The Still Mind

Bikram is an intense form of Yoga. Postures are assumed inside of closed sauna like rooms where the temperature is about one hundred and five degrees. The most challenging aspect of Yoga for me has always been concentration. When I focus on discomfort and the amount of strength I am exerting to maintain difficult poses, I break and fall out of alignment.

One of my teachers, Jagadeesha, has helped me to overcome being startled out of form. He told me to detach and to remain present, engaging only what I will. “Be still,” he said. I have applied this teaching to my yoga practice with much success but have always strived to assume this attitude in my daily life. There are instances throughout all of our days when it seems that almost everything and everyone around us is vying for our peace. “React to me in anger,” they say, “stress, worry, doubt, fear, be annoyed, be irritated.”

Yet the reality of our life challenges is that we are better able to address them in a state of peace. Stress, fear, anger, irritation and the other emotions that I mentioned above, are all extremely detrimental to our well being in terms of physical and mental health as well as spirituality. The endocrine system is damaged when we err in these states too often and too long. Folk also develop ulcers and cancers and ultimately exist in a lower level of being.

Work, performance and creativity are also stifled by an inability to transcend the emotional and sensual body. In Irritation: The Destructive Fire, Torkom Saraydariah states, “Many promising artists fail on their path of success when they tolerate irritation moving in and poisoning their being.” I realize that in the same that I lose my stance during yoga by focusing on the negative, I lose my stance in my life’s work when I allow myself to focus on everything that is not a higher idea, higher vision or higher thought. I am not arguing that we should be impervious to our emotions but that we should allow ourselves to do as Badu advises in Bag Lady, “let it go”.

I absolutely refuse to allow anything to take away my peace and wholeness. Yet I realize that my attention must not be directed at everything and everybody who/that I perceive as a threat to my peace. I must focus on directing and remaining aware of the lens that I perceive the world with because it is at the root of every one of my dilemmas. It is also my salvation. Check any study, positive thinking is the secret of success. At this point I think of challenging situations as just that—challenges. The challenge exists so that I can exercise my resolve to be well and as I contend I grow stronger in it.

Strategies for maintaining peace

Patience
Joy
Beauty
Clear sight of goals
Love
Light
Mantras
Humility
Wisdom
Flowers