May 5, 2019

Learning to Let Go of Comparisons

I just recently returned from a multiple day excursion to the Kripalu Yoga and Retreat Center in the Berkshires in Western, Massachusetts.  This is my second trip to the Center, and like my first experience, I find the experience to be life changing.

                While one can sign up for specific programs, I like participating in what is known as the “R & R” program which allows one to pick and choose between a variety of activities throughout the day.  This trip I rose early to participate in a gentle yoga class that begins around 6:30 am.  What a great way to start the day. 

Breakfast is served in the dining hall, and is observed in silence.   The absence of a lot of noise and having to engage in conversation so early in the day goes a long way into setting up the day for engaging in nurturing activities.  The whole experience is designed to offer healing and growth in all of our dimensions:  physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual.  All of the meals are included in the registration fee, and the dining hall is all self-serve and caters to healthy eating.  As a vegetarian, I am in heaven, and I’m particularly fond of the Buddha Bar that has all kinds of interesting, healthy foods to sample.

                I am able to settle into the experience very quickly, although on my first trip I learned to let go of what I thought I would do while I was there and just let my body and inner voice guide me to what was most useful for me.  I seem to be drawn to “quiet” and “restful” activities on the first full day that I am there.  I set my intention for the experience once I arrive, and basically I just express my desire to be open to whatever the experience of being there offers me.

                Being there for a couple of days is important as it takes time to rid ourselves of our daily distractions.  It takes time to become comfortable with stillness and space.  While I was there I finished reading Mary Pipher’s book, Women Rowing North:  Navigating Life’s Currents and Flourishing as We Age.  I brought several books with me as I wasn’t really sure what would call to me once I settled in, but this was the book meant to be part of my journey.

                Pipher states that as we age, we need “space around space” – a phrase that I find worth contemplating.  In this context, I take it to mean that if we are going to go deep within ourselves and explore what is going on in our psyches, we have to have the uninterrupted opportunity to do the “deep dive” that allows us to explore those thoughts and feelings that have been circulating near or making cameo appearances in our consciousness. 

                The space also allows us to explore how these “tributary” excursions feed into the stream of our lives.  In one workshop I attended, we focused on how we were evolving in response to the question of What am I becoming?  Pipher has multiple quotable useful insights in her book. One that is apropos here reminds us “that we have many lives within a lifetime.” 

                In response to my thinking about my own journey and evolutions, I was inspired to draw my response as a way of understanding what was bubbling up inside of me.  My sketch consisted of a number of rivulets that we’re flowing and coming together to form a larger body of water.  I’m not sure where the image came from, but I think I was seeking some clarity as to whether or not my current interests and pursuits could possibly come together in some meaningful way.

                Based on the name of my Blog – Still Evolving – I feel called to explore the experience of being older.  We have an opportunity as we live longer and have more leisure time at this period of our life to learn what it can offer us.  We are in a sense “explorers” if we commit to attending to our experience without letting others define it based on some resigned attitudes or beliefs that life is over after a certain age.  I once had a faculty colleague say to me that she believed “life was all downhill after adolescence.”

                So this approach to exploring the later stages of life with an openness to experience it with courage, resilience, and gusto is WORK as Pipher says in explaining her choice of the word “Rowing” in the title.  She thought about using a term like “Sailing” but realized that we have to do the work that makes it possible to enjoy this stage of our life.

                Part of my work I realized as I was able to put it into words during the reflective atmosphere of being at Kripalu was “to let go of comparisons.”  Specifically, I have to stop comparing who I am today with who I was ten years ago.  This issue comes up for me a lot during yoga classes.  I checked my calendars the other day and realize I have now had a yoga practice going on ten years.

                I can remember being very excited as I learned how to do some of the more challenging poses.  I was even able at times to enjoy hot yoga, but today I won’t go anywhere near that experience again. So I am working on focusing on the benefits of my current level of practice, but more importantly, I am trying to concentrate on how it is making me feel good today and contributing to my overall health.

                A lot of the work of developing self-awareness has to do with being present and being mindful.  The fact that I find  I need to stop making comparisons makes me aware that I am not being as present as I thought I was during these times in yoga classes when I let those inner voices take hold, reminding me that I don’t have the same physical capacity I had ten years ago.

                On a positive note, it’s great to gain insights into the ways in which we undermine our own good efforts!  Recognizing my own deception does make me smile, and strive to find a way to quiet the Greek chorus – those inner critics that find their way into our thinking.  For now, I’ve resolved to try to pick one thing I will focus on accomplishing in my yoga practice, and how that particular thing helps me feel better.  Gentle yoga offers many opportunities for stretching which helps keep us limber and more flexible.

                For now, I think I am “becoming” a cartographer mapping out how we can embrace our journey of aging in such a way that it brings us fulfillment, joy, deep connections, and gratitude!