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Most people who practice yoga regularly have at least a passing acquaintance with the 8 Limbs of Yoga as outlined by Pantanjali in the Yoga Sutras.  I wrote a series of posts on them last year.  The first two limbs are the Yamas and Niyamas - guidelines to live your life by – guidelines which, for the last decade, I have been trying my best to live my life by.

Yama numero uno is Ahimsa, often translated as non-harming or non-violence.  In the yoga world Ahimsa tends to go arm-in-arm with vegetarianism or veganism.  Which is just great, until you realise you might be causing harm to yourself.

Earlier this year when my health was really bad, when I ached all over every day, woke up every morning feeling like I’d been hit by a bus, when I looked too skinny and drawn and had dark circles under my eyes, I went to see a nutritionist.  We talked for a long time about this, that and the other.  And we came to the conclusion that a) I was protein deficient and b) I needed to start thinking about cutting inflammatory foods out of my life (ie diary and wheat).

I have eaten very little dairy for years, on the whole it makes my stomach do things that you don’t really want your stomach to do. No problem, dairy can pretty much go.  Wheat….well I’d had an idea in the back of my mind since the end of last year that I should probably look into how much wheat I eat.  After a few false starts and a long conversation with my lovely friend Svasti, I have been pretty much wheat-free for three months!  And I do feel better; less bloated, less sore, and I really do notice when I (either accidentally or otherwise) do eat wheat. So wheat and dairy.  Gone!

But then there was the protein issue.  For one reason or another I just wasn’t absorbing enough protein from vegetable sources and it wasn’t that I wasn’t eating the right foods, it was just that my body wasn’t doing what it should.  I tried various things, including taking a bunch of digestive enzymes before every meal.

I already ate eggs, but the nutritionist I spoke to thought I should start eating fish (which I have to admit didn’t take much persuading), and maybe some chicken (again it took a lot less persuading than you’d think) and Himself saw the whole thing as a massive excuse to barbecue a lot of different lumps of flesh…..

Ultimately, I have never been vegetarian because I don’t like meat.  I do, I love it.

There I said it.

Ultimately I have always been vegetarian because I don’t want other living beings to die because of me, I don’t want to cause harm, I just want to be guided by Ahimsa.

But as I said, what if you are inadvertently causing yourself harm?

The school of yoga in which I trained teaches that everybody’s body is unique and all of us need different practices and that practice will change as we progress through the cycles of life.  And over the last couple of years I have come to believe that the same is true of diet.  There is no “one diet fits all”.  I know a lot of vegans and raw foodies who are so full of energy it’s a beautiful thing to see but when I eat like that (and I know this is true for others as well), I feel quite the opposite; lethargic and tired.

Over the last few months, as my diet has slowly changed to remove the inflammatory foods and include more organic animal protein (as well as discovering that I don’t digest leafy greens and most raw vegetables very well either), I have started to feel much more like my old self; less tired and much more zingy! I have also noticed my hair, skin and nails are vastly improved.

I spent so long worrying about non-harming towards other living beings I had forgotten about having a non-harming attitude towards myself.  My health has always been a struggle, and I do need to keep on top of it.  I need to be kind to myself and live the life that suits me best, without allowing myself to be made to feel guilty by other’s interpretations of the Yamas or the paths that other people must tread.  If I do not keep on top of my own health, keep myself in top condition, how can I be expected to serve others in my work?

Alistair Shearer, in his interpretation of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, asks us to think about Ahimsa as “a dynamic peacefulness that is prepared to meet all situations with a loving openess.  It is the state of living free from fear.”

To live free from fear we must put judgement aside, love ourselves as much as we love others (for how can we truly know love if we do not show it to ourselves) and find the path that suits our own unique body, our own unique mind, our own unique soul.

I am, as always, a work in progress.

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Himself has a little bit of a man-crush on Jared Leto. Some of you will remember him from My So-Called Life and American Psycho. In this house it’s all about his second incarnation as frontman of 30 Seconds to Mars. They’re not a bad band, as bands go (I for one particularly like their This is War album), but what is astounding about them is their following. The die-hard fans call themselves The Echelon, go out of their way to promote gigs and albums and other appearances, tattoo themselves in the strange Illuminati-type symbols that Jared tattoos on his arms and know all the call and response/hand symbols to the songs. If you ever get a chance to see 30 Second to Mars live on MTV or something like that you’ll see what I mean.

Himself doesn’t really get it. He loves the man and the music, he just doesn’t get the strange cult-like following.

But I do.

You see it reminds me of New Model Army gigs in the late 80s/early 90s. We, the die-hard fans, called ourselves The Family. We travelled far and wide to see them play. We knew all the words to all the songs, as well as the actions (that is less lame than it sounds…. honestly!). We tattooed ourselves with celtic knots and always bought the t-shirt. And if one of us fell down in the mosh-pit someone would always pick us up again.

(the moshpit c. 2006 – a bit balder, a bit fatter but still going strong!!)

It’s about a need to belong. It’s about feeling like a lost lonely little freak, about nobody at your school understanding you and then, suddenly discovering this band that speak to you. Discovering that, amongst the other fans, you’ve found people who finally get you. You’ve found somewhere you can relax and be yourself. Who you really, truly are. No holds barred.

This need to be part of a tribe is primal. Those feelings start when you hear the record. But when you see the band live, pressed against the heat and vitality of other living souls who feel the same way as you it goes beyond that. Beyond time, to that place where we are all a spark of something else. Something special.

Why am I telling you this?

Because it happens in yoga too.

I know for a fact there are people reading this that know what I mean. That feeling of finally having found home when you walk into a yoga class. That feeling of finally belonging.

In our yoga class we know the dance, we know all the words, we know the call-and-response chants and the secret hand gestures (mudras). And we feel that primal belonging as we practice alongside others, that spark of life that lies within us all.

Those of you who know Linda will know that she refers to her husband’s passion for music as “his yoga”. And we all have that. It might not be a yoga class. But everyone has that place where they belong, where they’ve finally found what they were looking for. And if you haven’t, I promise you, it’s just around the corner if you keep your eyes, your mind and your heart wide open.

“Some people ask us if this is a cult; I say this:
It’s something special. It’s not for everyone – it’s only for those who understand.”
–Jared Leto

I still feel the call to New Model Army gigs at least once a year. I still call myself Family as proudly now as I did when I was 14. I can’t help it, the pull is strong, the desire to belong.

Almost as strong as the call to yoga.

I woke up this morning and realised November is over half way through.  How did that happen?  Where did it go?  Christmas is almost upon us (yesterday I made curried parsnip soup to begin the festivities) and in just four short weeks I’ll be closing the clinic for the holidays.

Wow!

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This year has been incredible on so many levels; but it’s also been hard. Really, really hard.

Ten and a half months ago I wrote a post choosing my word of the year and what I hoped to do to get there.  I chose Joy.  I chose that word rather naively hoping that, after a couple of years of trials and tribulations I could just be allowed to be happy and joyous.

Life doesn’t work like that though does it?  To be happy, to live the life you dream of, to make the waves you want to make you have to work your butt off.

With the benefit of hindsight’s 20/20 vision it would be more pertinent to have chosen Healing as my word of the year.  Because there has been a lot of that readers.  But out of that healing has come joy abundant and I find myself, at the end of this year with a little business that’s almost sustaining itself, the ability to pick and choose my own clients and my own hours, sitting down to breakfast every morning with Himself safe in the knowledge that these days neither of us have to commute anywhere very often.  There’s food in the fridge, a roof over our heads (although I predict a move in our future – more on that next year), money in the bank (mostly).

There are memories, like our amazing month in Australia to look back on, and the beginnings of a future plan to look forward to.  There has been the arrival of Dave the Stray Cat (much to the consternation of the spoiled house-cats).  There’s been Pilates Teacher Training (done and done – thanks crooked body for being so unimaginably strong!) and that phenomenal weekend in Durham when I got the green light to start to teach BWY Foundation Course Tutor Training (whatever I say, yoga will always be my first and foremost love).

But then there’s been the chronic anxiety and the terrible health, the low iron levels, the damn trapped nerve in my neck - I’ve written a lot of Small Stones this year to try to keep me present and a lot of gratitude lists to help me remember how much worse it could be.  There’s been counselling and coaching and a lot of lightbulb moments about where I’m going wrong, where the anxiety is coming from and where I’m self-sabotaging.   There’s been a lot of blood tests and a lot of trips to the doctor and that horrible moment when I realised that why yes osteoporosis is hereditary and I await an appointment for my bone scan.

I made the decision to stop eating wheat and start eating meat (there’s a poem in that), which was a hard decision but the right one for me for many, many reasons.  I have written a lot, but none of it what I thought it was going to be (maybe that will become clearer next year, maybe it won’t) and I think I may have a better handle on my finances (with thanks to the amazing Nona Jordan and this course – which I cannot recommend highly enough. There’s another one starting in January)

There are big things coming I know, not least that move I was talking about and the whole writing and presenting my first Foundation Course.  But that’s OK.  I am a different person now to who I was 12 months ago, as though I have been broken apart and rebuilt, and I will be different again in 12 months’ time.

2011 – you’ve taught me an important lesson in balance.

2012 – I’m ready for you, bring it!