Will post this here till I figure out how to create a category, wherever here is.
Have just finished my morning yoga (MWF) and am refreshed and wish to write down a few observations. 1) Yoga is the same no matter how one feels about it. I am often afraid to begin practice, and frequently happy to (I can be happy and afraid at the same time). But the practice is the same no matter how I feel, has the same effect on my well-being. So one may use the practice to become accustomed to the fickle urgings of emotion, and teach oneself to observe what stays the same. 2) Surely, after many years of practice, one of the results is that one has an inventory of dozens or perhaps even hundreds of positions in which one is comfortable. Then one may remain in one or the other of these positions indefinitely, and thus avoid pain. 3) The secret must be repetition. After one has repeated the positions for so many days that one has become bored with them, the body is left to find its own way to superior balance and relaxation in the given pose, and then one begins to automatically and actually learn.
I have actually heard and read so many good things about it that I am amazed that I have not already undertaken it. I think the mental aspects are more appealing than any of the physical benfits. This only makes it more so.
Dear Mr. Butler,
Pretty Fakes has seen more action than evah since you came aboard. That totally makes my obsessive compulsive nature to check this site many, many, times a day very happy. Thanks for totally rockin’ the Fakers.
With Thoughts of Anagrams and Yoga,
Pinky
second.
I agree with Pinky, but in the blogosphere “Mr. Butler” sounds so formal. How about a moniker that is more fitting, like Jujitsu-man or Jeeves?
brd, I was only mocking my brother because of his habit to send letters to people tellling them how he feels. I do agree that Mr. Butler is too formal, however Jujitsu-man is a pain to type and Jeeves reminds me of Skeeves. Jack seems too informal, so I’m thinking maybe Mr. Jack. Although, that sounds a little pedophile-ish.
Humph.
Any more ideas? Maybe Mr. Butler can comment on this one himself. What are we supposed to call you?
It’s tough to decide because I don’t care what people call me. A brief catchy moniker makes sense though. Jack is fine for the time being. Mr. Butler is way too formal. Maybe jax? I use that as shorthand for my stuff sometimes, a short version of Jack’s. I’m thinking, honest. Call me slow in the meantime I guess.
I like JAX
thank you.
jax it is then. Will change it as soon as I learn how.
Better, much better.
Hey, Jax – nice to meet you.
Have had this thought off and on for the last few years: Usually when we hear the practitioners of aikido or karate or yoga speak of energy, chi in Chinese or ki in Japanese, we think some exotic and mystical metaphor is being employed, a parable about states we think are evanescent but nevertheless somehow enobling.
It is quite possible and seems to me from my explorations (which I hasten to say are the efforts of a mere beginner) to be so, that instead we are being given plain talk about a physical reality.
In what I shall call The West for lack of a better brief tag the metaphor of the machine dominates. “Energy” must be transferred along rigid members. We perceive our own movement as the articulation of the skeleton, transfers of weight and leverage and momentum.
But what if we perceived according to another metaphor, in which we saw not the machine but the flow which our assumption of the machine theorizes. What if you could (and I believe you can) shift your perception so that you perceived the flow of energy? Wouldn’t that be at least as accurate a way to understand movement?
Wouldn’t chi suddenly seem a more practical concern?
Jax, in my personal experience, chi is a much more practical concern. But not to everyone. My brain thinks along a more artistic line therefore energy movements and the flow through the body are more relative to me than thinking about my thigh bone connected to my hip bone.
For instance, there is a breathing technique that I use when I’m under stress that I learned years ago in a “Yoga for Stress Relief” class. Physically, it’s just breathing in a rhythmic pattern that causes your body to react, to slow down and to function at a less adrenaline induced state. When I think of it like that, I can never breathe right, I get all stressy about breathing the right way and then, well, I continue to be stressed.
However, if I think about it in the terms of negative energy pouring out of my body and positive energy flowing in, I’m chilled out in no time flat. If you can perceive energy , or chi, if you will, it is much easier than just breathing, or moving. It seems more purposeful and much more cleansing. That’s just my take on it.
Yes, what he said.
If chi is a human/universal reality, something we are all born with or born into, and all have the capacity to “harness” it, I think one must approach it from their individual reference point as much as from an eastern sensibility. This means the “eastern” signs and signifiers are great as a guide, but at some point loose their strength since they are not a part of my broader sense of self, and if one seeks only to embed them in their psyche, they may only achieve a broader vocabulary rather than awareness. If I am on a road to enlightenment, the road signs speak as equally of chakras as they do of mechanism, and equally of Lufkin, TX and Lyle Lovett. In the end, we will all be surprised by our true definition, so I try to approximate mine with as many rudimentary signifiers as I’ve stumble across in my journey, and not play favorites. In this way, “harnessing” my chi is likened to facing my inner strength, likened to identifying the real me, likened to being saved, likened to coming home.
Chi is far too powerful for me to harness, but I hope to live in balance with it at least some of the time. I know of no human in possession of the one certain way, including myself, so agree that proscription is foolish.
I meant an analysis of what I thought was a prevailing metaphor. It’s quite possible other people figured it out a long time ago.