dailydatewithgod

So much of our survival skills are slated to keep an eye on what is wrong.  It is a much-needed survival mechanism to be able to detect problems and prevent possible danger. Given that we live in a world where our very survival is much less under threat, this inclination to focus on the wrong and the bad gets misplaced. It is still built into our psyche and I am grateful that it is but when we find ourselves turning it inward it can become harmful.  Just a few days ago when I was in yoga class, I could hear the conversation in my head about how I wasn’t doing the pose right or the best way possible.  So much for practicing something towards peace of mind.  My mind was busy beating me up.  Yet in a moment of breath, I heard an alternative in the form of some questions:  “What if what I am doing is correct?  What if how I am going about this class is precisely the way I am meant to participate in it today?” Now I got why in class there is always a reminder to stay with the breath in our movements.  It was the breath that activated the space in my heart to provide an alternative to my mind’s perspective.  It was the breath that gave me enough pause to ask a question and explore other perspectives. My doing it precisely the way the teacher set up the exercise and the way the other students were doing it had no bearing on my survival.  My mind was simply doing what it knows how to do.  The heart can engage a different conversation and present options.  It is not an either-or thing, sometimes it is fitting to hold the space for both to be true but harassing myself is hardly the way to go about it. So I took another breath and decided that how I was practicing in yoga class was precisely as it was meant to be in that moment.  Sure, I could go harder and stronger but bludgeoning myself into submission was not the way to get there. And I did find myself able to go past what my mind had decided I was capable of, but first needed to be where I was.  I needed the moment I was in to be precisely as it was meant to be.