Blog – Page 3 – Integral Yoga San Francisco

Humility

by Prajna Lorin Piper

A few years ago, I read an article titled ‘Humilty, The Virtue No One Wants.’ It was a good title, I thought, because humility is maybe just a little too close to the word humiliation for comfort, a bit like shame, the sort of thing we think we’d like to get away from. I was looking for teachings on humility because at the time, I was reading a lot of St. Teresa de Avila and she considered humility, along with love, the quality most essential for spiritual growth.

St. Teresa is difficult to read, and part of that is because she spends pages and pages, over and over again, professing her humility, apologizing for being such a stupid woman, so much less than her superiors. From 21st century standards, this is so over the top that I thought it might have been her way of surviving the 16th century Spanish inquisition and the male dominated church of that time. And that could be partially true. But I also could see that she was absolutely sincere – humility was the ground of her practice. At the same time she was very sure of her relation to god, and to her journey; she was confident.

The Webster dictionary defines humility as freedom from pride or arrogance. There’s certainly nothing shameful there. We can see this kind of true humility kick in when we finally give up any pretense of running the show. Humility includes the ability to be honest with ourselves about the inconvenient, painful fact that anything can happen at any time. Maybe we think that, if we were really doing our practice right, nothing unpleasant or unwholesome would ever pop up or bother us, but that’s not the case. The pleasant, the unpleasant and the neutral can all show up, and if we let them they’ll also roll away. We see that when we sit down to meditate.

Another thing that brings up humility is the fact that the more present we become for our lives, the more willing we are to look at what arises, the more impurity we’re going to see. Spiritual practice is a purification process that calls for a lot of humilty. The more we purify, the bigger and closer to the bone the impurities will seem. We become more sensitive to them and it can pain us more to see them. So in this process it’s important to not get lost in identifying with our impurities, our thoughts, our fears, our ‘spiritual progress.’ Those things are not who we really are – I say that to myself sometimes, ‘not who I really am’ – they’re just thoughts or feelings, ideas or constructs or moods or sensations.

There’s a teaching story about two little flies that lived in the barn with the farm animals, that were the best of friends, that flew around together every day. One morning one of the flies woke up and couldn’t find his friend. He looked all over the barn, high and low, and finally he gave up. But when the oxen came in from the fields that evening, there was his friend, riding on one of the horns of an ox. “Where have you been all day?” the one little fly asked, and his friend puffed up his chest and said, importantly, “We’ve been plowing.’ And the teaching is that we all think it’s us doing things, we’re all so busy and full of our importance, but really, we’re just riding on the horns of the great beast. Life carries us until it puts us down.

Understanding this brings us the kind of humility that Saint Theresa had, the kind of humility that supports confidence in our practice.

When this happens we can stop referring to the constructed idea of ourselves and the personal gain or loss of that construction and start listening to the awareness that’s inside us that is unstoppable, unlimitable. We can align with that and learn to listen to it, in daily life and in meditation. And of course, a big part of the training ground for that is meditation.

Prajna lives and practices at Integral Yoga Institute San Francisco.

prajna2024-08-19T19:41:40-07:00August 19th, 2024|

Teaching of the Month: Humility – Access to Deeper Wisdom

by Swami Ramananda

While humility is the hallmark of a sincere spiritual aspirant, we may rarely think of practicing it.

In an age where self-empowerment is synonymous with personal growth, the idea of humbling

oneself is decidedly unpopular. It can easily be dismissed as a sign of weakness or allowing

oneself to be pushed around.

Understood and practiced correctly, humility is an essential part of spiritual growth. It is letting

go of the need to be right, the effort to defend ourselves, and making space for the truth, whether

or not the truth is in agreement with what we want. For example, no real communication can

happen without accepting the possible validity of another person’s point of view. Then even

when we disagree, we have allowed ourselves to be touched by another person’s perspective.

We humans, like all animals, make an instinctual effort to achieve some mastery over our lives in

order to survive. Things like securing a home and a livelihood depend upon asserting ourselves

enough to achieve success. A healthy self-esteem serves us in accomplishing these basic goals,

but will lead us astray if we then identify our success in life completely with this ability to

control the world around us.

It is just as important to realize that there are ways in which we cannot control the outcomes of

our efforts, and that our happiness does not have to depend on events conforming to our plans.

We can put tremendous effort into building our dream house or getting the perfect job, only to

have a hurricane or a stormy boss take it away in a matter of minutes.

Real mastery requires not only the courage to try, but also the courage to accept being

unsuccessful, without losing the ability to learn and adjust. This is where humility comes in – it

is exactly the virtue that allows us to accept what comes or to see that we are making a mistake.

Then, instead of being lost in disappointment over that mistake, we can move onward with a new

lesson to guide future efforts.

Join Swami Ramananda Mon. September 9 @ 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm PDT for his upcoming workshop Forgiveness: Freeing the Heart from the Past

online & in-person.

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.

prajna2024-08-07T21:00:16-07:00August 7th, 2024|

The Ilusion of Permanence: Part One

by Swami Ramananda

We tend to identify with the body/mind because it is concrete, easily experienced and appears to be permanent, giving us a sense of security and control. Yoga teaches us that we are much more and that to center our lives around body/mind will be ultimately unfulfilling, often painful, and leave us feeling incomplete and unhappy. Hatha Yoga works with the body/mind to lead us beyond this identification to experience the Self, by attuning ourselves step by step to the more subtle levels of our being.

Deepak Chopra describes the reality of the body’s impermanence by reminding us that “We replace 98% of our atoms in one year.” Like a river, we appear to be, but never are the same. If that is true, why do neck pain, ulcers or allergies seem to remain unchanged? In exploration of that mystery, ancient yogis discovered the underlying force that animates and structures the body – the prana. The flow of prana gives life to every atom and the patterns of this flow determine physical form. If the flow of prana remains unchanged, so does the form it creates. Those yogis then traced this pattern of prana to its source – the mind. The thoughts and feelings that predominate in the mental level determine the flow of prana that structures the body.

Our understanding of how the mind works, while more scientifically accountable, supports those ancient yogic theories. It is estimated that 95% of our thoughts are the same as those we’ve had before. Thus, as Lao Tzu asserted long ago, set ways of perceiving the world and thinking about our lives lead to actions, which in turn become habits. Habits form our character, which ultimately determines our destiny. What remains truly profound, and even crucial in our quick-paced world, are the ways in which Yoga teaches us to use that information. The rich tradition of Yoga provides specific tools to observe, utilize, and eventually free ourselves from the conditioning that veils our true nature.

Join Swami Ramananda for some fun, offer gratitude for all the contributions to the Yogic Wisdom Campaign and celebrate Swami’s 71st birthday; Swami Ramananda’s Birthday Raffle & Brunch Potluck, Sat. AUG 3, 11:00 am – 1:00 pm PDT, online & in-person. Raffle tix are on sale now and the raffle draw will be at the celebration.

Prizes include*:

3-day personal retreat stay at IYISF
Sailing in the Bay for 2 with Swami Ramananda
Unlimited class passes
Gift basket full of “Yoga Goodies”

*Alternative prizes are available for participating Sangha from out of town.

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.

prajna2024-07-15T15:15:04-07:00July 15th, 2024|Tags: Swami Ramananda|

Unveiling Your Inner Wisdom – Overcoming Mental Obstacles

by Kalyani Cohen Barr

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, our roadmap to managing and mastering the mind, teach that: Yogas citta vritti nirodha, or, Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind stuff. In order to better understand this and arrive in this state, I have found that I need to work with what obstructs Nirodha (stilling the activities of the mind). Enter the obstacles and afflictions. The yoga sutras contain several passages that discuss what gets in the way, or prevents us from experiencing a still mind and a peaceful, joyful life in every moment.

In the first pada (section) we learn about the types of thought and the obstacles. Two of the most obvious obstacles are disease and dullness. Disease, as in dis-ease, because it takes us out of ease and away from yoga practices, and dullness because it clouds the natural clarity of mind. These two obstacles distract us and cover up or block the view to our true nature. To me they are more in the gross form or manifestation – we are drawn out by the senses and the effect is more of a physical cascading of symptoms, so to speak. Taken by these obstacles, we are often left in a lethargic, heavy, unmotivated state.

The second pada teaches us more about the inner world and takes it deeper into the mind and practices of attention. Patanjali teaches us about the five afflictions which begin with ignorance and egoism. The truth about ignorance, in this context, is that it indicates a disconnection. It is the lack of awareness of the Self and our true nature of peace, and leads us to believe we are simply this one body and mind. The last three afflictions seem to be more of our mind’s attempt at manipulating what is in front of us in order to conjure happiness. They are: Attachment – to what [the ego mind believes] brings happiness, aversion or avoidance to what we feel brings discomfort or pain, and attachment to the life of the body (which typically elicits fear). We learn to understand very specific ways that one (the mind) concocts a world, spins a tale if you will. This tale may feel like a safety net for happiness but really it is just smoke and mirrors (attempting to get the things we want, avoid the things we don’t want, and cling to the life of the body/mind).

What we can learn here is that there is no way to “make” happiness and that is OK – more than ok. This understanding gives us freedom to just be – to be available and present to what is meant for us to experience, available to feel the connection between all things, the web of life.

The obstacles just seem to arise, like tests, as we attempt to live a life based on a spiritual foundation. So, how do we connect to our spiritual source and remedy the illusion that we are only this body, this mind? I found it became easier to employ the tools once I had some awareness of what was going on inside my mind. Taking time to reflect and look inward we can use the knowledge of the obstacles and afflictions as diagnostic tools. We can implement practices that keep us connected to the Self and remembering our true nature.

Some of these practices will be on the mat, and some off. One example we can use, all day everyday, both for ourselves and others, are the Four Locks and Keys. “By cultivating attitudes of friendliness towards the happy, compassion for the unhappy, delight in the virtuous, and equanimity toward the non-virtuous, the mind retains its undisturbed calmness.”

In addition to the obstacles and afflictions, the Four Locks and Keys is one of the sutras we will also dive into during my upcoming 3-part series – Scripture Study: Unveiling Your Inner Wisdom – Overcoming Mental Obstacles, Mondays July 15, 22 & 29 from 6-7 pm.

Kalyani Carlee Cohen Barr first found herself at the Integral Yoga Institute (IYI) in 2001 and began teaching Hatha Yoga, Pranayama and meditation in 2005 after receiving her certification with Swami Ramananda at IYI Bacalar, Mexico. The name Kalyani is a spiritual name given to Carlee by Swami Ramananda which signifies a state of auspiciousness, recognizing blessings, and bliss. Kalyani has attended numerous workshops and trainings over the years, including Pranayama, meditation, Mantra, Mudras, Dharma, nutrition, Yoga Therapy for Cancer and Chronic Illness (YCAT), Yoga for the Special Child (IYINY), and Anusara Yoga. She is now certified in Raja Yoga (IYISF), weaving the yoga sutras into her teachings. Kalyani has led classes and small group sessions for musicians of all ages at Interplay Jazz Camp in Vermont, has co-lead a retreat in Northern India, has led “Yoga Day” classes for 150 students, and has appeared on Canadian public television. She co-founded Simply Yoga in South Florida. “Yoga has many facets that contribute to a peaceful, happy, healthy life. Yoga has transformed my life on many levels, and my favorite thing is sharing this gift with others.” Join Kalyani to find your breath and balance, and enjoy the benefits of increased energy, health, and overall well-being.

prajna2024-07-05T13:16:04-07:00July 5th, 2024|

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