This weekend marks the full moon, the time when I’ve been doing my daily sadhana for two full weeks and I believe the perfect time to let you in on what I’ve been up to!
While I was in my 500 hour teacher training, I learned the art of a sadhana. Sadhana has many translations that I have found, but the one I like best at the moment is “a discipline undertaken in pursuit of the goal.” The way my teacher explained it to me was that we don’t necessarily have to do physical asanas and meditation every day for the sadhana, but we need to keep yoga in our heart as we do SOMETHING each day. My yogi friend Charlotte used this as an opportunity to take advantage of her pool membership and would go swimming every day. One friend made mala beads, while another took time out for herself every day before the kids got back from school. Many chose to actually practice yoga in a studio for 30 days. Whatever it was, they had a discipline they were working with over the course of the month.
I’m not going to lie, when I started it was one of the hardest things I had ever done and I often forgot halfway through. Practicing yoga everyday in my head still meant to practice, even if it was “just at home.” Over the course of my training I started to realize that it was so much more than that and I created my own. One month I concentrated on meditation. The next month I focused in on my writing or reading of beloved yoga books. It felt better every time I stepped into my discipline, but that’s not to say it was suddenly easy.
That is entirely not the case with this sadhana. It could be that I’ve structured it differently and given it more thought prior to jumping in, it could be that I’m the teacher and the one who recommended the assignment so I want to be sure I complete this task or it could be that my soul finally GOT IT and tapped into the idea that doing something every day is good for me. For whatever reason, I’m keeping track this time and I feel amazing. I’m radiating from the inside out.
For this particular sadhana, I went above and beyond. I told my students to take a concept we had learned over our first weekend and think of it throughout the time we were apart….and then I went ahead and chose every concept for myself. That’s right: everything. We learned the 8 limbs, 7 chakras, meditation, history of yoga etc. I decided that for me this meant I would go through the limbs and chakras slowly. Each day I would awaken to a theme and try to live my life that day based on this theme. Today for example is svadayaya, self-study (I’m ALMOST done with the yamas & niyamas).
Throughout the last few days, I’ve had the opportunity to dig into cleanliness (saucha) where I cleaned my entire apartment top to bottom, including our refrigerator. I’ve played with aparigraha (non-greed) and given my love to others, while also giving away some of Zyan’s clothes that no longer fit him. Today I’m working with the art of self-study and reading a few really great books while Ziggy-man plays in his bouncer and I start my morning ritual of coffee, cleaning & reading. It’s such a beautiful study.
The really great thing about this project I have created for myself is that I am in control of it. The day I was supposed to do tapas (discipline), I ate two donut muffins and had 5 cups of coffee and did not work out. I considered that a fail of sorts, as you’re supposed to have control for tapas. It’s the art of creating fire and I doused mine in snacks instead of building heat within. So instead of being mad at myself, I just repeated the theme the following day and I knocked it out of the park: less eating junk, a workout, a home practice etc. I make the rules and it feels so good and so easy to do so!
I’m excited to see what comes up next. The last few days have been a magical adventure. I’ve recorded all my happenings in my journal, allowed myself to read a passage from the bible each day alongside my passage on the limbs (and chakras to come). I have felt more balanced in the last three weeks than I have in months. As I read Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic, I can feel my balance start to restore. I know my creativity is coming back to me, my writing is seeping back in while I feel the pregnancy hormones finally leave my body (alongside massive amounts of hair… seriously, I feel like I’m going bald! haha). But honestly, I’m restoring myself with this sadhana. I feel energetic enough to make healthy & delicious dinners again, happy enough to practice on my mat at home and secure enough in myself to follow my yoga theme each day.
I cannot recommend doing a sadhana enough! It’s an elegant practice in self-awareness. And I’ve been there on the other side of this. I know how difficult it can be to complete 30 days of anything. Once you’ve done it a few times, it finally feels good. So keep going. Keep dreaming or writing. Keep pushing for whatever it is you want to accomplish. YOU CAN DO whatever it is you want in this life. So keep believing, move forward and allow yourself to be catapulted into the future with love and light.
Get out there, do “yoga” every single day and make your life sparkle!
Namaste
Jenny