U is for Understanding

 

 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.

 If you've been following me through the alphabet this year you've probably come to see that one of the primary purposes of yoga is to gain a greater understanding of oneself.  To see the patterns of behavior that keep us stuck, to draw connections between those patterns and the things that trigger us in everyday life, and then to consciously observe ourselves when being triggered so that we can change those patterns by doing things differently.  There's a lot of tools that all come under the general category of yoga to help us in these tasks, but that quest for understanding is at the core of all of them.

 

I used to think, based on my professional experience, that understanding came from telling the story, dissecting it and studying it (much the same way one would in a lab- through logical, orderly testing and note-taking.)  Based on my experience in applying the techniques of yoga to my own personal journey of self-exploration I've come to believe that these techniques I've described through the month (meditation, asana, artistic creation, tribal discussion and all the rest) are far more effective and efficient tools.  Understanding doesn't come from telling a story.  It comes from feeling- mindfully, with total awareness and with all the compassionate observation in the world.

Because that is the place where change comes from.