Ever just wake up one morning and decide your life needs something? Busy people tend not to just arbitrarily add stuff to their plates, but sometimes adding stuff actually makes room for more–if you add the right stuff. For me, I wanted to add a habit. … … … A whet? Yes. A habit. For years I’ve lived the Indiana Jones equivalent of life processes. If I think of it, I do it– I think of lots of things, so I do lots of things. No day is ever the same and my life is a persistent adventure that never feels at all like drudgery. o__o. I will also admit that my life often does NOT feel stable. Like my life is a sand castle being built on THEE windiest beach on the planet. Yeezus. I’m not at all a status quo girl, but I am a guerrilla gardener. What I’ve noticed about plants is that while they grow on their own time and do what they want, when they want, they also can only do this when they are comfortably planted in a stable bed of soil that gets regular sun and water (and maybe some food). Plants are free to bloom and bear fruit or not, based on how stable they feel from where they’re planted. People aren’t plants of course, but the life metaphor is the same. We essentially create the soil our lives bloom and fruit from, based entirely on the fertilizer of our habits. The question becomes, what kind of soil are we growing our lives in? I had to really look around my life at my habits, particularly my morning routine:
6am– Wake up!!! Check my phone. This leads to Facebook, Instagram and Twitter jousting before I’ve even said thank you for another day.
6:20– Aubrei up for school. More social media jousting. Responding to overnight posts. Very important reposts on Instagram, etc.
6:30 or 6:40 or 6:50 or 7am–Play Gayatri Mantra (108 Repetitions), maybe sit in meditation in an attempt to keep scattered brain in a peaceful vibe.
7:20– Get dressed, hygiene, etc.
7:30– Take Aubrei to school, my day officially begins…
Um…
It’s not easy to admit out loud that something in your life needs upleveling. We’ll suppose that some wise soul said once that how we begin our days, sets the tone for our entire lives. Or at least the rest of that day. My mornings are all over the place and part of that is because I prioritized my phone, e-mail and social media before I even say, “hey life, what’s up?” The caveat here is that months ago, I tried practicing saying thank you the moment I woke up, and then went ahead and checked my phone and such. Switching the two things helps nada. The thing is, I know I’m persistently growing, my life reflects that. I get stuff done in my day too, miraculously. But I began to wonder if there was something I could do everyday that could help me grow up, create a life giving habit that would set the tone for my day and even set my mind right before bed too. Could I uplevel my morning and evening routines AND automatically uplevel this phase of my life by default–without making declarations about it?
So four days ago, something in my spirit said (it was totally a whisper) “if you want to really build the foundation of the kind of life that feels as exciting as it does stable, you may like want to add a habit to your life mix.” … … … A whet?
I have always wanted to have a consistent, daily meditation and yoga practice. I love practicing inversions (standing on my head or hands). I love the idea of waking up before the sun (and Aubrei) to have that peace and quiet and communion with spirit before the day officially begins. I love the idea of being connected with source energy before my brain is awake enough to protest. The problem is, I’m a night person and early wake up calls that don’t involve a pay check at the end of it are not at all motivating. I’ve been having this mental battle for ages. I want the poetry of this particular life work, but I don’t know how to start and stick to it (and care to) in any meaningful way. This whole creating a meaningful habit thing is paramount to setting New Year’s Resolutions. And I don’t set New Year’s Revolutions. Just like I don’t make declarations. Or make promises. I make commitments… … … Boo. But I was determined there was something I could do. Something small, but meaningful that I could do first thing–before I do anything at all in the morning and that I could also do at night before bed, to signal dream time. Something in the form of yoga + meditation, but didn’t feel like walking the plank. But what? With anything this vital, ground rules had to be set (for procrastination purposes). And so like anyone else looking for ways to keep from doing something I really should do, I came up with a plan (list) of things required for building the best possible habits over 21 days.
My 8 Point Habit Creation Procrastination Plan Checklist:
1. It has to be daily. We all know by now that a habit is a repetitive practice that re-molds brain waves over the course of 21 days. Whatever I’m going to do over this 21 day time frame has to be something I’m willing to do every single day, morning and night. For 21 consecutive days. Blah.
2. It has to be local. I’m not kludging or trudging myself anywhere to do anything in the morning or just before bed outside of the parameter of 5 paces from my bed.
3. It has to be doable. I honestly believe I can do any and everything in the world I want to and will do so, given the opportunity or not. I just think I’m magic. But it’s one thing to beat the high score in arcade basketball in 10 tries, it’s something else to maintain something twice a day for 3 weeks without wanting to throw up. My practice has to be a challenge, but not unmanageable or even miraculous really. It has to also not be terribly time consuming–30 mins tops–morning and night.
4. It has to be buildable. The point of a good habit is to metaphorically make better life soil to grow from. Any habit that doesn’t have growth built in, is not actually worth habit-ing. So my practice has to grow me automatically.
5. It has to be measurable. How do I know I’ve made progress? By how strong I feel. How long can I hold down dog? How far can I stretch? What hurts today, but shall feel right great two days from now? I have to be able to notice my progress and make notes of them in my journal–scientifically, of course.
6. It has to be enjoyable. If I have to wake up like I hate my life, but I promised myself I’m gonna do this here– I’m not doing it. It has to be a joyful undertaking. Or at least NOT drudgery. I hate drudgery.
7. It has to be beneficial. What are the benefits of my habit? If I can’t name at least a thruzen, why am I doing it again? Dewey skin and lithe, toned body parts are pluses.
8. It has to still be welcome at the end of 21 days. Anything I start, I’m going to finish. Even if it takes me my whole life. But if like when I get to day 21 and I’m celebrating like its the end of a 21 day water fast, um… not something I’d like to make a daily practice. I’m not actually trying to be more spiritual. I am spiritual. I’m working toward a more stable, consistent, reliable spiritual practice. Like hygiene, only internal. There is a difference. I think.
It turns out my 8 point checklist is actually pretty practical. It gave me a guide to keep in mind to also keep myself from setting myself up for failure. The only thing I could think of that I could do that fit all of my criteria… that didn’t feel exactly like starting a water fast was a yogic asana sequence called Surya Namaskar or Sun Salutation. Easy peasy. According to Yoga Journal,
…For thousands of years, the Hindus have revered the sun, which they call Surya, as both the physical and spiritual heart of our world and the creator of all life itself. That’s why one of Surya’s many other appellations is Savitri (the Vivifier), who, according to the Rig Veda, “begets and feeds mankind in various manners” (III.55.19). Moreover, since everything that exists originates from the sun, as Alain Danizlou wrote in The Myths and Gods of India, it “must contain the potentiality of all that is to be known.” For the Hindus, the sun is the “eye of the world” (loka chakshus), seeing and uniting all selves in itself, an image of and a pathway to the divine.
One of the means of honoring the sun is through the dynamic asana sequence Surya Namaskar(better known as Sun Salutation). The Sanskrit word namaskar stems from namas, which means “to bow to” or “to adore.” (The familiar phrase we use to close our yoga classes, namaste—te means “you”—also comes from this root.) Each Sun Salutation begins and ends with the joined-hands mudra (gesture) touched to the heart. This placement is no accident; only the heart can know the truth.
The ancient yogis taught that each of us replicates the world at large, embodying “rivers, seas, mountains, fields…stars and planets…the sun and moon” (Shiva Samhita, II.1-3). The outer sun, they asserted, is in reality a token of our own “inner sun,” which corresponds to our subtle, or spiritual, heart. Here is the seat of consciousness and higher wisdom (jnana) and, in some traditions, the domicile of the embodied self (jivatman).
It might seem strange to us that the yogis place the seat of wisdom in the heart, which we typically associate with our emotions, and not the brain. But in yoga, the brain is actually symbolized by the moon, which reflects the sun’s light but generates none of its own. But in the end, the brain is inherently limited in what it can know and is prone to what Patanjali calls misconception (viparyaya) or false knowledge of the self.
See, right in line with my mind waves. Plus, Sun Salutations look like this:
Behold my twice daily habit since the last four (4) days! *throws glitter, flailing sequins, yaaaaaas*
The coolest thing about choosing Sun Salutations for my daily habit is that I’ve been doing them for years. Every yoga class I’ve ever taken begins with the above sequence, AND as I’ve re-discovered, it’s the basis for just about every yoga pose. Technically, because of the name, we’ll assume ‘Sun Salutation’ is a morning jazz, but since I’ve taken classes all kinds of day and night, we’ll assume it can be a ‘Moon Salutation’ too. And that’s what I’ve been doing every morning and evening for the last 4 days. I just do 5 of the whole lot, then I sit in meditation for 10 minutes or so. The whole deal takes 20 minutes, sometimes 30–depending on my jigginess factor. Some of the last 8 sessions I added more kinds of stretches, added poses and practiced my inversions. Some, I happily did the basics and done.
I would like to report back that my life has absolutely changed in the last 4 days, OMG! I get so much more done now that I’ve begun and ended my days with stretches and brain quiet– before I ever touch my phone for anything other than playing the Gayatri Mantra!!!! Nawl. My life feels exactly the same, but my daily practice feels pretty promising. I will say I do feel a bit more stable. Which is the feeling I was going for. I know exactly what I’m up to when I wake up. When my eyes start to get that twitch at like 9-10p, I know that it’s bout time to salute the moon. I’m sore in places I wasn’t sure I had muscles… or that I was using those particular muscles in downward dog, but whatever. I know my inversion practice is stronger, just by Mr. Miyagi-ing my life back to basics.
I will also say, I’ve been compelled to clean stuff. Just randomly clean. I thought this strange until I was given this insight last night:
A yogic mind likes order. It requires it. But it isn’t a compulsion. It’s a natural unfoldment that your space needs to make sense, because your mind does.
So, yeah… great. I’ve been keeping a daily evening chronicle of my progress, as any social scientific explorer worth her salts would. Oh! And my creative ideas have been pouring forth like a well oiled sieve. Life visioning abounds! Plus, I’ve been spending far less time social media jousting. My Klout score suffers by this –but we’ll assume by day 21, something far more meaningful shall sprout from the life soil I’m fertilizing, yes?
Now it’s your turn. It’s February and some folk have already given up on their New Year’s Resolutions. Or like me, never had any inclination to start any. BUT… Is there something in your life calling out for an uplevel through a new or better habit? If you had to take 21 days to forge a life giving and meaningful habit, what would that be? What’s your morning/evening routine? Is it conducive to the life you want? Ever salute the sun????The party is in the comments section (I’ve fixed the ‘you caint leave a comment’ glitch. Although, if you happen to be a wackadoodle, you still caint leave a comment)! Like, Comment, Share! Also #ReadItandTweet
Osho Lovianhal (Light the Love in ALL) friends,
-e-
#DiscoverThis #Stromae