Second Sunday in Advent (2018) - Let me just like a tree

"When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all." ― Herman Hesse

                       

One of my favorite yoga asanas is the Tree pose (Vriksasana) - due to the difficult simplicity of the position. Moving from Mountain (Tadasana), you slowly lift one leg, raise your arms, and work to stay in balance. The asana works to move you to understand where your body is in the space around it, while also working to ground your energy in a specific time.

When I first began my yoga journey, I was a beautifully naive twenty-something. Young and full of life, yoga, in my thoughts, was going to be easy. My brain kept saying, "We are gonna master this in like two weeks, and will be the star yogi of the class."

Well, it didn't quote go like that, because the first two weeks of learning Pranayama sort of shattered my illusions of becoming instantly enlightened. Also, I could stay in Mountain or Tree for more than one minute, and my frustration levels began to rise.

But I stuck with it.

Today's podcast is a short Tree of Life meditation. It's a simple way to reconnect to yourself, and to the world around you. Even if you only have a few minutes, visualize your feet being grounded into the Earth, with your arms and hands reaching up to the sky. Be your own axis mundi, and allow your light to shine across all time and space. And remember to let the Universal light shine back to you - we are all connected, and it's important to keep our part of the web strongly grounded.

Let us be just like a tree,
keu/Yarn and Zen