The world is real.

Thanks for taking a look at the blog. I hope you're doing well and staying cool enough, without diminishing your own fire and light.

I'm fired up enough today to try to bring light to a yoga that acknowledges the world as real. And complex and complicated. We want it simple, but the world will always offer us more.

It's understandable, of course, that most yoga will offer escape from a world viewed as illusion, or simply a world that is too much. And we need that sometimes, and sometimes we need that a lot.

But that's not the yoga I will generally offer.

The body is real, the mind is real, the emotions are real. Suffering is real. Joy is real. The world is big enough for all of it at the same time. 

I advocate for embracing it, and least in life-size portions, and offer practices to help you do so. The practice must begin there, I think. 

Embrace the paradox that more than one thing can be true.

Rather than saying something fundamental about your experience or yourself is a lie, you might instead ask yourself, "What else is true? What else could be true?"

These questions help you to see the possibilities that might be hidden or taken for granted. They might help you to restore your creative flow or simply see other solutions.

(Of course this isn’t the same as saying people don’t lie. Wait a minute. Or is it? Or that that aren’t facts. Anyway….)

The mythic mindset toward life doesn't deny any aspect of it or divide it into true and untrue. The mythic mindset asks a different question: What could this mean? And then asks it again.

The mythic mindset embraces the power of consciousness, of knowing, but must also embrace the power of not knowing and the unknown. The fertile darkness.

The ritual learning process of moving from darkness to light, from unconscious to conscious and then back again. That's the creative pulse. The circadian rhythm of waking and dreaming. And includes the zone of overlap and transition.

How will your yoga practice tune you into these rhythms and move you into deeper engagement with everything that is real? Including your sadness and grief, your anger and fear and panic?

As the ancient Vedas said, three-fourths of the universe is hidden. How would you engage that larger world?

If you hide from or deny your anger, fear, and sadness...your depression, anxiety, and suicidal urges...your jealousy, envy, and confusion...how much will you have diminished your power and capacity to take effective action?

Rest. Sleep. Dream. Awaken.

Repeat.