Falling Inside Ourselves

Today is the Autumn Equinox in the northern hemisphere. New Zealanders always found it funny that I, as an American, call this season Fall and not Autumn. The few New Zealanders I know who have since come to the United States and experienced Fall finally understand. They, of course, have ventured to the Midwest and East. But alas, that is not the point of this post.

Fall stands for something else for me as well. It is the season when we shed that which no longer serves us, the parts of ourselves that need to die so we can reawaken in the spring. It is no secret that I love trees, and there is little in life I enjoy more than seeing leaves changing color. Until this week, however, I never fully understood why (other than the aesthetic beauty, of course).

I did my undergraduate studies at the University of Michigan, and there is a part of campus called the Diag. It is the center of campus, and it is surrounded by a few trees. Growing up in California, I saw trees change color, but it was nothing compared to what happens in Michigan. My freshman year at Michigan, I remember walking across the Diag and stopping in my tracks. The tree on the other side had turned colors overnight. It literally took my breath away.

Such beauty right before the leaves fall off. It is a reminder that it is time to turn inward. It is a reminder that it is time to fall inside and examine our lives. It is no mistake that it falls at the same time that Jews are focusing on forgiveness. I just learned that this week there is a festival in India to celebrate Ganesh, the destroyer (also known as the one who places obstacles in our path to keep us on our toes). The celebration is to let go of that which no longer serves us and to turn inside to see how we want to emerge again in the spring.

Turning inward can be difficult. But it is a beautiful and natural part of this time of year. It is the perfect opportunity to ask ourselves what we need. As I mentioned in the last post, this time of year I am thinking a lot about forgiveness. But what is forgiveness? The internet is full of a variety of definitions, including “excuse for a fault” or “To renounce anger or resentment against.” There is an entire Wikipedia article on what it is and what it has meant to a variety of religious groups over time.

But to me, and for purposes of this post on the equinox, forgiveness is an internal affair. Yes, we can forgive others, and in that sense it is external, but it is something we do by ourselves for ourselves. As the Buddha reminds us, “Holding onto anger is like holding onto a lump of coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else. You are the one who gets burned.” Without forgiveness, we burn ourselves over and over again. Forgiveness is the way in which we stop burning ourselves and move forward.

Forgiveness does not mean we do not experience the anger, the resentment, the hurt, etc. It does not mean we put ourselves into situations again and again where we are likely to experience those pains. Instead, it is the internal process of letting those experiences no longer burn us. They need not control us forever, and too often they get held in the body and cause us pain and other dis-ease. 

Forgiveness, therefore, allows those pains to come and then leave, in the natural course of how life moves. It is the way in which we fall inside ourselves. It is the beautiful fall colors before we shed our leaves for winter. Forgiveness is what allows us to sit with ourselves in peace throughout the winter. When we have sufficiently forgiven, we can use this hibernation time to prepare for the coming spring and to rebuild and replenish ourselves.

It is difficult in the modern world to take this time over the fall and winter to turn inward. We live in an extrovert-rewarded culture. We are expected to be “on” all the time. But if we learn anything from the world around us and from our yoga practice, it is through going inside ourselves and letting go of whatever is holding us back, that we create the space to be at our best.

So, on this equinox, help yourself come back into balance by falling inside yourself. Enter a place of forgiveness, and create the foundation for letting go and freeing yourself for all the wonders to come.

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2012, all rights reserved. 

Learning to Breathe . . . Again

On my 30^th birthday, I posted that after being lucky enough to focus on myself for the past decade, or so, it was time to focus on others. My new job (new back then), put me into that world full force. For the past 7.5 months, I have been representing children removed from their parents by child protective services. Intense is only the beginning. But it also means I get to serve children and families.

But focusing only on giving means the yoga bucket gets drained . . . and fast. I was lucky enough to be able to take a wee vacation. For a glorious week I was back among the mountains, and they looked substantially similar to the Remarkables in Queenstown, New Zealand. My four days in Queenstown were some of the most profound and moving of my time in New Zealand. If it is not abundantly obvious from previous posts, I love mountains. I also love trees. My trip to Yellowstone and the Grand Teton National Park was full of both.

The Grand Tetons

But it also brought me back to another aspect of yoga – the breath. Long before I started writing Is Yoga Legal, I had written another blog through Xanga (remember that company?). It was nothing special, and I believe I only shared it with my friends and only had about 6 posts total (whereas this is post 180 on this blog!). I cannot even find the posts I wrote for Xanga. But I remember one of them, and only one of them. Not surprisingly, it focused on the breath. I remember laying down one day and feeling as though I had finally learned to breathe. Those were my early days of yoga practice, about a decade ago. And it was a profound moment. It was the moment I realized how powerful such a simple movement can be. It was the moment I realized the healing potential of the breath.

The label, “breathe” is the most cited label on this blog. Breath is the foundation of all yoga. It brings us to awareness and helps us gauge how we feel and how we are currently functioning. It is a bit ironic, therefore, that my breath has shortened and become more shallow these past few months. I have noticed it even when actively practicing yoga, either at home or in a class.

But I took some time to get away. Interestingly, I went somewhere with a lot less oxygen than Tucson. The highest point you can drive in Yellowstone is 8,859 feet (2,700 metres). Our hotel was at over 8,000 feet (2,440 metres). I have never done well at high elevations, and the headache hit me pretty hard. In addition, I could feel my breath shortening as we went higher up.

But that was probably the best thing to happen. I had to pay attention to my breath. I had to pay attention because I needed all the oxygen I could get.

Paying attention was like relearning all over again. It seems almost silly to talk about learning to breathe. After all, our first action on this Earth is to inhale, and our last action is to exhale. The breath is usually completely unconscious. Our breath will happen whether we will it to or not. We can live days without water and weeks without food, but only a few minutes without the breath.

And yet, we can learn to harness the breath to our benefit. We can learn to make the breath work for us. We can learn to notice when we are holding the breath. We can learn to take deeper breaths. We can learn to use our diaphragm to breath and not our shoulders. In short, we can learn to breathe effectively.

Learning to breathe was the first indication I was on a yogic path. I remember the moment as though it were yesterday, which is surprising because, as I have mentioned before, I do not remember a lot. But learning and practicing are different things. Some days the breath comes easily, and other days it can be a struggle. Removing the oxygen from the air by going up mountains forces us to slow down and pay attention in order to ensure we get the oxygen we need. It forces us to relearn to breathe.

It was also a reminder that no matter how shallow the breath gets, we can always refocus and relearn to breathe whether the shallowness is from a lack of oxygen or a stressful day. We do not need to wait until it becomes painful to breathe to learn this lesson. Instead, we can take it with us every single day.

Have you taken the time to learn to breathe? What has been your greatest teacher?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2012, all rights reserved.

Waiting Out the Storm

As I have mentioned before, yoga has helped put me in touch with nature on a different level. New Zealand was full of nature lessons, especially its healing power. There were also reminders that nature is not always tame -- sea lions like to "play". Here in the desert, there are really three lessons I have learned. First, life exists in places you would never imagine possible. Second, hot has new meaning when you live in the desert. And third, there is such a thing as monsoons! Growing up in California, summer rain was nearly unknown, but here in the desert it is a lovely respite from the heat, but the storm itself is power like nothing else I have ever experienced, and they arrive and depart almost instantaneously. Seven years after moving to the desert, they still amaze me.

This year we have had a lot more rain than normal, so I have been thinking a lot about monsoons, especially after getting caught in one while driving over the weekend. I had to drive over two hours to see a client over the weekend, and the shortest path there includes driving over a road with a lot of dips. It is a beautiful road to drive, but as one of my friends and colleagues reminded me, it is less than safe in a monsoon.  

As I was preparing to head back to Tucson on my drive, I looked out and saw nothing but black clouds on my path ahead. Thinking it would be safer to take the long road back, which traverses highways (and no dips in the road), I turned my car around and headed north. Perhaps I should have consulted the wind; it was blowing north.

The storm I tried to outsmart caught up with me on Interstate 10. The wind put Wellington to shame, and there were moments I could not see the front of my car, let alone any other cars or the lines on the road. All I could do was pull off the side of the road and sit there. Other cars, and some trucks, tried to keep going, and each one that drove by scared me just a little more. It did not help that I actually thought my car was going to blow away in the wind. The fear was palpable, and my heart was racing, yet in the midst of all of it, I found a moment to breathe. After all, what could I do but be grateful I hit the storm in a place where I could find a relatively safe place to stop rather than at the bottom of a dip in the road with my car floating away?

And then it cleared! The skies revealed the post-monsoon desert serenity. There is no beauty quite like it. The air that has been holding its breath (and yours) for hours, perhaps days, is fresh and clear. And it is cool. The clouds that continue to dot the sky look light and refreshed, not bogged down with the weight of their water. But to get to that serenity, you have to wait out the storm, perhaps even with a bit of gratitude knowing you will survive and knowing what awaits you on the other side of it.

I was driving a work car, so I had to take it back to the office. When I got there, I sent a colleague a text message telling her the car survived, and I was just a little worse for wear after the scariest drive of my life. She told me she was in the office “in case I needed a shoulder.” Surprisingly, I did not need a shoulder, but I did need a friendly face. I went up to the office and laughed and chatted with her for awhile. When I left again, the air remained fresh, and the desert was full of peaceful life.

Saturday’s lesson was huge. No matter how much we try to outrun the storms in our lives, they are going to catch up to us, but we can keep them from killing us with a little bit of preparation and perhaps some friendly advice from friends and colleagues. We may freak out in the middle, then remember how to breathe and calm down a bit, and then be rewarded with a deep and true sense of peace. When we are really lucky, someone reaches out and offers us the support we need. But for all these lessons to be learned, we still have to wait out the storms, even when they are monsoons! This is why we do the yoga, this is why we do the breathing. When these storms hit, we can come back from them not too much worse for wear, even if we still need a friendly face.

How do you wait out storms? Have people reached out to you in the midst of them? After them?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2012, all rights reserved.

In Our Element

As I have mentioned many times here before, yoga has helped me tune in with the natural world a bit better. Perhaps it is because I simply pay more attention, but I actually think I understand and feel the natural world more. I also crave it more. If for no other reason, that is one of the best parts of being in New Zealand. The natural world abounds here like nowhere else I have ever been.

Of course, that can have consequences, as I mentioned in thepost describing where I was attacked by a sea lion. But more often, I find I learn something about the world, and about myself without having to fear for my life . . . too much. The other day, I was kayaking in yet another of the beautiful cities in New Zealand, Kaikoura. In Kaikoura, snow-capped mountains meet native bush meet Pacific Ocean.

This was my first time kayaking, and as I mentioned before, swimming is not something I do well, so I guess I was putting myself slightly into harm’s way, but once nice thing about traveling alone is that when you do crazy things like kayaking, you often end up being paired with the guide, as I was. (As a digression, he did almost capsize the boat a few times while looking for paua [abalone] for his dinner that night and when he stood up in the boat to look at a crayfish cage, but we did not capsize, and I got back to shore without getting wet.)

We were hoping to see the orcas that had graced the coastline earlier in the day, but they were nowhere to be seen, even when the seals got in the water. Oh well. But it was from the seals that I learned my lesson. Seals are incredibly playful and with romp and swim with humans while in the water. On land, however, they are aggressive and dangerous and according to several signs around town, they will inflict “infectious bites.”

So what’s the difference?

On land, the seals feel vulnerable. They do not move as quickly as they do in water, and in the very recent past, they were hunted to near extinction while lounging and sunning away on the rocks. In water, however, they are quick, secure, and in their element. It is almost as though they have multiple personality disorder when it comes to interacting with humans, but really, it is about feeling safe.

A seal playing in the water near our kayak (next to some massive kelp)

Humans, and indeed lawyers especially, are no different. When we feel threatened, we become aggressive, inconsiderate, and sometimes vicious. While we will not (hopefully) inflict gangrene on anyone through a nasty bite, our interactions are infectious, and combined with misunderstanding and confusion, lead to the downward spiral of our relationships (and our emailexchanges).

But when we are in our element, when we feel secure and understand ourselves well enough, we can handle the exact same situation with more ease and control. We know that humans are the same whether they are in the water or on land, but to seals, the two experiences are entirely different. Filing a motion, replying to an email, and having a conversation with your boss are all the same situations whether we feel secure or do not, but our responses to them very significantly depending on how secure we feel.

In many ways, yoga and all I have learned from it have helped me find that sense of security more often. I certainly do not feel it always (and I know of no one that does), but the ability to respond rather thanreact becomes easier over time. In that way, yoga has helped me find my element and become more playful rather than aggressive. Apparently, however, I still bring out the aggression in others when they are not in their element (though sea lions are different than seals).

Do you notice a difference in your responses when you are in your element vs. when you are not? What do you do to bring yourself into your element and safety?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2011, all rights reserved.

Getting Away for Real

Last week, I went on my first backpacking (called tramping in New Zealand) trip. It was on a track that the New Zealand Department of Conservation deems is the “most beautiful track in the world,” the Milford Track. I have no way to determine that, but I can say that it was absolutely amazing.

All sorts of things could have gone wrong. Along the track, you sleep in huts with anywhere from 8-20 other people in a room with you. The region, Fiordland, gets around 200 days of rain per year, snow can appear on Christmas Day (the middle of the summer in New Zealand), and when it rains, it can really, really rain. I heard stories of people trudging through water up to their chests, having to be taken off the track in a helicopter, and having to spend several hours in non-sleeping huts because it was too unsafe to leave. And to add to my fears, my ankle is still sore from a year-old injury, and based upon a 10-hour hike my friend and I did two days before we set out for the tramp, my knee was not loving me either.

But I refused to allow the fear and concern to control my thoughts. Instead, I have been “practicing” for this track all year long. I have gone out in the rain without being upset about it. I have done long hikes up beautiful mountain passes. I have been sleeping in dorm rooms in hostels. And I have been meditating and doing yoga, mentally preparing to look on the bright side and just go with whatever happens.

We had amazing weather. The other hikers were awesome. And I even did not get too badly attacked by the sandflies (think mosquitoes but even more annoying). For four glorious days, I let the vacation responder answer my emails. I told my family and friends where I would be. I went offline . . . for real.

And I was rewarded with this:

The final point on the track. We made it!

Tree Pose at the top of the pass!

Mountains and bush and fields. It was absolutely amazing!

I got off the track and wanted nothing to do with my email, and nothing to do with facebook. I had over 800 unread items in my Google Reader, but I did not care. The world did not fall apart while I was not paying attention. Certainly things happened, and there was news that interested me upon my return to civilization, but I finally found the perspective to completely turn off.

It felt amazing.

There is no question that people are asked and expected to be constantly connected. We liken our phones to addictive drugs (crackberries). It is no secret that I struggle with this. I have struggled with my addictionto the news (and let’s be honest, to facebook as well), and my fear of going offline. I was so worried about being disconnected that I gave my parents specific instructions on how to get in touch with me if something went drastically wrong.

But as I finished the last few miles of the track, I found myself not even concerned about what my inbox held. Of course, I opened it up and found all sorts of junk mail and a few great emails. I learned about the news I had “missed.” I even signed into facebook and saw that one of my friends had a baby.

Interestingly, I am still traveling. I am now in Auckland and attending the New Zealand Family Law Conference beginning on Sunday. I will be traveling quite a bit after that. I’m less concerned now with how I will stay connected. Instead, I’m searching for hikes and ways to get away. I leave New Zealand in just over three weeks, and I will be back to work before the end of 2011. But thinking about that takes away from my enjoyment of today.

On the track, I had to constantly remind myself to be there and not in my head about conferences, child abuse, and international travel. There is no doubt that my mind wandered away from the New Zealand bush and mountains, but being completely offline and totally away gave me some perspective on the addictive lives we lead. Surprisingly, my shoulders have never felt as relaxed as they felt carrying a 40-pound pack over 3,000 feet over a mountain pass in gale-force winds.

How often do you turn off? How often do you get away? Do you let yourself? What have you learned when you have?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2011, all rights reserved. 

Getting Away

We have all heard the phrase “stop and smell the roses.” But who actually does it? How often do we stop and notice as the world changes around us? How often do we notice the minutiae of the world?

I was raised Jewish, so this time of year has always been a time of reflection for me. While I do not follow most Jewish traditions (it was my rabbi, after all, who first recommended the book, That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Buddhist, about a Jewish woman who became a Buddhist), I do take the lessons of the New Year and Yom Kippur seriously. If for no other reason, they are a time to reflect.

Last year, I made a mistake. I scheduled my first-ever “Stress Management for Lawyers” seminar on Yom Kippur. A little mishap on my Google Calendar, and my own ignorance, were to blame, but I felt awful about it, not to mention the irony of working and teaching about stress management on a day that is supposed to be devoid of all work. Ooops.

So this year I decided I was going to get away for Yom Kippur. I am usually unable to fast from food for physical reasons, but there is little doubt of my most intense addiction. It is, of course, attachment to the internet. While I struggle with how much of the news to read and know, I also incessantly check my email on my phone and pop up facebook whenever I can. I even tweet, though that comes and goes.

But sometimes the universe works out right. I finished the entire rough draft of my thesis last week, and I knew I could get away for a few days. It just happened to be over Yom Kippur as well. So, I decided to head to Queenstown, the “adventure capital of the world!” My only adventure tourism was paragliding, but I got away from work, and Saturday, Yom Kippur, I stayed off the internet for more than 24 hours. Getting away from everything proved to be exactly what I needed.

It felt great. Absolutely wonderful, in fact.

Spring here in New Zealand apparently means still wearing a winter coat, but the trees and plants know it is spring, and they show it in all their glory. And for the first time in years, I took the time to pay attention. I do not mean just the flowers appearing, though the tulips and daffodils have been amazing. I mean watching the buds on trees turning into leaves, and the emerging pine cones. I mean literally stopping to smell the air as the flowers bring forth all their glorious scents.

But there was more than stopping and staring at flowers and leaves. There were hours of hiking and just sitting and looking at beautiful scenery. Early in the morning, I sat on the beach and watched the sun rise shedding its light on the Remarkables, the mountains looming over lake Wakatipu. At some point my shoulders dropped away from my ears. My breath began to slow and deepen. And my mind began to focus. 

There is no other way to say it, getting away did some good.

I was worried about turning off the internet. I was worried about being out of communication for a full day. I was worried about the massive amount of information to which I would return. And then I sat by a tree, staring out over a lake toward the Remarkables. All those concerns slipped away. The beauty of the mountain released me from my grip on myself. The "forced" fast gave me the perspective once again. Of course, I knew before being in Queenstown how much I love trees and mountains, but I had been striving so hard to live in two days at a time because New Zealand is a day ahead of the United States that I had forgotten how to live in the present. Mountains do not let you forget. Spring does not let you forget. 

The greatest lesson I want to learn from yoga, and in turn share with others, is how to use the tools in everyday life. I want to learn to sit at a desk breathing as well as I did on that mountain. I know it is possible. But I also know that modern life, especially a lawyer’s life, means cities. It means being indoors, carrying sweaters in summer because the air conditioning is too cold, and going days, weeks, and perhaps months without noticing the world’s changing patterns. Thus, sometimes we need to refill our coffers and remind ourselves what it means to truly stop, breathe, and reflect.

Then we can get back to work, the choice many of us make, using the tools to hold onto that essence for just a little bit longer. On this vacation, I found my breath again, not just my breath, but a deep, solid breath. But more than that, I remembered to stop and look at how amazing this world is and reflect on the beauty from which we so often hide behind our computer screens. It was through this fast that I was truly filled with the wonder of the world. 

Do you remember to get away? What do you learn from it?

Namaste!

© Rebecca Stahl 2011, all rights reserved.