Cultivating the Opposite
Pratipaksa Bhavana is to discontinue negative ways of thinking through the discipline of “cultivating the opposite.” (from Yogapedia)
When I started the practice of Yoga I was in my early 20s and feeling very challenged. I enjoyed going to yoga for those moments of clarity when I could push past negative limitations and feel ‘the flow.’ This practice seeped into my life, and I found ways to sit with discomfort and then challenge myself to ‘cultivate the opposite’ and move through it.
I started using a visual meditation of feeling green energy flowing through me and letting it push out the things holding me back and immersing myself in a river and feeling the challenges flow past me and not enter me. Through the stress and chaos of that ‘life-time’ I cultivated a deep grounding inner peace that guided me through.
I wrote this after one of my FIRST Yoga classes ever, oh so many life changes ago:
I had an out of body experience in yoga class last night. My teacher told us as we were in bound
warrior 2 to breathe through the pose, to be present, to not let the body win. That the body was mine, that I did not belong to the body. And all of the sudden, it was easier. I felt the strain and pull of my muscles, but they were my muscles. My body was mine. I was in control, and I was not ready to release. It became this beautiful tug of war in which I could feel my body, and myself, separately.
There are times in class when I realize I have been thinking about what I need to do when I get home, or what email I need to check, or friend to catch up with, or boy to call, and I pause and am disappointed. That I've gotten caught up in the clutter of life AGAIN. And then I get anxious that I'm wasting time. Wasting time I tried to devote to myself on other things. And then I wonder if I even know who this "myself" is. And then the body wins, and I get exhausted, mentally, physically, emotionally. Time for myself becomes yet another thing to schedule in. And I give in the hustle and bustle and movement of the day. It's like getting caught in the current. Well, this moment in class, it was like I was in this current, and then suddenly it wasn't just that, it was me flowing and feeling crisp and clear and a part of the water, and I felt myself clearly. It was that perfect harmony in some random song that makes you feel. Like sunshine. Sounds so cheesy, and so simple. But it's being a part of warm ground and grass and acoustic guitars and spring breezes. It's feeling life.
warrior 2 to breathe through the pose, to be present, to not let the body win. That the body was mine, that I did not belong to the body. And all of the sudden, it was easier. I felt the strain and pull of my muscles, but they were my muscles. My body was mine. I was in control, and I was not ready to release. It became this beautiful tug of war in which I could feel my body, and myself, separately.
There are times in class when I realize I have been thinking about what I need to do when I get home, or what email I need to check, or friend to catch up with, or boy to call, and I pause and am disappointed. That I've gotten caught up in the clutter of life AGAIN. And then I get anxious that I'm wasting time. Wasting time I tried to devote to myself on other things. And then I wonder if I even know who this "myself" is. And then the body wins, and I get exhausted, mentally, physically, emotionally. Time for myself becomes yet another thing to schedule in. And I give in the hustle and bustle and movement of the day. It's like getting caught in the current. Well, this moment in class, it was like I was in this current, and then suddenly it wasn't just that, it was me flowing and feeling crisp and clear and a part of the water, and I felt myself clearly. It was that perfect harmony in some random song that makes you feel. Like sunshine. Sounds so cheesy, and so simple. But it's being a part of warm ground and grass and acoustic guitars and spring breezes. It's feeling life.
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