Thursday, April 4, 2013

April Fool's Day


   The Musing of a Fool:The Pause & Beginner's Mind








Are you reading for your own awakening?  Every year as the days start to lengthen and the sun shines a little warmer, I can feel the urgency within me seeking .... something.  This Spring is no different, and I am amazingly experiencing this so differently that it feels like a whole new me.
 Let's start with the 'PAUSE', shall we? 
 That precious and exhilarating moment of waiting just as your legs crouch down and get ready to leap, the pause is about gathering in your breath, taking in the landscape around you and putting your intuitive strength of spirit on notice...now is the time for AWAKENING! 
Sometimes all this motivation and heavy breathing can get the best of us before we actually know what is happening.  This is where the notion of Beginner's Mind comes in; and for all you yogis and yoginis out there, I suspect you know right where this beginner's pause is leading.

Several years ago I began a consistent yoga practice, as opposed to the occasional stretch with a video in my living room or full-moon meditation at the spa, and oddly (just to me really) I chose Bikram Yoga as my entry into the practice.  For those of you not personally acquainted with this form of yoga, it is a 90 minute, 26 pose, 105 degree dance with self every time you enter the room.  For me, the dance was particularly inspiring (she says with tongue in cheek) because of my level of general fitness(or lack thereof) and overall intense need to analyze every moment of stretch as it arises.  I had challenged myself (and won btw) to two 30 Day challenges, almost gotten my nose to my toes and in fact, touched my head to the ground in a backward bend.  So you can imagine how pleased with myself I was when I mentioned to my yoga teacher that I had some goals to reach in my daily practice.  She immediately giggled as if I must be joking, and with a prolonged looked that eventually shared her understanding that I was obviously not joking, she asserted,
"you get that yoga isn't about goals right?"  
I most certainly didn't get that, and said as much, and her next statement, literally set me free!...this is the kind of truth we are all seeking, but generally don't hear even when it hits us over the head with a two-by-four..."yoga is just about showing up in the room, about being fully your best in every moment of your practice...as that moment appears...and then letting the moment pass'.( I'm pretty sure she said something wonderful just like this, but time has turned it into these words as the meaning has emerged for me.)
How is that concept even real? 
I almost felt like it was an attempt at a poor planner's way of getting away with doing nothing.  But that day as I entered the room, as if for the first time, I came to understand the truth
of Beginner's Mind.  Rather than psyching myself up for all that is possible, mentally stringing together each step I will take and filling my otherwise stuffed mind with more plans to be perfect by the time I die, I simply took a very deep breath(the Pause both literally and figuratively), emptied my mind of everything that was coming unbidden to presuppose it knew better than my own innate sense of intuition and stepped into the best ongoing meditation I have ever ventured into. (read as, this is a practice and discipline that is now my best form of meditation in every waking moment of my own daily living.)
There is nothing that knows me better than trusting to my own divine guidance, opening myself to the very moment of inspiration as it appears, allowing the space to evolve and act upon new information at the very moment it becomes real to me. This space of being willing to put down the 'should have dones', the 'could have beens' or the 'supposed to be's' is the most freeing moment of putting down baggage...like the fool stepping out onto a truly joyous journey, there is no baggage to carry when we expect the moment and divinity of life to show up perfectly to support our path.  There is no goal to set, when I remain true to the very demanding calling for authenticity and authoring of self in each moment with a beautifully opened and divinely attuned Beginner's Mind.
Listen, can you hear the beckon of the Spring?
 Take a deep breath my friend, clear your mind and get ready for the ride!

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