 I've been observing over the past two to three weeks what's been moving within me and also within the people I've been working with and the theme of being in "limbo" has emerged. It's the strange "in-between" state where we leave the old behind and are about to embark on the new, but have not quite taken the steps yet for whatever reason. Someone else described it as "being on the edge" with the sense of uncertainty around where we are heading and whether we'd like to move forward or not. Often previously dealt with patterns come up strongly and try to call us back. Very old challenges might surface and there is a sense that we've taken multiple steps backwards. Frequently it is in the moment we feel the most lost that we are about to enter the new and a huge shift is going to happen.
My personal challenge has been to hang out in the state of limbo trusting the process and knowing that something big is going to move. Walk in beauty Sandra
0 Comments
 As we are transitioning into autumn with the weather starting to change and the nights drawing in, I feel it's a good time to reflect on what we can let go of. In the four directions, a ceremony we do in Forrest Yoga, autumn is placed in the West. It's the location of where the sun goes down, where things come to an end and also where death resides. It's the season where the trees shed their leaves and prepare for winter. It's the season of letting go.
I've started to read Marie Kondo's book "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying". The author suggests that the first step in tidying is to "discard" and the criteria to choose whether to discard an item or not is: "Does this spark joy?". It's so simple and yet so profound. She says that if an item sparks joy, keep it, if it doesn't, throw it away. One of the ongoing learnings for me is to make my life simpler and I'm very excited and curious about applying this principle to more areas of my life. What is it in your life that you can let go of? What does not spark joy in your life? Tidy in beauty. Sandra  In Ana Forrest's book "Fierce Medicine", she talks in the first chapter about her "fear training", i.e. she would deliberately do things that she was afraid of. She came to the conclusion that even though it was not possible to banish all her fears, she was able to make a choice to not allow them to rule her life.
When I was on holidays last week at the lake in Northern France where we always go, my 65 year old father did a backward somersault into the water. I remembered how I used to do this as a child. So, I decided to get up on the platform, which was about one meter of the water - with my back facing the lake. I could sense the fear; it almost made my head spin. I first just jumped backwards into the water feet first and then did a couple of backward rolls in the water. Then I went back onto the platform and I stood there - very scared. I was feeling the fear in my entire body and there was a sense of paralysis and indecision creeping up on me, which in some respect was a great motivation for me. I completely understand Ana's decision not to allow fear to rule her life, so I connected to my legs and feet, took several deep breaths, pushed off and did a backward somersault. It was not the kind that earns you points at gymnastics. It was definitely not pretty, but it was totally and utterly exhilarating. It was not about being able to do a somersault, which did not alter my life, it was about doing something that I'm very scared of. I felt the fear and did it anyways. In my mind possibilities opened up, I felt empowered. Ana's steps to walking through the "spook zone":
... and do the somersault anyways. Somersault in beauty Sandra  As part of my ongoing personal development and process, I have been focusing on my anxiety that can be evoked over seemingly nothing. I get the feeling of losing my ground, of tightness in the chest, of ants in my whole body and a sense of restlessness and the urge to "do" or "fix" something. The cardinal rule for me is to stop and pause creating space versus going into a headless frenzy. And for sure not to write any emails at this point in time or make any major decisions.
I understand in myself that this reaction is not proportional to what is actually going on, but it is a "trigger" - as we call it in Forrest Yoga. When I manage to create the pause, feel into my body, notice the sensation and come back to myself, the situation looks very different and a lot more manageable. In that moment I have created perspective. Ongoingly, to cultivate a sense of calm and groundedness and inner peace I have been working on what author and researcher Brene Brown calls "swimming in your own lane". She talks about how we can be pulled out of our body by comparing ourselves with others; she likens this to swimming in a lane next to somebody else and trying to adopt their rhythm and strokes. At the end we are breathless, out of tune with ourselves and very inefficient. It's about staying in my own lane, focusing on what it is that I'm doing and what is important to me; of course taking inspiration and learnings from the world around me, but essentially staying concentrated on my own values, what has integrity for me and my own priorities. Staying in my own lane also extends to limiting my use of social media: as much as it can be inspiration and creates connection, it also can trigger separation and disconnection within myself. Walk in beauty on your own unique, wonderful and mysterious path! Sandra  This Sunday I'm turning 40 years old. As much as I don't see it as a turning point, I very much perceive it as a distinct marker. I've been contemplating a lot about the number 4 and what it means to me at this stage in my life. Coincidentally, my husband and I also had our 4th wedding anniversary on the 1st of May of this year. The number 4 is the number of completion - of full circle. There are four directions, four seasons, four phases in the moon. It symbolises arriving and a strong foundation.
After the teacher training in Peterborough, I taught workshops and then went on holidays in South Africa. It always takes me a while to step out of work mode and to arrive at a quieter space in myself where I'm more connected to nature and myself. Initially, the space caused me anxiety, before a deep sense of peace opened up for me. In that moment, I realised that at times in very subtle ways I'm feeling like a victim; I feel that something is imposed on me and I have to react to it without having a real choice. On a very mundane level, this is how I handle emails. I feel that they are just coming in without me having any control over it; becoming a victim to technology. When my therapist suggested that I don't check my emails for several days and just let the out of office message do its work, I nearly had a heart attack, but I gave it a go. It was the most liberating experience and it deeply shifted something in me. I did not feel that there was this invasion of my space, but when I sat down to reply to emails and work my way through my inbox, I actually felt ready to do that - with a sense of inner authority and agency. Not surprisingly I was also more efficient at it. It had a profound experience on me moving me out of the victim to a place where I could stay connected to myself, have a sense of authority and stay in a calm place even when outer things were chaotic. I have now decided to give myself a gift for my 40th birthday: no emails on two days of the week and additionally be more mindful not to check my emails twenty or thirty times a day, but to decide when I'm in a good enough space and have the time to actually answer them. I feel that this a very important, even though seemingly small, step to arriving more fully in myself. Walk in beauty! Sandra  I have written about the experience of overwhelm in the last blog, but I've been very compelled to write some more about it, because it is something that is so prevalent in myself and also in the people I work with. Last week the first half of the Forrest Yoga Teacher Training finished and one of the things I always tell trainees at the end is to leave enough space to digest the content and the experiences of the programme. Often, the tendency is to get back home and into a routine as quickly as possible. There is no downtime or in body psychotherapy terms there is no "downswing". The nervous is continually fired up without chance for the body to actually absorb what has been learned and experienced. There is not enough space to absorb fully and get nourished. Creating space and keeping that space is something I continually have to pay attention to. It is not something that comes natural to me. As one of the people I work with very aptly said: "My heart's desire is for lightness, simply "being" and joy." It's about leaning back more into oneself and resting in order to live life to its full.
Rest in beauty! Sandra  One of the things that fascinates me the most is an emerging pattern in myself that is mirrored back to me by the people I work with. At the moment, I can see a lot of overwhelm - in myself and in my clients.
Last week I took some time off and noticed that on day two and three I started to get edgy and restless. Even though I was on holiday with my family I started to think ahead and go through a mental list of a million tasks that I needed to do when I got back. And I feel that is very much how overwhelm gets created: thinking ahead, feeling the gravity of what is to come with no opportunity to do anything about it in that moment in time. For me, it's not when I do things that I feel overwhelmed, it's when I start overthinking, overanalysing and thinking ahead, which creates a sense of paralysis and/or anxiety in my body. Often a perceived lack of time, resources or skill for all that needs to be done is a deciding factor, too. There is a dose of feeling helpless sprinkled in there as well. When I was on holiday, I kept reminding myself: Right now, I'm on holiday and that is what I'm focusing on. When I'm back at work, that's when I work. One of the most important tools to stay out of overwhelm is to focus on what is moving through the body in this very moment. The question of "What is happening right now?" is very useful in feeling one's body and anchoring oneself in the present. In Forrest yoga the basic moves of activating the feet and Ujjayi breath are great ways to sense into the body, too. Moving the body, like in the sun salutations, can also be a good method to move out of freeze or anxiety. When we are present there are limitless possibilities and we have the opportunity to create new approaches to old issues (Dan Siegel, The Mindful Therapist). Being mindful is "avoiding premature closure of possibilities". We really don't know what's coming next, so let's lean into what is happening now and trusting that we have the resilience and skills to deal with what is to come and by doing so, we will stay out of overwhelm. Walk in beauty and with presence Sandra  I have mentioned several times in the previous blogs that last year was a year of a lot change for myself, but also for my clients. Often, I felt that I was resisting the change and thoughts like "it should not be that way" or "I should not have to deal with this" came up. There was a tightening around the changes that were out of my control.
A sense of entitlement or righteousness also crept in. I felt that I had put so much work into things and I was not reaping the benefits or received the gratitude I was owed. This in turn left me with resentment and exhaustion. My therapist has been suggesting for the last couple of years to give life situations a big internal yes. I never quite understood fully what she meant by that. At the beginning of the year, I had this massive realisation in my body what it really means to internally say "yes" to what is happening. When I deeply say "yes", my heart opens up, there is a lightness around my buttocks and sacrum and a softening around the neck and jaw. This year I have made a decision to truly accept what is coming my way and to embrace what life is giving me. The transformation has been incredibly profound and I feel there is a lot more flow and energy, as well as joy, in what I'm doing. I'm trusting life and the process even more and have been experiencing a lot more support in my work, but also in my life in general. It has opened up possibilities that go beyond what I could have wished for or could have ever imagined. I encourage you to stay present with what is and to embrace what is coming your way and to give life a big internal "yes". Walk in beauty Sandra  Over Christmas and New Year my parents kindly invited our family to go skiing. My mum also generously paid for some private skiing lessons. I decided to go back to the instructor I had some lessons with the previous year. He's an excellent instructor and able to see very clearly and deeply not just how I ski, but also how I live my life. It's amazing how accurate the following principle is: How we do one thing, we do everything.
The instructor told me to let the snow take me somewhere without going completely passive. He observed that I force my skiing and that I like to be in control. I have been thinking about this a lot. How can I let life take me somewhere without forcing matters and without giving up altogether or going completely passive? On the slopes, when I manage to let the snow take me somewhere, the feeling is one of cooperation and collaboration, which is coupled with a sense of deep connection; it is about the skill, but it's also about the mountain and the snow. It's about working together, trusting and not fighting against what is. The skiing then becomes effortless, fluid and joyful. I very strongly feel that it is the same in life. When we let life take us somewhere and we participate actively in the process, it becomes effortless and meaningful. I'll invite you to do just that: Cooperate with life, let it take you somewhere and let go of some of the control and the need to force things. Walk with ease, joy and beauty into 2019.  From my observations of myself and clients, this year has been a year of deep rooted change and disruptions right to the core. Uncertainty and a sense of being lost have been some of the central issues of 2018. What is our purpose in life? What is the direction to move into? What is the sense of it all? These are questions that have been emerging throughout the year. It has been about more than just re-orientation, the foundations have been crumbling. Out of the chaos, the possibility of something new, innovative and incredibly creative has been coming up to the surface. My feeling is that destruction has opened up the space for something radically different and very fresh. The deeper integration of our different parts has also been enabled - being ourselves and expressing ourselves more fully.
Words that describe my intention moving forward are: ease, abundance, there is enough, trust, leaning back into myself, letting go (especially of control), allowing, being guided, peace, aliveness. I wish you all a very peaceful Christmas time and a great start into 2018. Thank you for your support and for being part of Equilibrium. Walk in beauty Sandra |
BlogYoga, well-being and mindfulness... always walk in beauty. Categories
All
Archives
September 2022
|
RSS Feed