Tongue Twisted

So, this is really weird to actually type out, but the hardest thing for me during our yoga practice is keeping my tongue relaxed.  The first time I tried to do it I felt like I was going to choke, which is incredibly ironic since by relaxing my tongues I’m actually relaxing my throat and allowing my air in.  However, last class was the first time I was able to do it without it feeling completely foreign to me.  This was cool for a couple of reasons.  First, while it’s a rather small improvement, it’s still progress.  Second, it means I’m learning to relax and control the different muscles of my body.

I also struggle with biting my lip and tightening my face during the poses.  This is a bad habit I developed in high school through lifting weights for my different sports.  The coaches were always quick to push us as hard as muscles would allow, so to look relaxed was never a good thing.  Even more important is, by realizing I do this during yoga, I was able to noticed that I also do it when I’m thinking, especially when I disagree with what the teacher or student is telling me.  

I think everyone probably has some sort of physical reaction to things they don’t like to hear, but most of the time these reactions don’t do anything but antagonize the person they are talking with.  People are becoming more aware of the importance of nonverbal communication, but I would also add that if one is able to hold back the physical reaction during a dispute, one could more easily control the emotional response as well, enabling them to handle the situation more appropriately.  This is just a theory, and I’m sure it would take much more effort and practice than I am aware of; however, I think it’s a worthy goal to strive for.  

Intuition of Truth

When Friday was talking with Captain about how bad ways of understanding life become common acceptance, a lot of things ran through my mind.  The first, I'll admit, made me feel like the bad guy because my initial thought was, if she's arguing that people believe what they do blindly because that is simply what their parents and society has taught them, does she ever question her own beliefs?  After all, she was taught her lifestyle and worldly view by someone else.  It wasn't a stance that she came to on her own.  I wondered if, based on her own argument, that fact ever made her ask the question, "is what I believe really the truth?"  But how are we to answer such a question in an age when truth has now become subjective? 

I've often asked this question of myself when it came to my own faith in Christianity.  I've wondered if I simply believe what I do because it has been engrained into to my thought process since birth, and if the story is the same for one of my Muslim or Hindu friends.  If this proposition is correct, then what is the source of truth?  Can something as absolute as truth truely be subjective?  In some instances Friday seems to suggest that it is, such as when she tries to get the Captain to see that just because he deams the pen as a pen doesn't necessarily mean that is its function for everyone.  However, she adamantly proclaims her worldview as truth because there is something inside of her that tells her it is.  She uses that same intuition with the Captain when she asks him if he innately knows that drinking as he did was wrong.

I feel the same about my faith.  I read a book last year called "Blue Like Jazz" (which I highly recommend to anyone), and in it there's a chapter named "Penguin Sex".  Yep, penguin sex.  In it the author, Donald Miller, describes how mother penguins leave their eggs behind for months, and somehow, depsite being miles out in the ocean, they always come back in the week, if not the day, their baby hatches.  How is such a thing possible?  So far, it's not, scientifically speaking.  Miller describes the phenomenon as the mother penguin "just knowing", and that is enough explanation for him because it is how he now views his faith.  After years of struggling with his faith for academic reasons and questions of conditioning through his childhood, he now separates all of it and says he just knows.

Falty Seeds

I had a real problem with the whole seed thing.  I know we haven’t talked about karma yet in class, which means I’m basically arguing with a fictional character.  Despite this, I find a gaping hole in Friday’s explanation of why good or bad things happen to people.  Reading her defense was like a rollercoaster ride for me.  First, I disagreed, but was curiously as to where she was going with it.  Then, when she explained to the Captain how when the Sergeant lies for money, he isn’t really getting the money because of the lie but because of a previous good he has done.  I really liked that idea.  For one, it explains fairly well why good things happen to bad people.  I can except the idea that even bad people do good things at time, and that perhaps they deserves what they receive presently because of past actions.  I might also like it because it means that one day those bad people will be punished for what they are currently doing.  It was when Friday said that every bad event inflicted upon a person happens because they have done a similar action to someone else that she lost me.  There are just instances where that makes NO sense to me.

Let’s use the example given in the book.  The Sergeant’s little boy is burned to the point of deformity in at least one third of his body if not more, seemingly as a result to his father’s stupidity and drunken stupor.  If we were to follow Friday’s explanation, the little boy’s deformity is due to his own actions.  So I am to believe that this boy, who can’t be older than ten, somehow damaged another person through fire in his young life?  I know it’s just a story, but if this is really the true philosophy of yoga, and others really do believe this theory, I don’t see how they can justify certain circumstances

Stretching in More than One Direction

I am a very prideful person.  As much as I hate to admit it, I don’t like when I’m not good at something.  So, something this class has been teaching me is to laugh at myself.  No I can’t bend all the way forward or backward in any of the poses we do in class, but so what?  At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter all that much.  What matters is working towards being more flexible and less stressed, and let’s face it, me trying to do a shoulder stand is a pretty hilarious site, so why not enjoy it?  It’s a lesson I plan on taking with me outside this yoga class.  I think I take myself too seriously sometimes, even life to seriously at times.  Don’t get me wrong.  I know we only have this one life to live, and that it’s very important to remember that and make the most out of every day we’re blessed to have on this earth.  However, what’s the point of striving towards a goal if you’re not having fun along the way?  I’ve heard it said by more than one successful person that the journey to get to their dream was the actual adventure. 

Not to mention there’s something to be said about failure to achieve that goal or that dream the first time around.  Every time I can’t do a certain pose in class it humbles me, but it also gives me a new goal to reach and a desire to reach that goal.  I wouldn’t be able to get excited about or appreciate the ability to touch my toes if I was able to do it before.  It seems small, but big lessons can be learned from small things.

Wall Staring

I really connected with Friday's explanation of focus to the Captain, probably because that's something I really struggle with.  Yes, it's true I have ADD, but doesn't everyone these days? I feel like everyone says they do at least.  More than that though is my generational habit of multi-tasking that has insidiously crossed over into the way I think.  Even when I try not to, I am constantly bombarded by outside thoughts while I'm attempting to do something.  If I'm in class, I find myself thinking about my class after it or even the homework that's due the next day.  If I'm cleaning my room (which is a rare occurence, but we'll just use it for explanation's sake), then I'm thinking about emails I need to send or meetings I need to set up.  Even while I was reading this book, I was thinking about what would go in my blog for the day.  I can't remember the last time I gave all my attention to one particular thing.

When Friday told the Captain that those who are able to focus are not only better at their jobs, but they are also happier, I remembered in an article we read freshmen year during Examined Life there was an author encouraging the same concept.  He stated that there is no such thing as "mental exhaustion", that our minds are not capable of feeling physical fatigue.  However, we do fill it constantly and with pointless information, as Friday also points out.  The author suggested that if we as students would simply focus on the task at hand, it would relieve much of the exhaustion and stress we feel and enable us to improve in our studies. 

My question is, how is this accomplished, and is it even a realistic goal in today's world of multi-tasking?  Focusing on the wall might work for yoga, but it does not exactly help me when I need to be absorbed in my studies.