faith life – Frozen Spaghetti

Since October, I have been allowing the obvious words (what the folks in my restorative yoga community are sharing) surface. I have sat with them and given them space to come together to help me string together something meaningful, some way to describe what it is one might experience in the practice.

There is always the option with yoga to simply call it yoga or restorative yoga or whatever and trust the practitioner will get whatever they need to get out of it. Yet, the depth of my study in regards to the Holy Spirit – the fruits of the spirit – the divine consciousness, somatic spirituality, the way it feels when you feel and then breathe and why that works to enter into some understanding of freedom – why, if you say you follow Jesus, this practice is actually so essential – how the elements of the earth actually poetically unlock the Psalms – how the understanding of Ishwara from yoga sutra connects you so beyond beyond – I mean… it’s the stuff that cultivates your faith life.

You have a faith life.

I think that is what I am realizing more and more.

See, my restorative yoga classes are a 50 / 50 split men and women. They aren’t explicitly teaching on the fruits of the spirit nor are they outwardly “spiritual” or “witchy” in anyway. Or whatever the words are that tend to be a marketing angle or conversation for the female demographic.

The classes are about care & curiosity of the physical body, awareness of the emotional or energetic sensations in the body and becoming present. Being present. Being present.

Coming back to being present.

You know, the more I think about it, I really don’t want to get into the market of saying I know the way to experience God or that I can usher you into some divine or transcendent relationship. I know my role in life, my gifting, is to host and make safe. I have been called and equipped to be endlessly generous with care and comfort. How some people are able to build, I am able to soften. I design paths to perspective rooted in spiritual truth; trustworthy because it doesn’t know the one right way.

One of the honors in my life’s work is when I connect with people who have experienced spiritual safety in the restorative yoga or spiritual direction I offer. My entire life shifted when I realized I didn’t have to pray, emailing God and wait for a response on whether or not I would get what I asked for. Rather, my study (thank you to my teachers) and my practice and the Spirit that dwells within me activated this understanding that you always have exactly what you need.

This presence of self and this full awareness of where you are – right here, right now – this is Stoic, Yogic and Christ Consciousness, Old Testament stories give us this in rich narrative & poetry.

And you know the thing that tells us otherwise? Ads.

My rule of thumb, and I have found myself sharing this more these days for some reason – is that whenever I find myself about to Google what I need or a solution to how I feel. Whenever I feel like I need a certain treatment or need to spend to heal, I ask myself what somebody in Bible times would have done. What would the most ancient of my ancestors do with the feeling I have in my body.

Sit on a rock?

Drink some water?

Get comfortable?

Look around?

Seek higher ground?

Try to rest?

Wander the natural world seeking a sage?

Allowing the intuitive yes and no to lead me in any of these ways?

We all have a faith life. Whatever you believe is going to work to bring love (connection), peace (an evenness within) or joy (hey! wow!) is your faith. Whatever you believe will happen again tomorrow like it did today (rising moon? setting sun, anybody?) Whatever you know is the way things always work (light after darkness is a good one or the process of compost or how elements of the natural world work together) is the way things will always work.

In yoga, Ishwara is the supreme divine. It is what taught our ancient ancestors and what continues to teach us today. Ishwara is ultimate because it is the beginning and the end. We experience Ishwara when we chant OM – the literal sound of a circle as the mouth goes from Ah to Oh to Mm.

Circles are a great way to recognize where your faith. Cycle of thought or cyclical behavior not working for you? Giving you anxiety? That’s a great place to start rewiring into a new loop. Clear the mind chatter by establishing the miraculous circle of body – breath – mind – breath – body – breath – mind – breath – body – you get it.

I guess what I am trying to say is that having a faith life is not “being spiritual” or “being Christian” or “being religious”. It is being human.

SO. What do you put your faith in?

It’s Sunday morning and I’m outside by a fire in some great midwestern Feb sun, a hoodie and with a jelly jar of 2019 (our engagement year) Washington red wine.

David is walking up with some dry firewood I had stashed in my vintage (2006?) Honda from a workshop I taught back in the fall. I am breathing deep and reflecting – a lot – on Kindness, its relationship to Peace and how often we are required to call these forward because there is more LOVE in our life.

That’s right. I believe as Love increases in your life, there is a shift in how much Peace you experience.

Think about getting a puppy. More Love, less Peace. It makes sense.

Just as I write this, I notice the warm body of my blonde boy dog, Thor. Gorgeous dog, honestly who is now getting pets and ear strokes from David. Also enjoying the casual sunshine on a winter morning, we all know spring is a thing and are happy to see the world turning its way.

I believe as God gives you more Love through people and through dogs, the shift in how much Peace the external world gives you is not to make you question the Love or its meaning but to draw you inward. For what more is the spirit of Peace than the breath? The balance of alternate nostril breathing, the purification of breath of fire, the immediate effects of more oxygen in the brain from simple 3 part or 6 count inhales. I mean. Peace, I think, has always been meant to come from within.

I like to say I don’t know what I am doing with my life and I tend towards the struggle of “what’s the point and purpose” but I know how it feels to stumble upon freeing spiritual perspective and if there is one thing I can offer the world, it would be – at minimum – a sample of the truth in my life that is making navigation easier. Note: It’s not making hard things easier, it’s making the navigation of life easier. Hard things will always be hard.

My reflections this morning started as noticing how self love is God’s love and morphed into how inner peace is God’s Peace. I read Psalm 13 and replaced “Lord” with Peace and broke down the words to feel applicable: “How long, Peace – will you forget me forever? How long will you hide what you look like these days (face) from me?”

What does Peace look like these days?

There is an American Spiritual Song that references Peace “like a river” – Peace as changeable, fluid, evolving. But yet, always in the same direction – always headed for it’s bigger place. Able to carry, able to be explored. Peace can look like anything.

For me, a big part of my spiritual life is noticing how my faith in something bigger than me that gives me purpose requires me to grow and change. I think of the whole process like a plant. A little tender plant brought home from the nursery and how – no matter how long I have been gardening – I always brace myself for that first heavy rain or forceful wind. Astonished the next morning how the plant seems a little stronger because of what it weathered.

Its first full day in blazing sun where it looks parched and in desperate need of water, to then drink and seem to have grown an inch.

What are you taking in? Through your body, your senses, your heart? And how is the heat of it? The force of it? Changing you?

That growth, seems to be, an internal process based on what the plant takes in from the outside.

So what does Peace look like for you today?

And how can you use that breath – that fire – that sunshine – that ease to allow the internal processes to take in the elements of life and transform your heart?

Tag: faith life

The human experience of having a faith life.

On Peace

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