B is for Bhava

 

 As always, a huge shout out to Ninja Minion Master Captain Alex and his army of ninja minions! 

My Theme: Yoga.  For those of you who don't know, I've been working on obtaining my yoga teacher's certification for the past year and am just a little over a month from graduating with my RYT200.  As such, I figure there's no better way to spend this month than teaching you folks some of what I've learned.

Today's post is about Bhava, which translates from Sanskrit as "status of being".  In other words, it refers to you being you, being the most you.  In my teaching, we have come to look at it as our soul juice- the essence of us, the stuff that makes us US.

One of the first things we started talking about at the beginning of my training was our "bhava moments" or the moments in which we feel most like ourselves.  Not surprisingly, bhava moments come when we are truly present and engaged in the activity we're doing (especially when that activity is something we really love).

My bhava moments were ones in which I was writing, doing karate, running, doing therapy, communing with nature, and- of course- doing yoga.  So these posts, in some fundamental ways, are me talking about my bhava.

In some ways the practice of yoga is about really tapping into your bhava.  It's about identifying the behaviors you get caught up in that prevent you from being the best version of you and rooting them out so you can live a more authentic life.  It's about finding the things that make you feel alive and being truly present, focused, and aware while doing those things.  And, in possibly a larger way, learning to truly love that YOU.  (Perhaps why this practice has enhanced my self esteem more than literally anything else I've ever tried.)

When it comes down to it, life is about finding our bhava moments, sucking the juices out of them, and really living.  So whatever your bhava may be- be it writing, parenting, reading, building, painting, boxing, teaching, solving or any of the countless other endeavors we can pursue in this lifetime- do it fully.  Don't let yourself be distracted by what came before or what's coming up next.  Be present, be aware, be grateful.   Bhava.