We know several things about life.  First, we are going to die and second, we reap what we sow, we sow what we reap! Both laws are incredible helpmates for us humans and they should act as our guides to go and shape a life that we want to live. Instead they are ignored by most and we live lives that produce stress and strain. We ask how do I make the stress go away?  But we do not ask the right question which should be:  What is it about the way I think, feel and act that produces stress?

Stress does not come from outside agencies. It comes from inside of us. It forms in our operating principals through the way we see the world and ourselves. Our beliefs, in layman’s terms, come from not what we do but how we do it.

So here I am on another plane with all of the above in mind and what do I see?  A plane full of magazines with humans covered by them not understanding that Us Weekly isn’t about Us! People really isn’t about People and In Touch gets you out of Touch!

Our heads are on celebrities, as my teacher says, rather the eternities, and on the Times rather than the Timeless.

The law of causation works perfectly and we are always sitting in the seat we created from our past choices. If we want to change the seat, then we must change ourselves starting now!

Instead of reading about other people’s dramas, work on taking the drama out of your life. Replace your fascination with other people’s lives with a dedication to make yours incredible.

Finally wake up each morning to a rich study of the universal principles of life rather than a dose of caffeine. Follow these simple instructions and you will sow one hell of a life.

Peace, EP

The first step in a yogi’s spiritual education is Sravana, which means studying the truths from the yoga scriptures particularly the Vedas (it is best to enlist the aid of a teacher to achieve this goal).

The second step is Manana, which is independent reflection upon those truths.  This involves thinking! Yes, spending quiet time contemplating on what you have studied, questioning it, and testing it.

I have come across many people who are very knowledgeable, but few whose philosophy, when tested, stands up to the challenges we face in life.  It’s great to read, wonderful hear.  But if we want to live, we must learn to think, study and question.

We must understand what is coming out of our mouths and be able to prove to ourselves through fact not make believe that what we “Believe” is real.

Few take the necessary time to figure out what life is really about; what we are suppose to do here and how to manage ourselves.

Don’t leave your life up to the universe!  Be the universe that creates your life, live it well and question your own beliefs!  Your beliefs must be based on reason and logic in order to defeat the obstacles we all face on this journey. Peace, EP

As I sit here looking for words to describe the journey I have been on, all I can think of is how I wish for unity within myself, for our Yoga Shelter and for all creatures.

I have literally lived in palaces, tents and today, I sat in a prison in Stone Town (Zanzibar) where over 6 million slaves were either sold or died because of starvation, dehydration, exhaustion or infection. I have seen what is left of our beautiful gorillas and the care that each family provides one another. I have absorbed the perfection of the Serengeti. Each animal perfectly designed to live and die for each other. I became part of a mountain that helped me reach bottom and then lifted me up to her top. I have cried and cried and cried. I have laughed. I have reflected. I have learned. I have witnessed the “quit” in me, the desperation to avoid discomfort in so many ways. I have witnessed the strength in me to keep going; the power to carry on; to journey forth and to keep moving forward.

So much of the world has so very little and does so much with it.  Yet so many of us have so very much and do very little with it.  Most people, here in Africa, work and live in dust, dirt and decay.

This past May I was locked out of my house and to this day I have not retrieved many of my belongings.  But never once was I homeless.  Never once was my bed a slab of stone, nor was the roof over my head half torn open leaving me exposed to the sun and rain.   Yet at times, I “felt” like it was the end of the world.  We, and that includes me as well, all are so spoiled that we make problems for ourselves out of sheer boredom.

Our Shelter is perfect, or its not, depending on how we look at it. Our students are amazing or annoying.  Its only a matter of what glasses we are looking through. Our business is hurting or its reigniting?  We are sitting in paradise or smelling shit! Check your pants, clean them out if you must.  But even “shit” in paradise is better than trying to find paradise in conditions that are not fit for animals.

Vedanta points out “all sorrow and misery you experience in life belongs to your egoistic self”.  Let us drop that little “I”, the “me”, and the “my”.  Yoga Shelter was founded and is run with a “we” attitude.

The beauty about the poorest village here is that everyone works together.  Lets not forget that our greatest resource is one another. When we stick together we are a force; objects and beings are at our beck and call.  When we work separately, we fall.

For me, Paradise has always been about one thing, sticking together.  Therefore, if we are to get “stuck”, lets get “stuck” together.

The stories we tell with our problems can always be outdone by another one’s woes. There is always someone better off or worse off than us.  But our duty lies not in comparing or contrasting our stories, our riches,  or our debts, but in keeping ourselves mentally self sufficient, self poised, and self pleased.  Our primary service to the world is to keep ourselves cheerful and happy.  All other services we perform are secondary!

As Swamiji says ” to be sorrowful is a social, moral and religious crime. You do not spread the disease of melancholy to your fellow men. Your highest duty, your religious duty in the world, therefore is to keep yourself peaceful and joyful. This is the duty demanded of you by your nation, society, family and yourself”.  If we adopt this philosophy in our classes everyday, only then can we be of service to the world and be successful as teachers and as people.

All of us want the same thing.  Our differences lie in how to get it and/or how it is delivered. If you are under a Yoga Shelter roof, set aside whatever “differences” you may have.  Remind yourself that we are all on the same mission.  Our peace lies in working together, in setting aside  gossip, jealousy, and objections.  Look for the similarities, not the differences, and then there will be the productivity and the peace that we all crave.

I leave you with this poem, by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, as a reminder of who we strive to be for ourselves, and who we need to be for our students and for one another.

Solitude

Laugh and the world will laugh with you,

Weep and you weep alone:

For this brave old earth must borrow its mirth,

It has sorrow enough on its own.

Sing and the hills will answer,

Sigh, it is lost on the air.

The echoes do bound a joyful sound,

But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice and men will seek you,

Grieve and they will turn and go:

They want full measure of all your pleasure

But they do not want your woe.

Be glad and your friends are many,

Be sad and you lose them all.

There is none to decline your nectared wine,

But alone you must drink life’s gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;

Fast, and the world goes by;

Succeed and give, and it helps you live,

But no one can help you die.

There is room in the halls of pleasure

For a long and lordly train,

But one by one we must all file on

Through the narrow aisles of pain.

Peace,

EP

I do not know who or what God is, but I do know that I need saving.  Often times the answers and help I receive to make me whole are not the ones I am looking for.

I have spent countless years fighting off the life jackets and life boats that have come my way because I did not like how they looked. Never once did my rejection of those life savers help me, other than to keep me from drowning.

The business of saving our asses is a tricky one.  Because the same head that gets us into trouble is the one that “invents” what the solution should look like, sound like and feel like. To make matters worse, it even tells us how long the problem should last and how quick the solution should work.

Of course when it does not go down as our mind intended it to, we give up, change courses and look for new solutions from the same mind!

The questions I ask myself all the time are, “am I willing to do what I do not want to do, and listen to what I do not want to listen to? Am I ready to take the heat from those that will not approve? Can I stand up to those that will misinterpret or twist my actions, words or intentions”?

These are but a few of the questions anyone who is yearning for change must be ready to answer. If change was easy, we would not have to talk about it so much.  Our world would not be full of self help groups, healing circles, therapists, therapies, books and DVDs that all talk about change.

Ever think about prison? How many of those prisoners tried to be different and just could not? More than you think! The truth is that most of us are stuck.   Many of us do not even know and those that do have one hell of a time changing, myself included.

I have taken change so seriously that I built an entire organization around it! An organization to protect me from me and to help others stretch beyond the confines of their own personality.

Yoga Shelter is a life saver and a game changer. It gives “the makeover business” new meaning. However, I have found being involved in it everyday does not exclude me from having to go through the treacherous struggle of change. It certainly does not absolve me from the resistance that comes up when I get the answers I need, but do not like.

What the Shelter helps with is offering support to go through the pain of “gain”. We all must understand there is a deep cutting pain that comes with real change,  especially the kind the breaks us free from attachment or addiction. The person who can go through this pain differs in only one way from the person who cannot, and that is they have a bit of knowledge. The person doing his or her work has the knowledge that the pain and discomfort that comes from the work is nothing compared to the pain and discomfort of staying the same.

In all my years of helping myself and others there is very little to do to get a person to see that truth.  It all comes down to pain tolerance. Those with a greater tolerance for pain will stay unhealthy for longer than those that do not.

Knowledge is what should make a human being change.  But it is pain that makes most of us change . Therefore pain is not always a bad thing.  In fact, in many cases, it is the impetus for change, truth and freedom. If this is so, then the discomfort that comes with change is only proof that one is changing, and that changes the meaning of pain and the impact it has on us.

We do not know… How many times were we convinced that someone was great and they were not? That someone who appeared awful turned out to be great? How many times have we been convinced that the worst has happened only to have it be the best?  Or the best thing turned out to be the worst?

From these scenarios, we should learn to suspend belief or disbelief and just “go with the flow”.  That, my friends is where its at!

Nature works in its own way.  Every creature is unique.  Each is designed for a wonderful purpose in keeping a balance in this ever changing world. The song bird sings, the eagle soars, the lion roars and well… we fuck things up!  BUT that is part of the perfection.  It has to be. We are the only creatures on earth able to be incredibly wonderful or horrible.  Yet, in spite of us, the world has always found a way to keep spinning.

I know what you are saying. It may “not be for long”.  Maybe so, but the point is all I can do, all you can do, is tend to the business of saving our asses and “go with the flow”.  Because we don’t know!

This might be the end of the world or it could be a new beginning. Sitting on the sidelines trying to figure it out, is not where life is at, brothers and sisters.

Life is to be lived with every breath, working on taking ourselves to our highest heights! The world cannot stop us from soaring.  Nor can it lift us up. We have to do it ourselves.

So yes, we ask for help and I know the Shelter family can help.  But then we must let go, let go of the fear of the way things “should” look or feel.  Let go of what others may think or do. Let go of where we may land, and when all of that letting go is done, we soar. We sail to a dream come true, sweet freedom alas…. I hope….

The story:

Clifford was leaning against the fence, enjoying a beautiful view of the Grand Canyon, when the wooden posts suddenly ripped from their cement moorings. Seconds later Clifford was plunging down into the abyss. Halfway to the bottom, his desperate arm waiving, helped Clifford catch and clutch a single branch that grew from the canyon wall. Grasping and gasping he looked both up and down. No way could he climb the sheer cliff. But below yawned the chasm, with nothing left to brace his fall. To fall would be to die and be horribly crushed by the rocks below. No one had seen him fall, and he hung there out of sight, knowing that the wind would scatter his weak voice no matter how loudly he shouted.

Desperately, Clifford cried out to heaven, “God help me!” Hearing his own trembling voice he shouted again, “please God help me”. To Clifford’s amazement he heard a voice respond. “All right” came the voice. The initial warmth Clifford felt turned to a chill as the voice continued, “let go”.

Looking down, Clifford saw the huge boulders waiting below and knew if he let go he would surely die. Let go? he thought…. “but God you don’t understand”!  He yelled. “I’m far up, I’ll”….

“Let go” the voice repeated.

Silence filled the canyon. Then, in a weak terrified voice Clifford called out, “is there anyone else up there”?

And so it is folks, even if we heard the voice of God, would we listen if it was not what we wanted to hear? So long as we cling, we are bound!

Change involves release and one cannot be released when clinging. Our own minds hold us hostage and letting go is the enemy. The mind produces lies which become phobias, fears and addictions. Let us not feed those lies.  Let us starve them to death.

Remember these two delicious writings:

” COME TO THE EDGE”

” No we will fall”

” COME TO THE EDGE”

” No we will fall”

They came to the edge.

He pushed them and they flew. By Apollinaire

Everything terrifying is, in it’s deepest being, something helpless that wants our help….. Rainer Marie Rike

May we all fight the good fight!

Peace,

EP

At Yoga Shelter, we have a different perspective…sure, to be polite we share the well wishes. But we know that a new year cannot be marked on the calendar – it has to be created within ourselves. A real “new year” means clean-dropping our egos, our separateness and our selfishness. It’s a time when we seek Shelter from the storm of emotions and desires that flood us daily.

All happiness comes with conditions. If you say you are happy, ask yourself, why? There is always a reason: health, relationships, money, weather, people and circumstances outside of ourselves. Eliminate the condition, and you lose your happiness.

If you want this to truly mark a “NEW” year, where you are really happy, try the Yoga Shelter approach. We do not necessarily wish you a “Happy New Year”. Rather, we work hard to create an environment in which you can create a new YOU…the BEST you!

Rest assured, we are doing our work, personally and professionally, to serve you. Together, let’s forget about wishing “Happy New Year” and instead do something new.

Let’s make the changes we need to make…start things we have not started…stop things we need to stop.

You are never alone; Yoga Shelter is with you for the whole ride.

Peace, EP