Shine the Mind
Raja Yoga means “to shine the mind.” Over a month has passed since finishing week #3 of training with Yoga Awareness. For myself, this four weeks have been filled with many life-changing events including moving to another part of the world and a new job--to name a couple. Amidst these changes daily homework assignments provided a backdrop. The focus on our homework after in-studio studies emphasized setting a daily Ayurveda and yoga practice for ourselves. Our teacher Tedd designed yoga practice to help us to recognize patterns –physical and mental; positive and negative—that may be affecting our current way of living. Certainly, some patterns of living and thinking might not illicit a concept of “shining the mind:” Transitory feelings, and ideas such as worry, doubt and self-condemnation shroud the mind to the point we feel tarnished. How can daily yoga practice change us? How do we uncover the latent light shining in all of us? Unpacking boxes I found old family silverware I have been dragging around for years. I finally bought some silver cleaner and began working on a tiny silver cup that had held a hard-boiled egg for my father’s breakfast when he was a baby. Cleaning silver is no fun. It may even be considered pointless. But as my fingers worked on this relic from the past, I contemplated my relationship with my dad. Shining the intricate surfaces merged with gradual shifts I have begun to sense within myself: my “homework” enables me to recognize and appreciate the “before and after” affects of doing work for the better.
Melanie Barclay
Port Angeles, WA
Posted Date : 19-09-2018
Credited to: Melanie McHugh Barclay
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