Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Wednesday

Wednesday is kind of a day off down here. Many people have left the property to go on tours and so forth but I decided to stay put, relax, work some on my book project, and practice later. It is always one of my favorite things to do on retreats is to be at the retreat center when not everyone is around. It is so mellow. Usually John does a small practice and that is always fun. By the time I ever get on one of these retreats, I have been so busy leading up to it that all I want to do is rest bit and not be on a strict schedule.

Yesterday was a great day. The days on retreat have a simliar kind of routine. Backbends and active practice in the morning and philosophy, pranayama and forward bends in the afternoon. No major news other than my hip thing which had been going on due to a spasm in the psoas is now clear. (Even John was impressed I cleared it so quickly.) And I find it awesome that it cleared in the midst of the crazy poses we have been doing! Like "I cleared my psoas in scorpion pose!" Anyway it is a simple formula we all know works- adjust the inner body, align the outer body, bring the inner spiral up into the kidneys and then add outer spiral and organic energy and voila- the psoas is clear.

The other thing that really stood out for me yesterday was the importance of keeping our inner monologue disciplined. One thing about John is that he is relentlessly affirming. He talked a lot about how important it is to assert one's Highest Context even in the midst of dealing with relative details of "what is". I wrote about this some in my book but the idea of accepting "what is" is very multi leveled. There is the immediate what is of our life circumstances. But as tantric practioners we are also interested in seeing another level of "what is". That which is true, "What is" at the level of the absolute. We have to straddle both worlds so when the details of our life are difficult we do not lose sight of the other level of truth that is not problematic. For instance, so many times we are careful about what we eat but not at all careful about what messages we feed ourselves. I got very re-inspired about this level of practice from the day yesterday. More on this later.

Make a great day.

2 comments:

Jeremiah Wallace said...

"We have to straddle both worlds so when the details of our life are difficult we do not lose sight of the other level of truth that is not problematic." Love it. Love you. Love your blog. I wrote a little entry about that kind of thing recently and about negative connotations I've put on things that aren't really bad. ENJOY your retreat!

Leanne said...

I can say it and believe it-but it is OH so hard to practice somedays...it's like the "details" are this black glutinous sticky ooze that just adhears itself to you-its tenacious grip becomes so emcompassing that you can't move forward. It's so easy to just stay wallowing in the muck. (hmmm- Spiderman 3's plot now makes a lot more sense...)