Monday, July 18, 2011

Catch me I'm falling Part 2

I can't help but wonder what the little bird thinks when he's shoved out of the nest. What is the momma bird thinking? I suppose the momma bird knows when the time is right and she knows that it's the natural process of things.  But what about baby bird? What thought crosses it's mind at the moment when he realizes he's no longer safe in the nest but now in mid-air without the nest beneath him?

My guess is that he's thinking.... "OH HELL! I HOPE THESE WINGS WORK!!!"

I suppose at some point we all get that little shove from the universe. What we do next is up to us. We can do nothing and crash head first into the earth or we can flap our wings as hard as we can and hope for the best. After all, isn't this what we've been preparing for all along?

We ask the Divine for what we want but then we let fear hold us back from what we want. We humans are so strange. Haven't we realized yet that life is too short to sit in the nest day-dreaming about flying?

Attachment, I've discovered is really about fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failure. We're safe where we are even if where we are is no longer serving us. We become attached to what we know. What is familiar to us.

I watched my nephew clinging to the wall at the roller skating rink. He so badly wanted to skate with the other kids but he was afraid to let go of the wall. So he skated but only along the wall. One hand on the wall and the other hand reaching out towards the center of the rink where the real skating was happening.

Holding on to the wall is okay at first but at some point we need to trust in ourselves and let go of the support we've grown so attached to and stand, or fall, on our own. We may fall down a few times in the beginning but eventually we will find that we have learned more than we ever imagined.

I have been given an incredibly wonderful opportunity to share my passion for yoga sadhana as part of a new yoga teacher training program. It's an opportunity I've been asking the Divine for so why was I letting fear hold me back? I've been skating with one hand on the wall and other reaching for what I wanted all along. I couldn't reach it because I'm depending too much on the wall for support. 

For months the Divine has been showing me that the wall was no longer serving me but I couldn't let go. I didn't have the confidence in myself and I had become very dependent on that support.

(Oh..... I just had a realization..... perhaps this is why SD isn't a fan of props. Maybe, like the wall, the props make us too comfortable and we don't challenge ourselves enough when we get too comfortable.)

So God, in his infinite wisdom, has given me a big shove out of the nest. Here I am mid-air. What's going through my mind?

OH HELL!! I HOPE THESE WINGS WORK!!!!

3 comments:

  1. Attachment is all about fear. I agree. I think it also shows the fear of change--nonattachment also means we don't fear death as we do not attach our Self to this body. This is so hard for us, but the fact that we even see it is half the battle.

    Good blog.

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  2. God in his infinite wisdom has once again given me an opportunity to practice nonattachment. The notebook where I've bee keeping notes to prepare for this teacher training fell out of my bag and ended up on th floor of my car. Apparently the extreme heat dried the ink on the pages and most of my notes are gone!! Ganesha has not been my friend lately. I think I need to do a puja to Ganesha.

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  3. Oh, I just read this. Let's talk again this Saturday. I doubt I will go to NY for this yoga workshop--the heat will be too much. We can go over some stuff. Man, I hate it when I lose anything that I've written or someone wrote to me.

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