Tag Archives: self-esteem

Walk the Walk: It’s Not Easy

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Image by Helgi Halldórsson on Flickr

Image by Helgi Halldórsson on Flickr

I have taught workshops on dealing with chronic pain. I’ve led sessions on the power of meditation. I’ve counseled many students in gentle yoga classes to hear their bodies, to know that a gentle practice is as “good” as an active practice. I’ve told students in yin that it doesn’t matter whether you can do a pose; it’s the being there and with yourself that is the key. I’ve told friends to take time for themselves, let their bodies heal, stop trying to do everything, and recognize when they need help.

I can definitely talk the talk.

Sometimes, however, walking the walk is harder.

I’ve written before about the challenges of letting go of an active yoga practice or other lifestyle habits due to medical issues. So, I’m not surprised when that keeps coming up. But, I am a little surprised at times about the degree of anger I feel about such changes (recently not being able to have an active yoga practice and taking a break from yoga teaching). I’m a little surprised when I can’t even talk myself into doing the things I would recommend to others. And, I’m more than a little surprised when someone calls me out on it – which happened this week.

Cognitive Dissonance Theory (Festinger), among others, would say that in such a situation, where I can see that my actions are not matching what I believe, feelings of discomfort or dissonance will arise. Check. Festinger proposed that this dissonance leads to either a change in behavior, a change in cognition, a change in understanding of the situation by adding new beliefs, or a denial of the conflict. Not check. At least not yet. I think, right now, I’m more just rolling around in the dissonance, vacillating between being pissed off at my physical self, being disappointed in my mental self, trying to be more at ease with the situation, and denying that it even exists. People are complicated, yes?

At the fundamental level, I believe that any yoga is good yoga, no matter how active, it is important to listen to the body, meditation has value, and yoga will still be there when I’m healed. Now, I just need to get the other beliefs and behaviors in line, right after I finishing rolling around in my dissonance…

 

I Am Worthy.

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No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
~ Eleanor Roosevelt

I, mostly always, have a mantra for my meditation and yoga practice. It’s often based on what the instructor is discussing that day. Sometimes it’s more about getting my head in the right space (“be here,” “let go,” “stay in the now”). But, sometimes it’s about an issue that I’m dealing with or that someone I know (or don’t know) is dealing with (yeah, I’m going to go ahead and end on a preposition there).

Lately, I’ve had a little issue with not feeling like I’m worthy of love, attention, respect, reward, affection, membership, and so on. In my head, it sounds a little like, “Well, of course ______ wouldn’t want me to ________, because I’m not good enough at ___________.”  It’s delightful. And, it makes me more than a little whiny, which I notice, and then that feeds right back in, “Well, of course _____ wouldn’t want to be around me, I’m whiny.”  See, a nice little circle of self-disparagement.

It doesn’t matter that I know what I have accomplished in my life, or the titles that I have behind my name, or even the nice things that other people say to me. That little slightly mocking voice in the back of my head wants to tell me that I’m not enough. Simultaneously, there is another part of me that sings out that I am enough. I am plenty.

I wish I could show you, When you are lonely or in darkness, The astonishing light of your own being.
~ Hafiz

For this reason, my mantra of late has been, “I am worthy.” I don’t fill in the rest on purpose, but sometimes it comes. I am worth of my own respect and my own love.

You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love & affection.
~ Buddha

I am worthy of my own attention. I am worthy of my own acceptance, and I don’t need to be loved – or liked or respected – by everyone else. I need to provide that for me, because I am worthy.

To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself.
~ Thich Nhat Hanh

It’s not easy. I am admittedly someone who strives to be “good.” And when I think I’m not, I can get pretty sad about it. But, somewhere in the back of my head, I know that I can’t be good at everything, and I don’t have to. I don’t need to be someone else besides who I am.

The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you do anything but be yourself. ~Lao-Tzu

And if anyone doesn’t get that, whether it’s me or someone else, then that person should just hush up. Or should just take the judgment elsewhere. Because, I am worthy.

And so are you.

I Said I Do Yoga; I Did Not Say I’m a Saint

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As you know if you read The VeganAsana regularly, I’m currently wrapping up yoga teacher training.  Most of the people I spend my time with are aware that I have been going through this training.  And then there are people who don’t know much else about me other than that I do a lot of yoga (either because we only know each other online or we only know each other through the yoga community).  This means that there are a whole bunch of people who “understand me as a yogi.”  That’s  nice.  It means I can pester people about yoga and they will know why!

Saint Gertrude the Great - Also quite fond of learning but with a less than perfect temperament that she had to work on.

On the other hand, I notice that there is an assumption that, as someone who studies yoga, I should be above the negative and petty emotions of the world.  I shouldn’t be angry (or at least not without some major righteous reason). I shouldn’t be jealous or envious.  I shouldn’t be impatient.  I shouldn’t experience self-doubt, question my worth, or make statements that imply I’m engaging in self-judgment.  When I do express such emotions now, I get comments related to my yoga practice, or the raised-eyebrow  look, or general impatience.

I’m not going to say that achieving full equanimity isn’t a laudable goal, but I’m so not there.  I don’t actually know any yogis who are fully in that place.  Sure, some are great with not becoming very angry.  But, maybe that same person still has a lot of work to do on being prideful.  Perhaps another has let go of the attachments to the self that cause self-criticism and comparison, but has a hard time being patient with those who haven’t let go of such attachments.  We all have stuff to work on.  Being a yogi doesn’t mean that you have located fully that state of enlightenment that is in there somewhere, it means that you are engaged in actively working on it.  And that’s ok.

Namaste,

L