Everything as a Gift

I first learned of Rumi when I was a sophomore in high school. My English teacher was . . . eccentric. But in many ways, she was my first introduction to what would become my current path. Not only Rumi but Lao Tzu graced our reading lists, and even then, I connected with their words. Rumi’s poem, The Guest House, the poem I first read 16 years ago, comes and goes in my life, and right now, I feel its draw again. Here is the poem in full:

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

In short, he says, welcome whatever comes. It will not be staying long, and it may be making space for something amazing! It can be very easy to get caught up in the sorrows and meanness, especially when we are always expecting disaster, participating in the downward spiral of email, or caught up in vicarious trauma. But as Rumi points out, these experiences are just momentary guests. We may feel that some will overstay their welcome, but eventually they pack up and go. Eventually something new takes their place.

Yoga has shown me another level of The Guest House. Not only are these moments in life going to come and go, but we never have to let them define us. Our humanity, “this being human” is about being the building where these moments occur. They are not who we are. We are not defined by our sorrows anymore than we are defined by our joys. They are simply visitors who interact with us and perhaps change us, but they need not define us.

It is easy to think they define us. When we forget how temporary each of these guests are in our lives, it is easy to allow them to overtake our mentality. But when we do that, we forget that every one of these guests is something that can teach us something new.

I have been extremely blessed to have travelled a lot in my life. I have spent many nights in hostels interacting with people from around the world. And each and every one of them has taught me something new. I see them as the physical embodiment of Rumi's point. Sometimes I really enjoyed our conversations, and other times I was fairly annoyed by them, but I have always learned from them, and then they vanished from my life and I from their life. Rumi reminds us that all of our life experiences can be the same type of gift. We can always learn from them.

And we never know when they are going to clear us “for some new delight.” And thus, each and every one of them is a gift. We just have to recognize them as such. And that can be hard. That can be really hard. But Rumi helps give us a new perspective, a new way to smile and laugh when we think life is going to overwhelm us.

I have not, in any way, mastered Rumi’s suggestion. I have carried it with me since high school, but it is not something we are taught in modern society. Quite the contrary. We are taught to mask our pains, pretend they are not there, or cover them up with medications. Rumi’s suggestion is not a mask, but instead an experience. We are not to ignore the pains and sorrows. Instead, we are to recognize the gifts they are. The pain and fear still happen, but we can know they are nothing more than temporary house guests. Once they are gone, we can wash the sheets and be open for the next arrival.

In many ways, yoga has made this easier for me. When I struggle on the mat some days, I know that the next day, I may feel great. Some days my meditation practice is nothing but a movie reel of my thoughts, and on other days it is calm awareness (much, much more rarely than the former). But each day is new. Each experience is new.

And when we do not expect that everything is a disaster, but instead expect that everything is a gift, that awareness can open us up to the greatest possibilities of our lives.

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2012, all rights reserved.

Filling the Yoga Bucket

I have talked about the yoga bucket before (here, here, and here), so I thought it might be a good idea to actually explain what I mean, and there is no better time than the beginning of the year to think about refilling the yoga bucket.

I like to think of my yoga practice as a way to create a nice reserve of sanity when things get too difficult. It serves other purposes, for sure, but when the insanity of the outside world hits, it is nice to have had a solid yoga practice. When the outside world is not too hectic, it is easier to find time to do a practice, whatever your practice is. Thus, you can enter the world that a practice makes easier, a calmer, less stressful world. When the stress hits, you have some reserves on which to fall back before the stress overtakes your life.

Of course, the bucket is only so big, and eventually, if you are not refilling it, the bucket empties out, and the stress can overtake your once peaceful existence. Many of us live in this state constantly. Instead of our bodies and minds entering the world of stress and then coming out of it, the cortisone keeps pumping, and we stay in the stress response. Once the bucket is empty and the stress response keeps coming, we enter a state of dis-ease. Sure enough, that state eventually leads to disease.

So what can we do about this before the disease hits and while we still have one or two little drops of sanity left in the bucket? The signs are usually there. Does your body hurt more than usual? Are you yelling at loved ones more than usual? Are you getting emotional more than usual? Do you feel like you are just trying to live moment to moment and day to day seems like too much? Those are just some of the warning signs.

You probably know them, so what do we do about them? How can we refill the bucket when there is no time for retreats and vacations? How can we refill the bucket when there is no time to breathe let alone think?

Take five minutes and sit. Seriously!

Five minutes seems like a lot of time and not a lot of time. When we have a deadline, five minutes feels like an instant. When we sit to do nothing, it feels like an eternity. It seems like a lot of time you could be doing work, stressing about the family issues, or reorganizing the to-do list. But those five minutes might just gain you twenty later on. Five minutes per day begins to refill the bucket. Even one minute at the moment when the stress feels the heaviest can be the minute that brings us twenty later on.

But we have to listen.

I could be the poster child for the empty bucket this week. Although I was essentially on vacation for 4 weeks at the end of my time in New Zealand, I was living in dorm rooms and not doing my practice as much as I would have liked. My daily meditation practice had become a sporadic, and often spastic, affair. Upon my return to the United States on December 11, I had little time to acclimate before driving from Northern California to Phoenix and then heading to Tucson to start work.

And work has been stress central. The job is great, but the learning curve is not just steep, it feels like Baldwin Street in Dunedin (where I was living in New Zealand), the steepest street in the world. I have been running in all directions, attempting to meet dozens of new clients, attend hearings, prepare for trials, and still acclimate to being back in Tucson, a place I have not lived for 2.5 years. On top of all that, I have not been living in my own place. I am incredibly lucky to be living with wonderful family, but the lack of “me”-time is taking its toll. I even started to feel a wee bit sick, and I cannot remember the last time I got sick.

Luckily, I recognized this a few days ago and made “refilling the yoga bucket” the theme on the Is Yoga Legal Facebook page. This week, I have restarted, very slowly, my home asana practice, restarted my meditation practice, and tried to use the hours of driving between home visits as an opportunity for pranayama and reflection. I feel like I’m back to bottom, and now it is time to start refilling the reserves. One very slow step at a time.

I guess this post is partially to say that it is easier to talk the talk than walk the walk. My reserves dried out. There is no question about that. But even writing this gives me hope and faith that they will slowly start to refill.

The next post will talk about how to start a daily meditation practice as a way to refill your yoga bucket, but in the meantime, what is your favorite way to refill your bucket and stay sane?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2012, all rights reserved.

The Power of Life

I grew up in Northern California. It has the perfect climate for an abundance of life, including trees, birds, mammals, flowers, etc. After growing up in California, I went to the University of Michigan where squirrels and birds frolic in the plethora of trees. But then I went to the University of Arizona for law school.

Prior to relocating to Tucson, I had only been there twice. I love the beauty of the rocks, but over time living there, one thing became abundantly clear – I missed trees. The lack of trees started to grate on me. It seemed almost too metaphorical for law school and the legal profession.

But then I opened my eyes. I started taking yoga seriously in law school and started taking it very seriously my third year and while studying for the bar exam. It was then that I noticed how amazing the desert really is. Life exists where all reason says it should not. My favorite example is the Ocotillo cactus, which people often cut down and use to make fence posts. Rationality suggests that cutting down the cactus would kill it, but each spring these fence posts come alive and grow leaves and even flowers. It is incredible.

Living in New Zealand since January has been healing for me. This country does not lack for trees. So it has been easy for me to forget the desert lessons, but last week, I got my reminder . . . this time on a volcano. If people did not know before February, they now know that New Zealand is earthquake prone. What is less well known, however, is that its largest city, Auckland, sits on a few (read 52) volcanoes. I’m starting to wonder why anyone lives in this country . . . but I digress.

Last week, I visited the most recent eruption. It is an island called Rangitoto, which was created 600 years ago when the volcano erupted. It is an island, therefore, made purely of lava. There is no dirt. There were no trees. There was no life.

Today, Rangitoto has the largest Pohutekawa (a NZ tree that flowers at Christmas time, so it is called the Christmas Tree) Forest in the country. I was expecting a day walking on lava. Instead, I got a day walking through lush forest. In fact, the only lava you could really see was in the lava caves and along the road where the trees had been cut down to make the road. There are even NZ fern trees.

A view of the lush landscape on the island looking back to Auckland City.

A view of the crater, full of trees.

A NZ fern tree.

In 600 short years, out of molten lava came a beautiful forest. If the ocotillo cactus is not a great testament to life, the lava forest should be. It may sound cheesy, but I like to think of these examples when life seems incredibly difficult. Sitting in an office all day, devoid of nature, it can be very easy to forget how powerful life and nature can be. It is necessary to step outside and remind ourselves. Yoga is about being present and taking stock of the world around you. Sometimes that is the best way to remember how powerful life can be. Where do you most notice the power of life?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2011, all rights reserved.

The News Dilemma

I used to be woefully ignorant of current events. I wanted to care about the world, but I did not particularly want to care about scandal and politics. When I got to college, there were plenty of late nights discussing issues, but I rarely went out of my way to read a newspaper, and I stopped watching television, so unless it reached me some other way, the news of the day passed me by.

All of that slowly began to change the first time I lived abroad in France. That was, after all, when the United States invaded Iraq. When my friend told me about “Freedom Fries,” I thought it was an Onion article, until I saw the French newscaster explain it on television that evening. Upon heading back to the United States, I paid a little more attention than before, but life got in the way, and then I was back in France without good internet and without a television. Other parts of life were more important – such as learning to speak French.

Law school changed all of that for me. I remember my first year of law school listening to a conversation about the Enron scandal and having almost no conception of what people were discussing. I had heard the names before, and I knew something big had happened, but somehow, I had missed the specifics. I felt woefully inadequate. I decided lawyers should understand the issues of the day; we need to know what is happening. We need to be “informed.”

I am now at the other end of the extreme. My RSS feed and facebook feed are full of news organizations and legal blogs. Even though, because of the time difference to New Zealand, I wake up around the time the news day ends on the east coast, I read the feeds from earliest to latest. I like to know how the news develops. I read stories about Herman Cain knowing that he will never be the Republican nominee. I just want to be “informed.”

So, what have I learned? The news is depressing. The news is mightily depressing.

The yoga and meditation community have a different take on “being informed” by news. DO NOT DO IT!!! Generally, the advice is to purposefully ignore it. Knowing all of the heartache, pain, destruction, and ridiculousness of the world is only a drain on your system. All that negative information causes your own body, mind, and soul to react negatively. I went to a Laughter Yoga Seminar yesterday evening (more on laughter yoga in another post), and one of the facilitators said she has consciously stopped watching and reading the news. She does not want the negativity. One of the participants added, “if you cannot change it, why let yourself be depressed by it?”

I felt my insides tighten. I know it is true that the depressing news just makes us more depressed. But at the same time, I refuse to by into the notion that we should shut it out completely. There are people who take news vacations, a day per week or a week per month where they tune out. That makes some sense, but what if there is another huge earthquake during that break? I do not want to not be able to reach out to friends and family anywhere in the world because I did not know about the news. I cannot imagine missing it, even for a day. 

But I also know how horrible, difficult, and depressing the news can be to read and see. From stories about war and famine, to stories about racial profiling and tea partiers cheering death, the media is not good about sharing the uplifting stories. It is easy to wonder if there are uplifting stories left.

I have waffled with these issues for years, wondering why I get more and more drawn in when I know it would be healthier to let go. Then last night I got an answer, and it was (perhaps ironically) from the person suggesting we should all just turn it off. Her statement, “ if you cannot change it, why let yourself be depressed by it?” made me realize that is why I watch the news. I may not be able to end poverty in Somalia, solve the middle east conflict (though I have an incredibly inspirational cousin working to do just that), or prevent racial profiling on planes in the United States. Chances are even better I cannot stop earthquakes, floods, and tornadoes.

But I can have compassion. I can tell hear and see their stories, share them with the world, and send metta, lovingkindness their way. I can ask that others do as well. The Quebecois have “Je me souviens (I remember)” on their licence plates, Jews say “Never Forget” about the Holocaust, and Hamlet’s Father’s Ghost begged Hamlet to never forget his story. This need to be heard, seen, and understood is deep.

That is why I read the news. That is why I share the stories. That is how we can hopefully all begin to understand one another. What began as a need to feel "informed" in order to be able to keep up with conversations among lawyers has become a need to feel connected to the world, connected to the people within it, and connected to their stories. Might it be possible for all these tragedies and wars and disasters bring us together enough to understand? I simply do not know. But I am going to continue trying to share stories and bring these issues to light. The more we see, the more we awaken to our deepest connections of humanity.

And just for my own sanity, one of these days, I may take up that idea of a news vacation.

What do you think? Have you given up the news? Do you seek it out? Why? Why not?

Namaste!

© 2011 Rebecca Stahl, all rights reserved

When the going gets really tough . . . we still have a choice

In the last post, I talked about how the snow here in Dunedin helped me see how important it is to prepare and how much our response to events influences our understanding of those events. As I mentioned, the post was not only inspired by the snow but also by a film I saw. At first I wanted to put them in one post, but there is no way to compare a snowy day to what the film portrayed. I have been thinking about the film all week, and I finally have the words to put down about its impact on me and what I think it has to teach us about yoga in everyday life.

The film is called "Brother Number One," and it is a documentary about a New Zealander who accidentally drifted into the waters of Cambodia during the reign of the Khmer Rouge regime. He was taken as a prisoner, tortured, forced to confess, and eventually killed. It was gut wrenching, and I was openly weeping, as were many others, even though there was not one scene of violence, and only a few grotesque pictures during the entire movie. I’m really hoping the film makes it to the United States and around the world. I highly recommend you see it. Here is a link to the film's website, and here is a link to their facebook page.

The last post was about snow and a yoga reminder that we can face just about any challenge life throws our way if we prepare for it and confront it with joy and wonder rather than fear and anguish. I thought about that as I walked out of the film into the snow. I had decided not to drive into town that day, but that meant taking a bus home, and the buses going up the hills were cancelled. I was irritated that I would have to walk up the hill, in snow. Then I caught myself. I just watched a film about torture, and I was concerned about walking up a hill? This is no small hill, but it still seemed petty after the film. It was not until the next day that I had my fun in the snow walking back down that hill.

So, when life throws us snow, or other minor issues, it is easy to say “be prepared,” and confront those situations with openness. But what about real torture? What about those situations that go to the core of our being set on destroying us? Remarkably, even in those situations, we have a choice. We can still choose how to respond.

Perhaps the most moving part of the film was when we got to see the “confession” of the tortured Kiwi. The Khmer Rouge required him to confess that he was a member of the CIA and/or KGB (honestly as I think about it, I cannot remember which one because the confessions were always about one or the other or both). In this “confession,” he wrote about learning spy techniques from Colonel Sanders and about his commander S. Tarr (his mother’s name was Esther). This man, while being physically and emotionally tortured, found a way to make a few jokes and pay tribute to those he loved. The Khmer Rouge were oblivious to his humor, yet I find myself thinking that he relished in it. He could play his own game, get outside of the horrific situation and embrace his inner self. It is impossible not to compare these actions to those of Viktor Frankl during the Holocaust.

And speaking of the Holocaust, that is my own family’s history. I have one remaining great, great aunt who was in Auschwitz, and many members of her generation died at the hands of the Nazis. I have visited Auschwitz. But to tell you the truth, I had almost no emotional reaction there. Instead, I cried while walking through Anne Frank’s house. The enormity of a situation is hard to conceive, but one person, one story, touches us in different ways.

These individual stories, from humoristic confessions to a grown man finding his peace amidst the horrors of concentration camps, to a young girl grappling with looking for the good in all people while hiding from the darkest side of humanity, remind us that even in these situations, our response remains within our control. The documentary reminded me that we all have capacities beyond that which we consciously know.

These stories, while painful and inspiring all at the same time, are not to show us that these responses are easy. But they are possible. Personally, I would rather come to know these capacities through yoga and Antarctic winds than torture or even disease. When we take the time to do yoga, to meditate, to be conscious of our responses to the little things in life, we train ourselves to be conscious of our responses to the harder parts of life. Learning to respond is like a muscle that can get stronger with use. Each time we stop and respond rather than react, we remind our conscious and unconscious selves that it is possible.

I am grateful to this film for this reminder. I hope the story can spread. And I hope we can all use it as a kickstart to begin being more mindful of our reactions and responses to that which annoys us, or worse, in our everyday lives.

Do you try to respond consciously to situations in life?

Namaste!

© 2011 Rebecca Stahl, all rights reserved

Inspiration, Ego, and Letting Go Part 2

In the last post, I talked about the tension between inspiration and feelings of inadequacy. We can look at those who come before as inspiration for what we might achieve, or we can be paralyzed by fear that we are never going to be as good as they are. While I believe Nelson Mandela was right when he said, “It always seems impossible until it is done,” I also know that bodies and life get in the way of us sometimes, and that is okay! If we learn to listen, these bumps on the road in fact become our new inspiration and our new paths.

In asana, this is easy to express -- everyone’s body structure is different. Therefore, it really is impossible for certain people to do certain postures, even without any injury. Paul Grilley, who teaches Yin Yoga, does a great explanation of anatomy that focuses on how bone structure influences our asana practice, and he “proves” that some bones just do no move into particular positions.

With the asana book discussed in the last post, one of the most amazing “abilities” the yoga teacher had was to do incredibly deep backbends almost seamlessly. Guess what? Our teacher, who has studied with him, informed us that he has a squishy, almost spongelike, chest. In other words, where most people have very solid ribs, the front of his chest is more malleable. Thus, he can do a backbend easier, and others may never be able to do it . . . simply because of our bone structure. 

Thus, we can do our daily (or whatever time period) practice and find the inspiration to keep going, but forcing ourselves into postures and places that do not work for our bodies will only result in injury. And believe me, it is no fun when your hamstring informs you that you should have backed off. It is no fun at all!

This blog has focused on the topic of letting go before, including the second post (it is sort of strange for me to go back and reread old posts, but I thoroughly enjoy it!). Today, however, I want to focus on how inspiration and letting go can work together. By looking to what others have done before, whether it is on the mat or off, we can see what is possible in the universe. But we can only know what is possible for ourselves when we look inside. When I look at an asana book, I am not necessarily inspired to do any particular posture. Instead, I am inspired to keep practicing and working toward my own edge, my own limits, in order to help them expand and grow.

Again, this is harder for me professionally – perhaps because the modern world is so focused on success, and it is often measured relative to others. But taking the knowledge from the mat, from my asana practice, to my work life, I notice something that I have discussed before – we all have our own paths! A yoga teacher can help guide us into new and exciting asana, but at the end of the day, we must look inside to ensure we do not hurt ourselves. No yoga teacher can know what any posture feels like for you.

The professional world is no different. We can have mentors and friends, heroes and inspirations, but at the end of the day, we have to follow our own paths. We do not have to be a Supreme Court Justice or a Partner at a Top 10 law firm or even what we thought we wanted to be last week. Instead, we can seek out inspiration, move to our edge and then reevaluate and ask ourselves if this path is working for us or whether it is time to move in another direction. 

In a world blindly focused on one definition of success, such a shift might be called giving up. In a world that recognizes that we each have our paths, such a shift might instead be called perfect for you. Thus, know that your bone structure may never allow you to do pigeon pose perfectly but that same hip structure gives you better stability in a backbend and take that knowledge to know that your path may not be to be the head of a corporation, but instead to give children a chance in life. In this scenario, those who have come before are inspiration for what can be achieved when you follow your own path, not a particular outcome, whether on the mat or in your life.

We can be inspired by people on a different path than us, and we can learn from how much they have accomplished, but we can only measure our own success based upon our own path. Are you on your path?

Namaste!

© 2011 Rebecca Stahl, all rights reserved

Inspiration, Ego, and Letting Go Part 1

One day a few weeks ago I attended a yoga class taught by an Ashtanga teacher. I do not normally practice Ashtanga, but she was subbing for someone, and I have always been intrigued by it (though honestly a bit weary of its intensity). Before class began, several of us were talking about various postures, and she brought out a book by her teacher whose name escapes me. We sat in a circle looking through this book on asana simply stunned. Some of those postures looked like he needed to be missing vertebrae to be in them. It was like looking at a modern version of "Light on Yoga," which if you have not read and are at all interested in amazing asana explanation, give it a go. It remains the asana bible to many.

Flipping through this asana book with a group of non-Ashtanga students, some of whom were fairly new to yoga, instigated a discussion that has been running through my head ever since and in various forms. Interestingly, it also crossed the yoga-lawyer line. A few people bemoaned the fact that these postures looked impossible. Even though I was a student in that class, I went into teacher mode and made two remarks. First, everyone’s body is different, and that just means that there are certain postures that some people may never be able to do (a discussion for the next post). Second, I look at a book like that and find inspiration.

And so the conversation began . . . The teacher mentioned she also turns to such books for inspiration rather than a reminder of how far she has to go. 

As students, are we to look at those more “advanced” in the posture as proof that we are lesser? Are we to feel inadequate because we have not achieved as much as they have? What if we have been practicing for nearly a decade and still have injuries, pains, and fears? Does not being able to fully express a posture make someone a bad yoga student? Does it make someone a bad person?

Of course not! Quite the opposite, in fact! 

Having a posture to aspire to provides the basis for the practice. When I started doing yoga, I could barely touch my knees in a forward bend. Today, if I am warm enough, I can place my nose on my knees. But I am also that person who has been practicing for almost a decade and still has injuries, and there are other “basic” postures I can barely do, if at all. Thus, I know where to work. I know what must be done.

That is why asana books are inspirational. Yoga has helped me learn that it can take years to increase flexibility and strength, but it is possible. We can go from not understanding our bodies at all to listening to them and letting them guide us through life. We can go from no balance to Dancer. Seeing others who have gone down the path before is inspiring because it helps me see how much is possible. On the yoga mat, I understand this concept.

I find this harder in the professional world. What really inspired this post was not the discussion around an asana book, but an email from an organization I love. The new President wrote her first President’s Message, and even though I have known her for years, I was amazed at how much she has done. I wrote her an email telling her how inspiring she is. I meant it. What I left out, however, is how it was also a bit like looking at an Asana book thinking, “there is no way I could ever do that.”

The reason I came to New Zealand to study was to learn about a system that I thought was working and share it with the United States. My inspiration was to bring a model of children’s representation in custody cases to the States, to give children support during a difficult time in their lives. That same organization I love provided the inspiration, and the connections, to make it possible. But now I am here. Now I am learning. Now I am seeing how difficult it really is.

It is like standing in a forward fold with my hands on my knees thinking that the ground is a mile away. The professional world is different than a yoga mat because our actions and internal awareness cannot change others. It can seem overwhelming at times, impossible even.

But then I remember that I did not touch the floor overnight, and the new President did not become the President of an international organization overnight. Change comes in increments, slowly but surely. And change comes from within first, and then we can share it with the world and make a difference in the professional world in which we inhabit.

So we can look at the “great” practitioners, on and off the mat, and think, “I could never do that,” or we can look at them and say, “I am going to do that!” With teachers and mentors, we can begin to reach closer and closer to the floor in our forward folds and higher and higher up our dreams in our lives. The first step, though, is to see those who have come before as inspirations and not proof of how far we have left to go.

Who inspires you? Do you allow yourself to be inspired instead of paralyzed?

© 2011 Rebecca Stahl, all rights reserved

100 shared adventures - where to go from here?

100 Posts! I have a hard time believing it, but this is the 100^th post on Is Yoga Legal. From that night in savasana in Tempe, Arizona to a small town on the south island of New Zealand, and every post in between, this has been an adventure. I was unsure what would become of a blog dedicated to yoga and the law. I was unsure of where I would end up, what words would be set forth, and what life would throw at me, and all of us, along the way. One of my friends expressed doubt that there would be sufficient material. Secretly, I agreed with her. But life kept offering new avenues, and conversations kept opening my eyes.

100 posts later, I am sure of one thing: I have learned so much from sharing this community. And for that, I am eternally grateful to everyone who has shared this journey thus far.

This blog was not designed to be a personal blog about my day-to-day affairs but a place to share yoga with stressed out members of the 21^st century. It was to be a place to explore what yoga means to us in a modern world. From the philosophical underpinnings, to injuries from asana, to disaster preparedness, this blog has grown and evolved in ways I never imagined.

There were many reasons I wanted to do a yoga teacher training program. The most “superficial” reason was because I was moving to a new city, where I only had a few friends, and I was working for the Court, so I knew that I would have an 8-5 job, perhaps for the last time in my life. A chance to meet new friends and do something I love was a great kick start. I also wanted to teach at the Juvenile Detention Center in Pima County (yes, they have yoga for the kids there), but they told me I had to be certified. Reason number 2.

The most important reason, however, was because I wanted to deepen my own practice. I wanted to learn. The best way to learn, I have found, is to try to teach others. One reason, of course, is that you have to make it understandable if you are going to try to teach others. But there is more to it than that; it is from teaching that we are challenged by others. Many, many people have shared their comments on this blog, both publicly and privately, and these comments have become deep conversations. I feel as though I have gained so much.

The question is whether this endeavor has offered anything to the world. I hope it has. Those discussions make me think it has. But I want to know what would make it more useful. Do you have ideas for helping create a community? Do you want posts on particular subjects? The facebook page has weekly intentions and daily tips, except sometimes when I am traveling without great internet access.

But what else can this community become? The internet has a way of bringing people from all sorts of backgrounds together. We can engage with one another on so many levels. I have learned a great deal, and after 100 posts, I am positive I want to keep this going, but the direction is anybody’s guess, so what do you want to see happen?

Thank you all for sharing this journey thus far. Through teaching, on and off the interwebs, I have gained so much, learned so much, and changed so much.

Namaste!

© 2011 Rebecca Stahl, all rights reserved

Your Inner Guru

For over a year now (I cannot believe it has been that long), we have mused together about the intersection of yoga and law but also about yoga and life in the 21^st century. After all, much of what makes law practice so difficult is that it is a product of the 21^th and 21^st century rat race – except on steroids (or worse, but we shall leave that post to another day). But we have always focused on the “what” of yoga, e.g., the asanas, pranayama, meditation, and even some yoga teachings. But today, let us focus on the “how.”

As the American Hindu Foundation is making clearer each day, yoga came and comes from Hinduism. Like everything in life, however, it has evolved and changed and become its own all over the world. The beginning of this evolution into various “schools” was the result of the “how.” Yoga was essentially a guru-student teaching scheme. A student would seek out a guru and would study for many, many years, then go off and teach himself, yes always men at the time.

In fact, this is how many religions and philosophies have evolved. The martial arts are about a sensei (teacher) and the student – well illustrated in “The Karate Kid.”  In Western cultures, Jesus taught his disciples, and even Socrates taught Plato who taught Aristotle who influenced the rest of western philosophy for centuries. In other words, the student-teacher relationship is traditional and cross cultural. But does that make it the best for everyone?

Without being too personal, one of the reasons I have never claimed a particular religion or practice (though I learn from and discuss ideas from many both here and in my life) or become a devotee is because the concept of having one guru does not resonate with me. I do not see it as something wrong, and I actually think it can work great for many people, but it does not work for me personally. Longtime readers of this blog will know that I prefer community. Buddhists teach about “the three jewels,” the Buddha (either the historical person or the enlightened state), the Dharma (the teachings to get to enlightenment), and the Sangha (the community with whom you study the dharma). This works better for me, but it still does not fully resonate.

Yesterday, I had a discussion with someone who is incredibly passionate about mentoring, and I came away from the meeting feeling inspired. I started thinking about why I love community so much, what it does, and going back to the conference where I felt my heart open from community and inspiration, it finally clicked. Community is about inspiration; it is about finding the inspiration to keep on going. And that can come from anyone at anytime.

But external inspiration is not enough. I have been watching a lot of TED talks, and they are incredibly inspiring, but they do not always spark that seed within me that makes me want to do something great; they do make me glad that others are doing great things, and that makes me less scared about our future, but I realized that we have something to learn from the “how” of yoga, from the concept of a guru. I must find the balance between strict guru-student and aimless wandering.

Your guru can be one person or many people, but what matters is that you are inspired to do what you love to do. It could be your longest-time friend who can remind you that you always wanted to be a veterinarian (what child did not?), and now you are a lawyer – leave it completely and find something new! It could also be your longest-time friend who reminds you that you always wanted to be a lawyer (yes, those people exist), and on your toughest days, remind you why you wanted to do law. If you still think you can fulfill the why while practicing law, you have your guru.

In short, your guru is anyone who reminds you about your inner guru – that voice that has motivated you and driven you since you were young and idealistic. So, like the yogis and others of old, who studied for years with one teacher, delving into ideas and striving to find enlightenment, I implore you to surround yourself with people who inspire you, who make you want to be great, who make you believe that you can achieve that state of “when you love what you do, you will never work a day in your life.”

Who are the people that inspire you to be your best?

Namaste!

© 2011 Rebecca Stahl, all rights reserved