Try Softer! I challenge each of us to do just that: Try Softer!
We all have areas in our lives that we compete in; athletics, body
image, success in career, the neighborhood we live in, etc. This list
could go on forever!! This fall, let us all make an effort to become
softer in effort with our yoga practice and be aware of when we fall
into our ego and participate in competitive yoga. Who and what are we
practicing for anyway? Cultivate peace within and have that pour out!
Try softer! Below is one man's experience with yoga that hits home on so
many levels and provides a FANTASTIC laugh. Please enjoy the musings
and the lesson he gives!
'Not long ago I went with my wife to a yoga class for the first
time in my life. Immediately it became clear to me why yoga will never
catch on: They don't keep score. You can't tell who's winning.
Mostly we just stretched, and I am not good at stretching. On a
good day I can touch my knees. What made it worse is that most of the
other people in the class were clearly double-jointed. There was a
middle-aged woman who didn't look particularly fit---I thought I would
definitely beat her at whatever you compete at in yoga--but she was a
dancer. At one point she did the splits with her legs, bent forward
with her torso completely flat on the ground, then tied both her legs
around the back of her head. If they had been keeping score, I would
have lost at that point on the mercy rule. Afterward, I did ask the
instructor if the woman could be tested for performance-enhancing drugs.
As you might imagine, the class was a lot of work and good for my body. But I was struck afterward by a phrase I never heard: Try Harder.
The instructor never said, " Try harder to stretch. Try harder to be
flexible. Try harder to contort your body like a 14-year old female
Russian gymnast."
When you stretch, you don't make it happen simply by trying
harder. You must let go and let gravity do its work. You give
permission, opening yourself to another, greater force.
This is not just true when it comes to stretching. AS a general
rule, the harder you work to control things, the more you lose control.
The harder you try to hit a fast serve in tennis, the more your muscles
tense up. The harder you try to impress someone on a date or while
making a sale, the more you force the conversation and come across as
pushy. The harder you cling to people, the more apt they are to push
you away.
Sometimes trying harder helps. It can help me clean my room, push
through phone calls I need to make, or run another lap. But for deeper
change, I need a greater power than simply 'trying harder' can provide.
Imagine someone advising you "Try harder to relax. Try harder to go to
sleep. Try harder to be graceful. Try harder not to worry. Try harder
to be joyful."
There are limits on what trying harder can accomplish.....The
problem with trying harder is that I get fixed on my own heroic
efforts. I grow judgemental. I can't let this endure forever. So
instead of making vows about how my spiritual life will be perfectly
well organized until I die, I seek to surrender my will for just this
day. I look for small graces. I try to engage in little acts of
service. I pray briefly to accommodate my limited attention span. I
look for ways of being with God that I already enjoy. I try to go for
half an hour without complaining. I try to say something encouraging to
3 people in a row. I put $20 in my pocket that I will give away
sometime during the day. I take a 5-minute break to read a page of
great thoughts.
If trying harder is producing growth in your spiritual life, keep it up. But if is not, here is an alternative:
Try softer.
Try better.
Try different.'
by John Ortberg
Can You Hear Me Now?
chapter 6 pages 70-71
The
No comments:
Post a Comment