Pulling threads
Notes and news from the present moment, on its swift way to becoming past.
Asteya - The Yama of Non-Stealing
The third yama in Patanjali's Yoga Darshan is asteya, or non-stealing. Not committing acts of theft seems like an obvious virtue. More subtly, asteya also applies to speech and to thinking — to not claim what is not ours, to not cheat, nor misappropriate. How do we steal, how do we take what is not offered? We may do so in unawareness, unconsciously; or, more deliberately, out of a sense of not having enough, of not being enough. Could this apply to this end-of-year and a seasonal hunger for what we don't have — for the future, for the past, for things as we wish they could be?
Life Is Art Is Life
At the beginning of 2020, besides thinking about the yamas and niyamas, I chose a word to be my focal aspiration for the year. (Much more helpful than a resolution!) My word was “concordance,” which is to bring all parts together in harmony.
In Essence
Essence, harmony, truth … satya is the glue that holds the formed universe together. Precepts and seed-thoughts for thinking through…
Ahimsa and the Centipede
For a period at the beginning of this year, I framed my yoga classes with the yamas and niyamas: ten guiding principles or ethics of yoga philosophy. I listed them at the beginning of each class, and invited participants to choose the most resonant precept, the one that caught their ear, and to draw into deeper consideration of it.
The precept that continues to resonate for me through this whole year, is the one taught first, the seed of all the others: ahimsa, or non-killing, non-harming, non-violence. Read how sangha, aversion, and a big bug show up as teachers.