Blog – Integral Yoga San Francisco

Effort and Ease – Non Harming for the Holidays

by Marc M. Morozumi

Being amongst diverse communities, cultivating meaningful connections and reserving personal downtime, all feel like useful ingredients for living a rich life. Engage, then relax. Out and about, then in and quiet. “Effort and ease” students often hear me mention during a Hatha class. I’ve learned my introverted/introspective self needs quite a bit of downtime to reflect, process and let go.Insights for self-care that have lasted from the pandemic…

While I’m certainly grateful for all the ways I can be connected with these experiences, I also know from my ongoing connection to the genocide in Gaza and other crimes against humanity, that my full experience of being on this planet is also filled with great sadness and anguish. And I need time to process and reflect on that. Rather than feel like I need to only focus on the happy things, it’s sobering and grounding to stay aware of how our everyday actions may contribute or perpetuate the cycle of harm. How being disconnected from our full story of existence may actually be the silence in the background that allows things to normalize in the foreground. What ways do our cravings for privilege and convenience require harms to be sustained, all the while knowing it’s not sustainable?

I saw the news about the 21 protestors in the 98th annual Macy’s Day Parade today. I’m sure we all have different viewpoints on this based on our tolerance and interest in holding numerous points of view at once. What if a parade included a full section to honor our indigenous people? Not simply a land acknowledgement which only first took place in 2020, but a full section to help educate? What if the parade included a moment of silence for all the harms from past and present settler colonialism? What if we were to make it a practice that we understand the harm we sustain when not acknowledging the pain that has been caused? I am grateful Native American Heritage Day exists, but I wonder how many people know that, versus Black Friday?!

In the same way that I make a conscious choice to be vegan and not wear or purchase products made from animal skins, etc., I aim to be mindful of all actions with a goal of ahimsa, non-harming in Sanskrit. I see our actions being linked to one another, all cause and effect as an interconnected web. While I know there’s no way to avoid causing any harm, I do my best to add in as much positive energy as I can, one interaction at a time.

I am grateful for you and for your connection with Mukunda Studio. I hope you enjoy this holiday time. May we celebrate, honor and have highest gratitude for the land, creatures great and small, and all of humanity. May we make the choices that call us into present time versus cause us to linger in unconscious habit time. May we deepen our bonds with family and friends and trust there is a higher purpose that will reveal itself in the right time. May Truth guide us, Liberation unite us, and Peace settle us.

Marc M. Morozumi, E-RYT-500, CMT #73144Marc is a certified Integral Yoga Hatha, Raja yoga and stress management teacher with over 4000 teaching hours and a CMT in the state of California. His diverse career history, which has varied from a life in the arts to working in a high-paced event world, unifies in one voice today as a health and wellness entrepreneur.

prajna2024-12-16T16:37:48-08:00December 16th, 2024|

Ahimsa As a Way of Life

by Swami Ramananda

Ahimsa is a Sanskrit word that translates as “without injury” or “nonviolence” in English. It’s a principle in Hindu, Buddhist, and Jainist philosophy that involves causing the least amount of harm possible to all beings. It’s the first ethical principle given as a practice in the eight-limbed path described in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. There are endless ways for us to incorporate this intention into our lives – I’ll share some of my reflections and efforts here.

One of the first ways I began to practice Ahimsa was with my diet. I embraced a vegetarian diet as a young person, wanting to avoid causing unnecessary harm to any living creature.

Recently, I began to eat a vegan diet after learning in detail how the dairy industry causes so much suffering to cows. But I see that when it is inconvenient for me, I too easily give up that commitment and consume some dairy product – case in point: pie at Thanksgiving. Reflecting on this makes clear how limited my commitment has been, and how easy it is to rationalize disregarding a spiritual principle for a little pleasure.

Another important way that I am trying to practice Ahimsa is in communication. I have found the teachings of Non-Violent Communication especially helpful in practicing mindful listening and speech. I really appreciate the idea of listening carefully without interpreting the facts and jumping to conclusions. I also believe an important aspect of this practice is to not take to heart the comments that are spoken when someone is upset. If I can remain neutral and refrain from being triggered, I can better ascertain what timing and response will bring the most benefit to a relationship.

In the last 6 or 7 years, my vision of how Ahimsa can be observed has been enlarged. I began to think more about the subtler energies that we all bring into being through even our thoughts, as well as our words and actions. I have been considering how the feelings of compassion or ill-will that I cultivate become my contribution to the collective consciousness of our world. This understanding makes me feel that I am responsible, first of all, for making peace in my heart by practicing regularly Hatha Yoga and meditation. These practices have made it possible for me to calm and clear my mind, and give me at least a chance to carry compassion in my heart as I go about my day.

In meditation, I have been cultivating an awareness of the ego — the me-centered thoughts that identify me as this separate entity with beliefs and desires that pertain only to me. I am attempting to see how these habitual ways of seeing myself as separate pervade the way I interact with others, making it easy to identify them as either allies that support my personal desires, or obstacles to those desires. I am beginning to see how even in very small ways I end up being friendly and loving to those whose behavior is supportive, and indifferent or even unfriendly to those whose behavior is not aligned with my desires. Catching myself and interrupting that tendency is another form of this practice.

I do believe that regular meditation practice and the glimpses of freedom I experience are supporting the subconscious mind in a new way of seeing things, and that new values and beliefs can emerge from experiencing a sense of connection with all of nature.

I hope this evolution in my relationship with my own mind is laying the foundation for practicing Ahimsa as a gift, not just a way of feeling good about myself or building a spiritual identity. I envision that my efforts are integrating precepts like Ahimsa more and more fully into my consciousness in a way that will one day make them a natural response to life, implying a concurrent freedom from needing something from outside myself to feel secure and at peace.

At this point, one of the most difficult places for me to practice Ahimsa, and even to recognize when I am not practicing, is with myself. I readily push myself to my limits in my service and always feel compelled to do more. This tendency is so familiar and feels so natural that it’s hard to catch it until I really suffer from it. I have improved from the days when I would go for long stretches sleep deprived and stressed, but I still struggle to remember that I can serve from a much deeper place, be more fully present, when I am rested and clear.

Clearly, I have not yet learned to value my state of being, staying grounded in the source of connection and peace within, as much as keeping the to-do list down to some imaginary place that seems manageable. At least becoming aware of this is a start and it helps me to remember that those around me that I wish to serve as a leader and teacher, don’t need to see another example of a stressed-out person trying to do more instead of being fully present.

One last intention is to see the practice of Ahimsa as a gift. I see all the Yogic teachings as gifts in the form of principles that initiate the process of awakening, that bring ever subtler awareness of my behavior and its effects. In this same way, I see the suffering as a gift, the teachings and teachers as gifts, and even this body/mind that lives and breathes on its own as a gift. My prayer is to make good use of these gifts and offer as little resistance as possible to the process of realizing the truth.

You can join Swami Ramananda for the following programs* this month.

Dec 24 @ 4 pm – Christmas Carols Satsang, online & in-person with Swami Ramananda & Snehan Born
Dec. 22 @ 11 am – Sunday Spiritual Talk: Swami Satchidananda’s Jayanthi, online with Swami Ramananda
Dec 31 @ 8pm – New Year’s Eve Program, online & in-person with Swami Ramananda & Swami Vimalananda

*By donation/free

Swami Ramananda C-IAYT, E-RYT 500, is the Executive Director of the Integral Yoga Institute in San Francisco and a greatly respected senior teacher in the Integral Yoga tradition, who has been practicing Yoga for over 45 years. Ramananda offers practical methods of integrating the timeless teachings and practices of Yoga into daily life, and transforming the painful aspects of human experience into steps toward realizing one’s full potential.

He leads all levels of Yoga teacher trainings and programs around the globe. Ramananda co-developed the Stress Management Teacher Training program and has trained many teachers to bring Yoga into corporate, hospital and medical settings. He a founding board member of Yoga Alliance and is a co-founder of The Spiritual Action Initiative which brings together individuals committed to working for social justice for all beings and for the care and healing of our natural world. His warmth, wisdom and sense of humor have endeared him to many

prajna2024-12-03T09:14:09-08:00December 3rd, 2024|

Union and Renunciation

by Vivek Anand

Any occasion provides the opportunity to reflect and align oneself. Having listened to me sing with Sukhawat Ali at the Integral Yoga Institute and then at a solo show in Noe Valley, brother Snehan excitedly said to me in mid-August, “We typically have kirtan here, but we have not had classical music. If you can create bhaava or emotion with this music, we want to offer it to our community!” So I began to think about how to honor this invitation through creating a concert of khayaal and spiritual music.

I will be presenting a concert called Union and Renunciation – Jog aur Tyaag, Songs exploring the Connection between Romantic Love and Transcendence. Many of you know that Jog or Yoga is a joining, a Union, whereas Tyaag is a letting go, a Renunciation. The songs will explore both themes in dialogue with each other, through romantic and reflective ragas and lyrics.

Our musical choices of raga and bandish in South Asian music are often tied to a time of day or night, season, mood, events, a response to an energy in the room. Thus, I thought to explore Yoga in this concert through the music, and I reflected on it as a discipline, union, a joining, a way of being in the world but not of it. There’s a beautiful raga called Jog, very meditative, ‘bluesy’, with some beautiful use of shuddha ga and komal ga in the language of sargam, or ‘mi’ and ‘me’ in the language of solfège, and there is a beautiful romantic raga called Bihaag, pentatonic in the ascent and heptatonic in the descent, and using both a shuddha ma and a tivra ma or a ‘fa’ and ‘fi’ in solfège. I thought to sing these ragas as well as some others. Now this can sound intellectual, but I assure you that it isn’t, in the singing or the experience! It’s just the beautiful complexity of music devised from seven notes.

The lyrics to the raga, bring out the feeling as well, beginning with the opening of the song I plan to sing in Raag Jog.

Jog swara ko karein, bhoga rasa karein, roga bhaava ko harein.

Let’s sing the notes of Jog, of union; let’s taste pleasure, worldly and mystical; let’s prevail over illnesses of the mind.

In addition to being a singer, I’m also a psychotherapist. Right now, we have been involved in an election, and are also witnessing great injustices in the world, so it’s worth thinking about what is health and ‘illness of the mind’. I don’t believe that health is a state of smiling and detached happiness, nor do I believe that it is a state of being overwhelmed and paralyzed by events. I imagine that the absence of illness (or the absence of disconnectedness) is about being able to access pain, empathy, finding the pleasure in simple things, every moment, in a state of alignment with reality. Health includes feeling and being connected in deeper ways.

This is what the music gently encourages us to pursue: to align ourselves through singing, playing an instrument, resonating and vibrating with these notes and melodies, diving into the words, and having a transformative experience which changes you and your experience in the world. Sometimes it gives language and sound to your feelings so that you don’t have to suffer in silence.

The romantic composition in Bihaag goes:

Ab ghar aavan kahi gaye Mohan, ajahuna aaye morey priyatam, ati dukha paayo mora tan, mora man

Krishna/Mohan said he would be back, he hasn’t returned, I ache in my body and mind.

Both romantic love and the longing for union with the Divine have a similar feeling. The sense of loneliness and viraha are hard to bear. We make room for expressing this pain and desire through this plaintive song, written by the eighteenth century musical composer and artist Naimat Khan, whose pen name was Sadarang (literally ‘eternal color’). The song is followed by melodic variations, and then by a tarana which is a fast composition with rhythmic syllables. Perhaps the tarana reminds one of the restlessness of waiting, and offers relief from the pain of separation in love.

Raha takat mori ratiya beeti, taarey ginat, ginat aru doojey, Sadarang biraha satavey.

I spent the night awaiting his return, counted stars, Sadarang is troubled by loneliness.

Join Vivek Anand in a Hindustani Vocal Concert: Jog aur Tyaag, in-person, Saturday, November 23 from 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm PST.

Vivek Anand is a vocalist with a focus on emotional and spiritual meaning. He is also a poet, lyricist and life-long student, practitioner and champion of South Asian Classical/Hindustani Classical vocal traditions. Vivek has studied and sung with his guru, Rita Sahai (vocalist of the Seni Alāuddin Gharānā and Benāres Gharānā, and accomplished student of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan) for the last twenty-five years, and with his ustad, Sukhawat Ali Khan (vocalist of the Shām Chorasi Gharānā, and son of Ustad Salamat Ali Khan) for the last sixteen years. Through this training he has acquired his emotional and spiritual focus, a knowledge of rāgas, composition, lyric writing, elaboration, rhythm, and language. His extensive repertoire includes Hindustani classical, semi-classical, bhajans, Sufi songs, ghazals, and raga-based collaborations with jazz and world musicians.

prajna2024-11-05T16:19:45-08:00November 10th, 2024|

Practice of the Month: Practice and Non-Attachment: A Two Pronged Approach to Liberation

by Swami Ramananda

If you want to see well through a window, you have to clean both sides. Practice (Abhyasa) and Non-Attachment (Vairagya) work much the same way. They are the complimentary practices given in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras as a means to quiet the movement of thought in the mind so that we can experience our true nature — a source of unchanging peace within.

In order to see clearly, we must remove anything that would cloud or color our vision. Practice implies a steady effort to calm any thoughts, emotions or prejudices that might prevent clear, neutral perception. For example, if you shake a glass ball with imitation snowflakes inside, and then hold it still, the snowflakes will gradually settle, leaving an unobstructed view. We may think primarily of sitting meditation as a means to still the mind, but practice can include anything done with meditative focus or mindfulness, creating a steady flow of attention.

But only learning to calm the disturbances in the mind does not insure our vision stays clear since we are so often disturbed by the difficulties that we encounter in daily life. Non-attachment works perfectly as a compliment to practice by preventing disturbances from arising. While practice may be pursued by pausing from activity to meditate or quietly focus the mind, non-attachment is meant to help us relate in healthy ways to all the activity we engage in.

Non-attachment guides us to learn that we cannot depend on anything outside of ourselves for our peace of mind. Non-attachment towards our goals means not depending on the results for that peace. We work with less tension and more clarity when we are not anxious about the outcome. Non-attachment towards the things we enjoy simply means that we can remain at peace even when those things are not available to us. In relationships, we can love more freely if we are not afraid of losing someone’s love or approval.

These two approaches to creating and maintaining a clear and focused mind support each other perfectly. Any effort to develop non-attachment becomes much easier if we begin to experience a natural sense of internal contentment as a result of a regular practice. Feeling this innate peace within, we more readily let go of desires and expectations as the source of our happiness. And if we learn to let go of attachment to the results of our meditative practices, we can pursue them steadily without becoming discouraged or disappointed.

We can develop practice by meditating regularly with sincere effort and by performing any action with one-pointed attention. Non-attachment can be a little trickier to cultivate. If we look deeply into any situation that causes us to suffer, we can usually find that we are wanting something so much (recognition, admiration or some experience that we enjoy), that we become disturbed by not getting it. We unintentionally make our peace of mind dependent on acquiring or achieving something.

It can be difficult to observe and analyze our struggles with enough clarity and neutrality to see the underlying motives that give rise to suffering. Here again, practice compliments the effort to free ourselves from attachment by calming and strengthening the mind sufficiently to look deeply and objectively at our desires. When we are able to see clearly what we are holding onto in an unhealthy way, we then have the choice to let go.

These two elements of spiritual life empower us to free ourselves from the illusion that we can gain happiness by arranging the people and events around us make our lives happy. It is ultimately our choice. We can all gradually build the mental strength to focus our minds in selfless ways that align our behavior with the Cosmic Will and reveal the natural peace that has always been there.

You are invited to join Swami Ramananda and Zubin Goldman for Sunday Spiritual Talk: The Mystery of Death online and by donation on Sunday, November 17 at 11:00 am – 12:00 pm PST. Swami Ramananda is also leading Meditation Teacher Training starting November 14th, learn more and apply here.

prajna2024-11-01T18:27:35-07:00October 30th, 2024|

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