John and Lisa's Blue Skies Blog – Soaring with God

When I teach yoga, I enjoy sharing short, inspirational readings at the beginning and middle of the class.  Sometimes, I try to sum-up the lesson in my own words at the very end of class.  Sometimes, in the middle of class, while the students are resting in Child’s Pose, I’ll suddenly feel inspired to share something “off the top of my head” – some tidbit of wisdom that lives in my mind due to all the years I’ve spent with spiritual studies.

This week, I reminded the class that yoga teaches us not to cling to the things we love, the things that feel good; and not to reject the things that are challenging or uncomfortable.  We need all these experiences.  They are all part of life.  If we can practice this lesson in class with our yoga poses, then we can learn to translate it into other areas of our lives.

One of my students stopped after class to thank me for this lesson.  I told her it’s Buddhist wisdom – the kind of wisdom that’s transformed my own life from one of depression bordering on despair to one of peace and fulfillment.  She said she’d never heard anything like it before.  I agreed that our society doesn’t encourage such a view of life.  We’re continually being nudged to believe we can “have it all” or that we can ignore or squash painful situations/emotions without any consequences.

Hearing the truth is very liberating.  It’s like part of us already knows the truth, already holds this wisdom deep inside.  It’s a relief to hear it spoken aloud.