As we close in on Thanksgiving and the holiday season, my yoga instructors are starting to send out the message of the importance of self care and carving out time for oneself, especially in class. One teacher went on about how family and community can be great but challenging. As she wore on for over a minute, I felt the room fill with what I call “ramen noodle energy,” and thought, Why are you projecting your stress into this beautiful space we’ve cultivated with our breath?
It always kinda weighs on me to hear people talk about having a yoga or meditation practice that they can’t get off the mat. They’ll say things like, “I find so much peace in yoga class but the minute I step out…” I’ve been mulling this over the last couple days because for me this is about integration and integrity—no small thing.
This morning a new bit of understanding came in, which is that while it can be said that all your issues will pop up on your mat, the human ego is also a clever thing and it will find ways to hide aspects of yourself during your “sacred time” so you can feel as if your very best self is showing up. And of course, in a way, it is, when you get that taste of peace and stillness and maybe even bliss. But there’s a way that “safe space” also means “hiding place.” So consider how there might also be an aspect of you hiding from your practice. How will you know? If your life outside yoga is filled with worry and stress is one common indicator. You might find this compartmentalization elsewhere. E.g., you’re high-performing in your career, but your personal life is kinda messy. Or you only feel fully alive in your “happy place.”
In life there are no compartments but the walls we ourselves construct. There is no division between yoga or meditation and “real life,” just as (I’m really pushing this to make a point) there is no distinction between vacation/holidays/retreats and “real life.”
I’m often asked how I’ve managed to get my yoga and meditation practice off the mat, or how I bring such an open heart to my asanas, but the truth is I don’t consider myself a yogi or master meditator. I’m not. What I excel at is integration. And that’s because I have an Akashic Records practice, and that is what I bring to every moment.
This is not about “everyone should have an Akashic Records practice.” While I believe it’s a connection we all are able to cultivate, it doesn’t call everyone. This is about finding a practice where you cannot hide, where the self is continually exposed so the Self can emerge. This can be your asana practice. But if the ego keeps you feeling safe, then perhaps something more…intense is needed.
YMMV, but for me cultivating an Akashic Records practice was about showing up spiritually naked to an experience of the Divine. Here I AM. There is continual exposure. There is vulnerability. There is very little room for striving, people-pleasing, or any of the ego’s many shenanigans. Those backfire very quickly. You will either quit your practice or persist, lighter from all the baggage you’ve let go.
Yet there is also the opportunity to experience the paradox of when you have nothing you have access to everything you need. There is the visible measure of your life transforming from the very roots. There is living from the juiciest marrow. That is what keeps you practicing: not to escape life, but to run into its wildest center.
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