The Columbia City Yoga on-line Moving into Meditation class met this morning.  We continued exploring life as a sacred journey.  Today our breath was our companion and guide.  We explored oscillating patterns of breathing and movement.  The underwater world of seaweed was a metaphor for how we can remain rooted and also give ourselves over to undulation, flow and a deep sense of allowing – even that which is painful.  In saying yes to life we value and revere the lives we’ve loved and lost.

This week’s meditation was greatly inspired by Valerie Brown’s Kosmos Journal essay, Hope Leans Forward | The Body as Grounded Wisdom,  The essay was reprinted from Valerie’s book, Hope Leans Forward:  Braving Your Way Toward Simplicity, Awakening and Peace. Valerie is a meditation teacher ordained in the order of Thich Nhat Hanh.   She leads an annual pilgrimage to El Camino de Santiago, Spain to celebrate the power of sacred place.  You can find her essays, guided meditations and videos on her web-site. Valerie Brown studied Donna Farhi’s teaching on how to free the breath and the mind.

We also heard insights from meditation and yoga instructor, Donna Farsi. Her Yoga International article How Breath Awareness Will Change Your Life. Donna has been teaching yoga informed movement for over forty years.  She is author of several books including the Breathing Book.  This essay is a beautiful example of her skill in bringing meditation and movement together.  Valerie Brown studied Donna’s teaching on how to free the breath and the mind.

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The Columbia City Yoga on-line Moving into Meditation class tried to meet this morning. Unfortunately my internet connectivity failed.  Ironically, today’s class focused on ways our mindfulness practice can help us to live with uncertainty.  I am finding this more and more important as a number of my friends and family members are experiencing health challenges.  I’ve been struggling with the impulse to control situations.  I want to do something to fix that which is a difficult and natural part of life.  Trusting my own loving awareness helps me to accept what I can’t control.  Practicing loving kindness – to include myself as well as others – helps me to find inner peace and rest.

We drew guidance from Kristi Nelson’s Grateful Living essay, Deepening Our Comfort with Uncertainty. Kristi suggests trusting life can help us to find a wider perspective in our relationship to the unknown.  She shares a lovely “self-care” practice she uses to ease into the solace of sleep.  What a beautiful way to transform a tormenting mind into an ally in well-being. Kristi Is author of Wake Up Grateful.  She was Ambassador for Grateful Living and Executive Director from 2014 – 2022.  You can find many of her essays and talks at her Grateful Living page.

We were inspired by poet philosopher John O’Donohue’s words about our wholeness.  He made his observations in the Inner Landscape of Beauty, a conversation with Krista Tippett.  It was one of the last interviews he gave before his unexpected death in 2008. He suggests that we all have a place inside that has not been wounded.  After sitting with this idea for a while it began to make sense.   John counsels that we rest in the inner sanctuary of our wholeness.  I think he may have been referring to the soul. For me, this dimension of being is loving awareness.

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The Columbia City Yoga on-line Moving into Meditation class met this morning. We cultivated wonder and gratefulness. We imagined living our lives as a sacred pilgrimage.  We considered what our inner compass would look like:  how we might navigate the rest of our days with intention, letting go of what we no longer need and letting in the guidance and resources we will need to make the journey.  A pilgrimage often involves solitude and silence, contemplative states that enable us to hear our hearts speak.  May our heart’s wisdom can support us through the sorrows and wonders along the path.

We drew inspiration from Grateful Living’s Live Your Life As a Sacred Pilgrimage: A 5-Day Practice.   The program is a gratefulness practice that offers a guided pilgrimage of the heart.

We heard John O’Donohue’s poem, For the Traveler. The poem is an encouragement and a blessing.  When we travel we experience a new aloneness and a new silence.  In the silence we can hear our heart speak.   We are encouraged to venture into the unknown and to allow ourselves to be changed by the experience.  He blesses us with a homecoming in which we will live our lives to the fullest.

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The Columbia City Yoga on-line Moving into Meditation class met this morning. We cultivated wonder and gratefulness.  We practiced mindfulness and explored Anu Gupta’s encouragement to be mindful of everyday wonder.  We practiced mindfulness and appreciation for the body.  We reflected on the human and more-than-human ancestors that create the causes and conditions that made our lives possible.

We drew inspiration from poet and author Mark Nepo’s beautiful essay, The One Life We Are Given.  He experiences finding heart wisdom while caring  for his dying father. This wisdom arises when we recognize the preciousness and wonder of life.  He urges readers to cultivate wonder by affirming the “unseeable thread” that holds all life together. 

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The Columbia City Yoga on-line Moving into Meditation class met this morning.  We explored perspective taking as a way of practicing radical compassion.  Our intention was to truly be present with a marginalized person, a person subject to stereotyping. Imagining the rich complexity of their lives helps to connect with the wholeness of their lives and our shared humanity.

We practiced mindfulness and explored Anu Gupta’s perspective taking practice.   We thought of a marginalized person subject to stereo-typing.  We imagined their life’s journey from the time of their birth, through their life’s transitional moments, to the dreams and aspirations they held for themselves. Our intention was to appreciate the wholeness of their humanity.

We drew inspiration from writer Richard Powers, author of many books including the Pulitzer prize winning book, The Overstory.  In his magical interview with Sam Fragoso on the Talk Easy program, Richard shared some of his ideas about the qualities we cultivate when reading a novel: stillness, focus, concentration, presence, empathy and compassion.  Reading is an exercise of imagination.  We are alone and also inside an unknown person’s life as we follow their story.  This is also what we bring to the practice of perspective taking, when we imagine the life story of another.

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