I took a yoga class several years ago with my good friend and amazing yoga teacher (Raquel Pennington) that I will never, ever forget. It was the first time I had finally made it to that particular class of hers- which I had been planning to and “trying to” take for months. It was a mid-morning gentle basics class. Gentle was an idea I loved and knew I needed, but I didn’t really understand it in my own body or in practice fully. I understood the concept and even taught it. I can honestly say I didn’t get it though. This time, I made it to the class and she opened with the theme of the practice: be soft. We were essentially going to learn how to soften and surrender energy for 75 minutes. It sounded perfect and I was ready. She had us set up all of our props so we could begin in a gentle, supported reclined position. I mean very supported. Bolsters, blocks, blankets- all the comfort. Everyone made their way down easily. Meanwhile I was having a pretty hard time just getting myself situated. I was fidgeting, wiggling, trying to adjust the props and my body here or there until eventually my friend came up to my mat, she put her hand on lightly on my forearm and kindly said, “Sam. Just stop moving.” It was pose number one. We weren’t going to be there for more than a couple minutes, but I was already uncomfortable and wanted to be comfortable and I guess I needed to stop moving. Upon my friend’s instruction, I stopped. It didn’t relieve all my wants and feelings of needing to keep wriggling around or try to get comfortable or try to relax. But for that pose and in each pose after that, I was definitely becoming aware that I maybe didn’t know how to stop. I learned what being soft entailed: surrendering. It was pretty mind-blowing to experience so much challenge. It was a huge lesson in self-awareness and a revelation that there was an entire way of doing things that I thought I knew but didn’t know how to actually do. I’m sure I had practiced a theme like this or in this realm before. But this day maybe I was paying more attention, I was more open and ready to try. It felt like an invitation and I was accepting it the most consciously and in full participation. At the time I could only imagine what kind of balance this would probably manifest physically and beyond if I continued practicing this way- which I had every intention to and absolutely did. It’s one of the classes in my practice thus far that sticks out the way that it does because it illuminated an imbalance and
For the most part, I think it’s pretty safe to say that we all know somewhere deep inside how we do things. I believe that whether we’re fully aware of it or not we know that we are more inclined to co-participate with life in one way more than another. Realizing it fully is a different story. And then beyond that, whether we know, realize and then look to practice finding or creating balance is also a whole other. Clearly just based on what I’ve shared personally here and in other journal entries, there’s knowing and then there’s practicing. Practicing is the process of knowing through some type of action.
The Buddhists have a proverb: "To know and not to do is not yet to know"
I remember seeing that quote etched into a bench overlooking the ocean somewhere on a dock in Morro Bay recently. I kept staring at it and kept feeling it strike. Because we all do this. We know but often don’t practice. Thank goodness for yoga. This class woke me up to what I knew but didn’t really know yet. I hadn’t practiced truly surrendering my power. I didn’t really know how to let go so I could relax on bolsters. Was this how I was doing everything? (turned out, pretty much yes…) My go-to quality was effort. I knew how to do so much and too much. And since that class it has been a continuous work in progress.
The concept this week is to draw awareness to both of the opposing but balancing qualities of effort + surrender. When we practice both effort + surrender on our mats we enter into a divine opportunity to cultivate a balanced experience, to experience the other side of things while appreciating the side we are on. We get to consciously attend to whatever subliminal or deliberate requests have been made within. Maybe requests that have been made for some time but haven’t been given attention- until now. Remember, we all know inside what we need even we are not making big, fully-conscious choices to attend to them. Be it the mind, the body, the heart, our Spirits. Whatever part or parts of us is whispering or yelling because it’s overworked and exhausted, in need of complimentary support. This practice is our graceful act of truly knowing how to tip the scale. Now does that mean leaning on one end is wrong or bad? I don’t believe so. It’s all about balance- which we can understand to mean that we are learning to teeter. Because we will always lean to one side, work harder than we need to, or sometimes not give as much energy as we need to feel supported and strong. This is simply a space to up the learning curve and to embody more than just our usual way, or one way of being. We are often yearning for the opposite of what we know and do regularly. Sometimes it’s subtle and sometimes, like in my case in that one class, it’s big.
On the mat we can look at how we hold ourselves in each shape. Each shape being different than another and representative of circumstances that we can relate to as feeling similar in our bodies. We become aware of how much energy we are putting into the pose, how much effort we are giving to be in the pose. At the same time, we become aware of how much we are releasing and relinquishing in the pose. Can we surrender some of our effort?
We work this message into our asana practice by playing with what effort + surrender can mean. This is done often and in so many intelligent and sophisticated ways by so many different teachers. No one class on this theme is ever the same and always enlightens. The universality and numerous ways to experience the dynamics of effortful energy and surrendering of energy is greater than one class or one teacher or one category of pose. In my class this week, we are pairing effort + surrender a couple different ways: one way is through identifying and feeling physical engagement (contraction) and stretch (expansion) in our poses. As one of my other friend-yoga teacher, Keric says, “I think it’s safe to say that we all come to yoga because we want to get stronger and also to become more flexible.” I/we hear it all the time. And often we conceptualize one to mean only effort or only surrender. When in reality, the body attains both at its best when we are engaged as we stretch. Without enough engagement, a muscle that is lengthening can be at risk of stretching past it’s true capacity. Maybe putting our tendons at risk of stretching- which they aren’t really meant to do. And on the other hand, if we are looking to engage and we are so engaged that we are tense, we may end up producing more tension and a limited range of motion and potential. Flexibility is way more complex than what we think of as stretching, but in general, the flexibility of muscle (or group of muscles) relies heavily on the balance of contracting (effort) and relaxing (surrender). Then we can talk about lengthening the muscle without worrying about it. Just as an example: in TT this past weekend during our anatomy module we learned about thigh muscles and discussed “yoga butt”. Heard of it? Happened to you? It happens to a lot of yoginis in practice when there isn’t enough focus on engaging but more focusing on extending and lengthening. In “yoga butt’s” case, in the hamstrings. The imbalance can lead to a sharp pain caused by a strain, pull or even tear at the upper hamstring close to the sit bones. All “yoga butt” needs is a little effort! We can practice that in other areas of the body similarly. Effort and surrender.
The second way is through exploring and playing with balance in inversions (or any pose where your head is below your heart/upside down stuff!). Going upside down is such an “abnormal” physical concept as we grow older- until or unless practiced of course. Which makes it a perfect petri dish for cultivating and balance. If we put in too much effort when we go upside down, the body and the pose itself can feel tense, rigid and restricted. Meanwhile, if we are too surrendered and don’t apply enough effort, we can often feel like we’re lacking the support we need and want when we’re going upside down. With enough of both, we can produce a feeling that is both steady and free- on our hands, our forearms and our heads! Finding balance is about putting in enough effort and also not trying too hard. As Raquel would say, “work smarter, not harder.” Duh. But also, that’s really hard and we’ll both be the first to admit it. And that’s exactly why it’s a never-ending balancing act.
Our teachers in class encourage us to participate by way of observation, noticing, and feeling. At the end of the day, as much as the teacher is guiding you, the ultimate guide and teacher is always going to be our very own selves. We practice getting to know effort by seeing what it’s like to fully and genuinely try. We learn to relate to surrender by learning to grip less and consciously let something go- to not try so hard that we unconsciously stifle our own postures and experience. The observing, noticing and feeling maybe leads to finding a voice inside that learns to assert itself more when things aren’t quite right or even to ask how things are going. We can always ask ourselves in any pose if it feels like we are truly being effortful enough. Does the way this pose feels provide me with the information I need to confidently say that I’m putting in my fullest effort? Can I relax or soften somewhere? Broadening our perspective to know we’re not just giving ourselves the answer we always do or the answer that’s based on what we think we’re doing is part of what we gain in the process. In the end we’re doing more than teaching our bodies what effort and surrender are. We’re teaching ourselves on every level what it can mean to do both. If we can develop a voice that learns to check in on our balance while we’re on the mat, that voice leaves the mat with us and guides us into finding more balance in other aspects of our lives. Magic.
I love the notion that balance isn’t on one side, it’s somewhere in the middle of both and requires both. It feels far more representative of how life feels- always in flux and always doing that teeter. We can learn to teeter with it. We can learn to ride the waves. We can learn to find a rhythm that supports and nourishes our strongest, most flexible and expansive spirit. Learning to weigh in and even out is a way of learning our true potential.
In my practice and in my life, learning how to try less and relax more has opened up everything on and off the mat. I am better at applying effort without feeling like it has burdened. I don’t feel taxed when I give and I don’t feel incapable or out of my body when it comes to relaxing or stretching. I don’t do poses with my face anymore (you know what I’m talking about). Off the mat, I don’t work myself into a total state of malfunction. I have more energy because it’s not mostly going in one, exhausting, effort-based direction. These are just ways that this lesson and this practice have helped me grow and feel better. Your balance may be on a different end or could be already highly cultivated and practiced. This is just a reminder that there is a middle and that’s where the balance exists. It’s also a reminder that life moves, we move and things move constantly. We forget and we lean. Through practice we can remember the potential is there for us to see and continue to truly know. So whether you make it onto a mat with me in class or you simply read through this to upload the concepts and let them ruminate and sink into your heart to practice in your own ways- this is ultimately about discovering how to fortify the power you already possess so you can keep using it efficiently. Finding balance in our hamstring muscles or in our inversions becomes a way of understanding this bigger message of finding balance in maybe everything. The revelatory experiences we have in poses and practices in our highest and most balanced state transforms into a radical spiritual discovery as they expand our consciousness and help us move in a higher more balanced way off of our mats.