I've been vegan for close to 6 years now, and I've had the opportunity to explain my choice to different people with different backgrounds in different ways. One time, my 5-year-old niece offered me some non-vegan food. I wanted to explain my veganism in a way that is clear and understandable while remaining true to my ethics. So I thanked her and said I cannot eat it because I do not eat anything that comes from animals. She looked at me with this expression on her face that basically said "silly you". Out loud, she said "This did not come from animals. This came from the supermarket!" And so I laughed because it was funny. She is sweet and innocent and takes things as they are presented to her, without suspicion and without cynicism. But a part of me was heartbroken. I was heartbroken because this sweet innocent child was lied to. We have all been lied to. Many of the norms of our society are lies. The meat, dairy, egg and other animal use industries use words to intentionally deceive us, to create that disconnection, so that we can continue to leave things unexamined. Words like meat or bacon or pork or beef are meant to disconnect us from the truth of what they really are. We were told they are things at our disposal, instead of the sentient beings that they really are, beings who like us would like to have pleasure and avoid pain, bask in the sunlight and play, fall in love and take naps and eat thing we enjoy, move and walk and run and swim etc etc. The words that are used and how they are said are meant to deceive. And so it breaks my heart that we have been lied to. But we are yogis. That means we are not victims of the lies that are passed on to us, nor are we motivated to keep perpetuating those lies by staying in the dark. One of the yamas or ethical precepts of yoga is called satya. It means truth. It is to speak of things as they are, free from lies and obscurity, without deceit and embellishments. My teacher Sharon Gannon says yogis are radical-- we get to the root; we are courageous souls who are willing to dismantle systems that do not work. And so, through our choice of words, we can start to create a world that lives in the integrity of truth. We can break away and liberate ourselves from systems that oppress ourselves and others. We stop saying meat when we mean animal flesh. We use words to bring back the connection and truth to what things really are. Lies hurt. They victimize the ones who are lied to or lied about while keeping the person saying the lie in a vicious cycle of negative karma. Think of someone who has lied to you and hurt you as a result. I'm going to challenge you to do the very difficult thing of forgiving this person and letting it go. Just as you let go of the anger, let go of the pain, and let go of the lies as well. Free yourself by choosing to break away. Do not let the lies keep you trapped. Even if you think that your anger and pain are justified, do not make them the reason for your continued suffering. Let go. Let go. Let go. Now think of someone you have lied to and hurt as a result. Make amends right now by choosing to commit to the practice of satya or truth. The best way to make things right for others is to stop hurting others. This includes the animals whom we have hurt-- in our thoughts by degrading them and seeing them as things, in our words by calling their body parts inanimate objects, in our actions by eating or otherwise using them. It is often said that truth will set us free. It may break our hearts to admit we have been lied to, our trust betrayed, our feelings disregarded, but ultimately acknowledging it gives us the right to take our power of choice back. Love and compassion are our true nature. When we are connected to this nature, we will start to think it, speak it, and live it. Lokah samastah sukhino bhavantu. May all beings everywhere be happy and free, and may the thoughts, words, and actions of my own life contribute in some way to that happiness and to that freedom for all. May the words that we say and how we say them honor the truth and integrity of all living beings.
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There is one category of things we say that seems in some way risky-- it is to ask for something. We are sometimes so afraid to ask that we do away with the asking altogether and just expect others to read our minds. Newsflash: most people are not mind-readers. Or we are so afraid to ask that we become passive aggressive, thinking falsely that this will give us our intended results. Another newsflash: it usually doesn't. If this sounds familiar to you, it is not because I have singled you out. It is because I know I have this tendency. Someone once pointed out to me what I never noticed in myself before-- that I did not know how to ask for things. Instead of saying "Can I have water?", I would say "I am thirsty." Today, I have had a little more time to reflect on this topic of asking and being afraid of asking. And I think it has to do with our fears. We are afraid that the answer is going to be no. We are afraid of putting ourselves at risk. We are afraid of putting ourselves out there in the world. And so we resort to saying things that fall short of asking. How we say things lose their power. We are not confident with our intentions, and so our words reflect them. But you see, we can expand our understanding of what it means to ask, to see it not merely as a risk, but as trust-- to trust perhaps the other person, the universe, and most importantly ourselves, to know that we are going to be okay regardless of what the response may be. At first glance, asking seems daunting because we may be attached to our small selves. We may not genuinely believe we have the right to ask. Or we may think it's selfish. Or we are worried about what others might think. But asking for something, on a broader perspective, is not about us. It is about daring to make that connection. It is asking: Are you with me? Are we on the same side? And whether or not the answer is affirmative, if we have gained that trust within ourselves, we would be grounded enough to not be afraid to try. The focus of the month "It's not what you say. It's how you say it" is about the sounds that we make, the words that we choose, the tone and intonation and intention behind them. We often take it for granted, but when we take time to think about it, we will realize that language is such a gift. We are able to understand each other not through grunts or gibberish but through the clarity of words. Isn't it amazing that humanity has created this common ground-- languages whose sounds enable us to share with each other our deepest thoughts, our random musings, and the nuances of our emotions? Isn't it absolutely mind-blowing that we can express who we are with no other skill but the ability to speak? And yet, we use this language quite thoughtlessly sometimes. We use this medium of communicating to gossip or judge or complain or make excuses or lie or insist that our truth is the only truth. Sure, we have the ability to say what we want. The question is: Are we using these words to make sounds that uplift, that give justice to the gift of this language? I was listening to a Ted Talks lecture about communicating. The speaker Julian Treasure said that if we want to speak in a way that will make others listen to us, then we use four principles: Honesty, Authenticity, Integrity, and Love. To be honest means we speak in a way that is clear, direct, and straightforward; that we do not conceal or minimize or embelish or exaggerate or beat around the bush. To be authentic means to be ourselves, to let go of that pressure to be someone we are not, to find irrelevant that self-consciousness that makes us falsely believe we have to act like somebody else. To have integrity is to be our word, to let the way we live this life be a testament to the words we speak and promises we say we vow to keep. To be grounded in love means to think well of others, to speak well of others, and to wish others well. Language is a gift. It holds so much power. It can either connect or separate, trivialize or emphasize, uplift or put others down. Why not give language the justice it deserves? Use honesty, authenticity, integrity, and love to create something beautiful-- today, tomorrow, and the rest of your life. The focus of the month is nada yoga, the yoga of sound and vibrations and music. My teacher David Life said that the first step in nada yoga is to become receptive. In other words, to listen. We may think it's easy. After all, we've had decades of practice listening! And yet, how common is it that we pretend to listen but we are really just waiting for the other person to finish so we can say our piece? While the other person is talking, we are already composing our own thoughts in our head, ready to respond or refute or argue. That is not truly listening because we are set in our agenda. No matter what the other person says, we are going to say what we want anyway. Listening is not only keeping quiet verbally-- that is just being polite. Listening is also quieting the mind and shutting off that mental noise. To listen is to be fully open to the reality that someone else is sharing with us, regardless of our own preconceived notions and biases and opinions. The poet Mark Nepo said it more eloquently: "To listen is to continually give up all expectation and to give our attention, completely and freshly, to what is before us, not really knowing what we will hear or what that will mean. In the practice of our days, to listen is to lean in, softly, with a willingness to be changed by what we hear." There are many attributes we cultivate in a yoga practice that help us become good listeners. The humility in child's pose is what we need to acknowledge that there are truths bigger than ours. The heart openers in backbends allow us to let go of hurts that may blocking our ability to truly hear the depth of what others say. The surrender in forward bends give us the release of our past. The courage required in inversions helps us be more open to what is different and unfamiliar and even what we perceive to be risky. Listening is to work on all of those, so that we can get deeply in touch with our own inner voice. If we suppress listening to truth of who we are, how can we expect to listen to the world at large? Therefore, in the practice of listening, include yourself. Living is not merely about moving from one thing to another, unconscious and lacking mindfulness. Living our lives to the fullest includes deeply listening to the pauses, the transitions, the ways in which we may choose to stop or have the stops made for us. Nada yoga is the yoga of sound and vibrations and music. And because it is so, this practice is available to us at all times, wherever we may be. Spend today being more in tune with deep listening. Listen to the sounds you hear around you-- the voices, the laughter, what is said and what is not said. Listen to the words in the conversations you are a part of-- the intention, the sincerity, the direction, the meaning of it all. Listen to the sounds of nature-- the soft sounds of leaves as they rustle against each other in the wind, or the distant chirp of birds, or the excited barks of a dog. Listen. Listen. Listen. And be willing to be changed by what you hear. Years ago, I wanted to strike off one item from my bucket list-- to go hang gliding. It happened that I was going on a trip to Europe, and I thought it would be more meaningful if I combined the trip with hang gliding. So I searched online and found this person who would be able to help me. It was not a center or a tourist spot. It was one person teaching hang gliding. I set up the day and time even though my online search did not give me a clear idea on how to get there by public transport. When I got to Milan, I hopped on a train that I thought would bring me to the general direction of that area. After some time, it dawned on me that I may be on the wrong train. I mustered up some courage and asked the friendly-looking fatherly man in front of me "Is this train going towards Varese?" He gave me a polite smile, spoke in Italian something that meant he did not understand English. I took out my map, unfolded it, and pointed to the area that I wanted to go. And thus started our two-language conversation. He spoke Italian the whole time, and I English. At one point, he must have asked what I wanted to do there, and I raised my arms up shoulder height and tilted from side to side, and he excalimed "volare!" and it sounded right for whatever reason, so I joined his excitement and said "si, si, volare!" It in fact meant flying, as I found out after-the-fact, and we understood each other enough that he was able to help me get to the right train in the end. This little episode is a testament to the focus of the month this month, which is: It's not what you say-- it's how you say it. We may think communicating is about language, the words we choose, the breadth of our vocabulary, the level of our eloquence. While those things are useful, they are not the only things that make up communications. Communicating is also about the tone we use, the starts and stops, the pauses in between, the gestures, the facial expressions, and perhaps most importantly and least emphasized is our intention. There is an intelligence we all have that we do not quite measure-- the ability to read and pick up each other's intentions. For today's practice, choose an intention in which you would like to communicate, be it to be speak more patiently or compassionately or openly. Let this intention root you. As you move from asana to asana, notice the tone and manner in which you speak to yourself. Is it consistent with your intention? If not, make no judgment. There is a reason why you chose that particular intention. Acknowledge it as a practice and keep picking up where you left off. When we come into challenging poses, is our internal dialogue one of acceptance or one of reproach? Often, how we speak to ourselves is also how we speak to others. If we find it easy to forgive ourselves, we find it easy to forgive others. If we are critical of ourselves, we are also critical of others. And these tendencies show up in our intentions; we emanate these vibrations, and however carefully we choose our words, our deepest intention will come out in some way for it to be known. When you come to virasana or hero pose, consider if the natural tendency that you have in speaking to others is a manner that uplifts others or a manner that puts others down. Choose to be a hero by practicing your intention, speaking with that motivation, communicating with that openness. The last time you had a miscommunication, did you state your intention to yourself clearly? Were you conscious of what you intended to do? Did you by default start to speak without truly listening to the other person? Offer your last urdha danurasana to this person you had miscommunications with, and in your mind speak to this person with your chosen intention, such that the next time you communicate, you will be able to carry this clear deliberate intention. It's not what you say-- it's how you say it. If we chose our intentions well before we let the words come out, perhaps our own lives would be a lot more peaceful. It's not what you say-- it's how you say it. If we communicated by truly listening, our interactions would be an exchange and not an imposition of our own views. It's not what you say-- it's how you say it. If we acknowledge that deep down we share the same intention in seeking happiness and freedom, our words will start to hold the power of uniting rather than separating. |
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March 2020
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