God speaks to each of us as he makes us,
then walks with us silently out of the night.These are the words we dimly hear:
You, sent out beyond your recall,
Rainer Maria Rilke, Book of Hours, I 59
go to the limits of your longing.
Most times before we start our yoga sessions we go through a list of permissions. These are meant to create enough inward space for everyone to move about without bumping into the boundaries of our habitual self-help agendas for maybe all of two seconds. (Confession: The two seconds part is usually the time span I have where I am free of my own agendas.)
I share the permissions because sometimes we have a hard time enjoying the moment and we miss out on being right here, right now. Using them is a good on the mat practice and good off the mat practice. I frequently come back to them when I find I’m on a bit of a self-judgment kick and feeling the weight of my expectations and I’m forgetting the words I heard dimly in the original before times.
Take a look and by all means change them to suit your needs.
Oh, regarding the two seconds, the fact that I forget so often is actually not such a terrible thing. I keep realizing that forgetting is actually part of the practice of returning to myself and my own sanity. Every time I return, I know I am strengthening my awareness muscles.
Here are the permissions:
- I give myself permission to be here.
- I give myself permission not to fix anything about myself (even this no fixing permission.)
- I give myself permission not to improve anything.
- I give myself permission to feel my emotions.
- I give myself permission to be distracted.
- I give myself permission to sense my body.
- I give myself permission to feel pleasure.
- I give myself permission not to put so much effort.
- I give myself permission to be at ease.
- I give myself permission to practice.
