There’s more to life than this

Spiritual practices variously talk about “the way” (Daoism), following “the path” (Buddha Dharma), realising “the view” (also Buddha Dharma), and cultivating transformation by way of  “a return to wholeness” (Yoga). All of these are descriptors, indicators and signposts, intended to alert us to an approach to living, to life, to understanding both living and life, that can show us that there is, as Bjork aptly puts it, “more to life than this” – where “this” is the world of likes, dislikes, aversion, sorrow, disappointment and dissatisfaction.

It's easy and fair to say that modern life has much to answer for when it comes to generating the aforesaid disappointments – industrialisation, capitalism, colonialism, materialism, social media, and all the other nefarious agendas created by mankind (and it is largely mankind, although of course suffering is genderless and we all have a part to play in it, whether we orchestrate or get caught up in it, but nonetheless, patriarchy) have created systems that want us to want, desire, yearn and strive.

Because that fuels the beast and keeps us tethered, trapped, losing our minds and our sense of our essential human nature in the merry-go-round of temporary dopamine hits from attainment and achievement.

Yet it has always been thus, albeit in different contexts and modalities. The world has always presented its challenges and its miasmas – challenges in the form of mystery and uncertainty you might see, which the human mind, grasping for meaning, mistakes for a problem and seeks to impose a solution.

Hence spiritual practices emerged thousands of years ago to offer a way out and through of the cycle and the trap – and a return to the realisation that the world, and our mind, when freed from the discriminatory views of good/bad, this/that, is perfect as it is.

It's all about perspective and action

"All" we need to do is stop, step off and away from the rush, and reset.

Lately I've been returning to the fundamentals of my own combinatory practice - in terms of body and mind. Switching off from social media for a time, and more regularly from time to time, as well as turning my attention to physical books and newspapers rather than on-screen alternatives, has really helped - with focus, attention, ease, concentration and satisfaction. In short, because of the lack of distractions.

BKS Iyengar's Light on Yoga is one of those books that I have read over and over, and find something afresh each time. Right now, my own writing projects, as well as several I've been commissioned to work on, are focused on our relationship with the Earth, on re-imagining and re-inhabiting a mutually respectful sense of place in space.

I've been sitting and practicing with these words from Iyengar in particular:

"As a farmer ploughs a field and makes the ground soft, a yogi ploughs his nerves so they can germinate and make a better life. The practice of yoga is to remove weeds from the body so that the garden can grow....

"What we are really doing is infusing dense matter with vibrant energy. That is why good practice brings a feeling of lightness and vitality. Though the mass of our body is heavy, we are meant to tread lightly on this Earth."

Weeding is something I find myself doing regularly, as one must - quite literally in terms of removing the weeds that might otherwise deprive the plants we're growing of nutrients and light, as much as figuratively, in terms of uprooting and clearing the debris that scatters my mind.

This is the point. To read, ponder, apply and integrate - rather than consume, accumulate, acquire and move on to the next thing (which is what social media and a lot of on-screen mediums deliberately encourage us to do). I feel this is what Iyengar means when he emphasises the importance of "reflective intelligence", of considering what we are doing and why, how we are moving and what impact that has on our inner world as much as the outer, saying:

"Action is movement with intelligence. The world is filled with movement. What the world needs is more conscious movement, more action."

Integrating wisdom

Writing is similarly a practice of weeding, of finding release, and ultimately freedom - because it frees up space when we have a place to put the thoughts and feelings that might otherwise run our minds ragged on unguarded repeat.

Just as the wise and inspired words of others can shed light on the feelings and thoughts we might not (yet) have a way to express, our own words - however messy and random - have enormous power and potential to illuminate all that we might not otherwise fully see. They give us the tools to process, to release, and to move on with greater clarity.

That's why I find a combinatory approach to practice so powerful - one that tends to the body, the mind, the heart and the spirit. That's also why I believe in the power and the potential of practices that invite us all to integrate what we feel, what we learn, about how we inhabit our bodies, our lives. It's this whole integrative approach that underpins my offerings - including my forthcoming 6-week programme, Let Your Words Lead the Way.

We'll be sitting and practicing with the wise words of others as well as weeding and tending to our own, aided by restorative yogic practices designed to bring forth what needs to be released. Come take some precious time to see, feel and find out for yourself. We begin on 15 August.....