (on the toes variation) (Tadasana) and Forward Fold Pose (Uttanasana). Both poses require strong core engagement (locks or bandhas), strong foundation engagement (asana), and balance, combined with breath awareness (pranayama). While the sequence can be modified by keeping the heels on the ground during the Mountain Pose, finding ease and stability in the Forward Fold is a critical element – and one that is often overlooked or taken for granted.
Standing in Mountain Pose, with feet together or slightly apart, focus on balancing the weight and standing up tall. (Remember, this is also Equal Standing.) Spread the big toes and little toes wide in order to start activating the arches and stabilize the ankles. Squeeze the legs towards one another and spiral the outer thighs in towards your mid-line. Squeezing a block, small book, or small ball between your legs encourages adduction and internal rotation. Use the quadriceps to lift the knee caps up, so that the thighs are firm; lift the pelvic bones up so that the sits bones drop down; squeeze the perineum muscles together and up (like you’re trying not to go to the bathroom); draw the belly button up and back; and the shoulders.
Inhale deeply and – with hands on hips – hinge from the waist as you exhale. Inhale, look up and lengthen so that you are in the Half Lift position (see yesterday’s post). Place your hands on your thighs or bend your knees and place your palms on your thighs. Spend a few breaths in the half lift position in order to find the flattest back position possible – even if that means the knees are bent.
Now, if it’s accessible, places your hands on a floor or a block – so you have closed-chain engagement and, therefore more control over accessing your muscles. If placing your hands lower causes you to round your spine, bring the hands back to the thighs and use the legs as a prop. Keeping the back flat and the core engaged, start to hinge or fold from the hips. See if you can bring your hands flat to the floor or the block without your low back rounding. (Remember: Low back issues, unregulated blood pressure, eye issues like glaucoma, and certain types of osteoarthritis are reasons to stay in the Flat Back position.)
Keep your weight balanced between hands and feet, arms and legs. You want dynamic tension that pushes your hips and ribs away from each other. After a few breaths, bend your knees, let your chest rest on your thighs, but maintain the core and foundational engagement. Release the arms, but keep the feet, legs, and core strong. While you surround your upper body to your lower body, let something roll of your back, something that no longer serves you. Or, let go of something you know. Or something you want but aren’t getting. If you are in the Half Lift position, whatever you are releasing rolls off when you stand up.
Either roll up, one vertebra, or inhale to a Half Lift and then lift the whole torso up on the next inhale.
If you want to move through Palm Tree Breathing, inhale your arms up for Mountain Pose. Again, make sure everything is strongly engaged. Use a block if you want to strengthen your adductors. Stay on your heels or roll up to your tip toes. Keep your eyes on something that’s not moving. As you exhale, lower the heels, hinge from your hips and fold. At the end of your breath, your heart will rest on your thighs. Inhale and reverse swan dive, maybe lifting the heels as you go, but definitely straightening the knees and rolling up one vertebra at a time until arms are overhead. Exhale and repeat at least 3 – 5 times. Finish with an inhale to Mountain Pose.
A Joyful Practice 