Pieces of Me

Yoga is Peace?

“Peace is the result of retraining your mind to process life as it is.” –Wayne W. Dyer 

 As practitioners of yoga, class often begins with a description that sounds something like: “The word yoga is derived from the Sanskrit root “yuj” meaning to yoke or to bind. So, yoga means union.” If you have ever practiced yoga in a studio, you have probably heard some variation of this definition. Union of body, mind and heart. Union of Shiva and Shakti. 

But what if yoga doesn’t only mean union? What if yoga means peace? The Sanskrit root of yoga (“yuj”) does not only mean “to yoke.” It can also mean “to discipline, to control, to subjugate.” Many yogis and yoginis would agree that yoga has much to do with control and discipline. And so we can ask: control of what? 

 Perhaps the most famous definition of yoga, as written by the great sage Patanjali, is yoga citta vritti nirodhah. There are countless translations: Yoga is the silencing of the modifications of the mind; Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind; Yoga is the restraint of the agitation of thoughts within the mind. The Sanskrit word nirodhah means cessation or removal. Citta is often translated as “mind” but it refers to a more complete organ of perception than what Westerners would call “mind.” It could be translated as “heart-soul-mind” for it denotes the lens through which we view the world and through which thought arises. Vritti, in this instance, refers to the modifications of consciousness that colour and add to the originally clear lens of perception. Vritti are disturbances or ripples upon the lucid clarity of undisturbed and peaceful citta. 

 Therefore, if yoga is the end of turbulence and agitation in our thoughts, in our minds and in our hearts and souls, then, Yoga equals Peace. Peace of mind. Peace in our hearts. Peace in our Souls. 

 Wishing you all Peace. 

  Shanti Shanti Shanti 

 Peace with your past. Peace in this present moment. Peace for the future.

5 Day 100 Word Stories Challenge

Day 1: The Pink Hat (Origin Story) 

 The pink hat was unimportant. Maybe I lost it again the very next day. What mattered is that he jumped into that freezing mucky river to rescue it. Seven-year-old me stared aghast, unable to believe that an adult would sacrifice so much to assuage the tears of a child. There was trepidation, what if he drowned? The hat is not so special to me. He resurfaces, wringing neon in his heroic hands. “There, good as new,” he smiles. I don’t speak. My cousin, who later dies in a skydiving accident. If only the air had been a raging river instead. 

 Day 2: Sounds Like Limon (Emergent) 

 He looked back over his shoulder, blew me un besito, then walked away. He named me Limonada. A good man. I hurt him, and he didn’t even know it yet. Guilt and shame. Anxiety still gripped me, a flat tire on the way to the airport. Even with so much privilege, he could still change a tire. Income distribution. We learned that, in Guatemala, the richest ten percent control more than fifty percent of the national wealth. He is in that ten percent. The impossibility of a future together is a powerful love potion. I never saw him again. 

 Day 3: Sparkle Bear (Body) 

 Mind racing. Anxious and angry; why? Lonely. And you are already in bed. And yet, you have never rejected me… I crawl in, dig myself beneath you. Feel your weight, your warmth, your softness stilling my chaotic mind. Rhythmic breaths and city sounds soothe by paradox. Clean hair, I don’t love the too-sweet scent of that new coconut shampoo, but I do love you. It’s dark. I thought I was angry with you for being absent (asleep), but my skin was only longing to press against the specific sparkle of yours, to be gently crushed by the peace of you. 

 Day 4: GIRLS (Heart) 

 Standing outside, the old brick building looms over her. Above the door it says, “GIRLS.” She is here to pick up her youngest child. The door clicks, and she pulls it open. Sounds synonymous with little humans fill the air: laughing, crying, yelling, playing. She peeks through the glass before going into the room. Her daughter is sitting happily at the table, it’s snack time. As she turns the knob, her little girl’s eyes dart to the small window. “Mommy!” Love encompassed in one word. The angel with curls and deep eyes runs. This reunion never gets old. 

 Day 5: Manta Ray (Awe) 

 I am struggling to maintain buoyancy. The dive instructor rescued me from popping to the surface. I now hold his arm. We move silently, ten metres beneath the surface. Myriad of fish and colourful choral delight me eyes. I feel joyful. The dive instructor is making the signal for me to look up towards the surface. I bend my neck back and an enormous, graceful shadow floats over us, blocking out the water-refracted light streaming down. A manta ray! Time freezes, I stop breathing, and my eyes are transfixed. I am in love. I am in awe. I am free.

The Unk and the Ants Unite: A decolonial tale of death

 The Unk and the Ants Unite 

Women wash clothes--scrubbing each inch of colourful fabric between their powerful knuckles, hands becoming 3-inch square washboards—we peel onions, braid each other’s hair and visit. Our slippery Caucasian hair requires elastics to keep the rows of braids in place. The scent of salt air and frankincense fills me with a strange sense of home, and longing for home. Brilliant textiles dry on clotheslines, children play with old tires, and rejoice each time that we return, singing: “Toubaby, noumana, toubaby noumana:” the white skins are back. 

 All the while, the West African sun beats down. As I lean against the cement wall while sitting on the mosaic tiles, I find the heat almost bearable. A gentle breeze blows through the centrally located courtyard, though most days sweat gushes from my pores. My little sister and I have been in Sénégal for almost two weeks and have gone from drinking five litres to three litres of bottled water each day. Still, I hardly ever pee. 

 I notice a gecko, called unk in Wolof, on the wall opposite me. An invasive species that has made it all the way to the Americas, likely crossing on the same ships that carried slaves across the Atlantic. The unk is scurrying about catching flies and other insects, one moment deathly still, the next in rapid assault. The reptile’s keen eye catches a glimpse of something trundling through the sand, and in a flash it attacks. For a moment I think the gecko has decided that the bug is too large and has simply flipped it over. Feeling sorry for the overturned creature and having assigned myself the role of rescuer, I slowly walk the short but scalding stretch of sand to right it. 

 Only now do I realize that the odd bug, some kind of centipede perhaps, has been injured. One quick nip and the unk has removed some vital part of the creature’s form, some body part that kept it upright. Why did the gecko leave this many legged-bug to suffer? Why didn’t it gobble it up instead of wasting its life source? Often, when faced with suffering creatures, I become the merciful killer and crush them; this time, being a visitor to this world, I leave the bug to die as it may, on its back, legs flailing beneath the intense heat of the mid-afternoon sun. It’s not my responsibility to fix this trauma, is it? But if not me, then who will? 

 I return to my seat against the wall as a young girl named Amicole runs past yelling, “Bonjour toubab! Comment ça va?” The children love us, pull our arm hair, and cuddle up in our laps. I ask Amicole: “Pourquoi tu nous aimes?” Why do you like us? “Parce qu’on est Toubab?” “Because we’re white skins?” 

But not all the children feel this love and curiousity. Just yesterday, one young child screamed in horror when she saw our white skin and became inconsolable. On our first day little Mamlibasse studied us closely, then looked to the shared television as if trying to figure out how we had walked out of the Spanish tele-novelas that were so popular there. 

I begin to wonder if my volunteering as a teacher here is helping or is it futile, perhaps even harmful. Am I here for selfish reasons? All I have really accomplished here is translating the hokey-pokey into French, and even that caused harm. As our class performed the song, I accidentally smacked a young girl in the face with an over-exaggerated sweep of my arm. “Main gauche en avant…” the innocent instruction of left and right brings pain. 

 My pondering is interrupted as Madame Awa approaches. “Salamalekum,” she greets me. 

“Malekumsalam,” I reply. 

 Are we at peace? 

I think we might be, in these moments, while the heat of the equatorial sun melts any negative energies from our bodies, muscles relaxing and dripping with sweat. I glance back across the sand to discover that the doomed centipede is anything but at peace, its helpless body completely enveloped by an army of ants. As they continue to consume the live flesh of the flailing bug, I notice that the school children are returning. 

I take a gulp of water and prepare myself for the onslaught of play.

In-Circle me with Wombs

Grandmothers, sisters, aunties, friends. I long for you on this day when the blood runs red and deep, my soul and body craving sleep, rest and the embrace of kind feminine faces all around me. We weren’t meant to be so isolated from each other. I am grateful for the love of man, my brothers, partner and lover. But today, I long for the depth of the feminine womb space, warm and welcoming, the embrace of earth magick, dark and damp and so powerful. I am lonely for my sisters. I am lonely for the goddesses and for the wisdom that has been silenced. For simple ritual and ceremony, for seeing and being seen. Hearing and being heard, each word landing on the soft all-encompassing flesh that heals by its very essence. Let the blood run red and wild down your legs seeping into our Earth mother, nourishing her with our long remembered womb-wisdom. The kingdom of childhood has been gone for so long, but what has replaced it? I have been robbed, but I will reclaim this space Where grandmothers and mothers, Maidens and Crohns, all sharing the throne that Kali, Brigid, and Sky Woman gifted us. I am sweet…sometimes, but not very often, the strength that I carry can soften the deepest pain. I am a warrior. I am a storyteller. I am a mother. I am a healer. I am your lover, too. But right now, I need the reflection, the reverence, the honouring and pleasurance, of my vulva, lips and folds that hold the forces of creation. Swollen and cleansing, I shed what is no longer needed in cycles that circle with grandmother moon. Too soon I am expected to reenter the room filled by man. I crave: Safe. Dark. Quiet. In reflection, held in sacred sister space. Such grace. Happy International Women's Day to everyone <3 I can offer so much more to the All if I am gifted the freedom of honouring my body, harmonizing with my cycles, and being the all so varying wild woman that I am.

The (love) songs we sing - part 3

     Of course, this is my 111th blog post. Numbers, always with the numbers. And this is part three of my  lunaversary, anniversary, valentine's day trilogy tribute.

    Today is my and my Beloved's 39th lunaversary. What is a lunaversary, you are wondering? Our love was consummated as the five days in February came near their end. We were in a Kamloops motel after driving through a snowstorm with all-season tires on the Coquihalla. It was February 19th of 2019, we could drive no further, and a young woman delivered our pizza. I had never thought about the fact that perhaps every other pizza that had ever been delivered to me was delivered by a man, until the contrast of opposites stood smiling at me through the motel door. But I digress. We haven't even had our first kiss yet and here I am jumping ahead. To make a short idea long and complex, we celebrate each full moon, sometimes with a kiss, a mention, a foot rub. Earlier on, more often, with flowers, gifts (rainbow themed ones), cakes... 39 moons of loving.

I wrote this poem for my love today. Unedited, with baby at my feet, in about ten minutes (it could use some work):

For you, on our Lunaversary

Thirty-nine moons

full swoon

Time goes by so soon

Ethereal eyes of the deep-dive loon

And I am still, 

                loving you

I wonder if we have a tune

Celebrating the love and the ruin

Time-torn patterns mangled and strewn

Butterflies, both of us, emerge from the cocoon

And I am flying,

                     loving you

When we rise at dawn but wake at noon

songs of love from the speaker croon

Hearts bleed red, burgundy, and maroon / I know you will never leave me adrift, marooned

And if they lie our bodies 'neath icebergs or sand dunes

I will be sleeping,

                      loving you

    My love has a rhyming dictionary. I didn't grab it for the writing of the poem, but maybe I should have? I ran out of -oon words! Spoon! Of course. June, as in June's Lunch. 

    Come see JustBee and her amazing hand-crafted jewelry on February 26th in Highland's on 112ave in the old spooky fun La Bohème (which now houses Fox Burger and June's Lunch-it is worth coming just to go to the bathroom, so eerie down there). I will be doing a reading of poetry just for fun!

    If you wish for more exciting details about my first date to the ocean three years ago and the intense, apocalyptic love that has me growing, learning, and co-creating and nurturing new life...well, you will have to buy my collection of short stories, once I write it!

    

The (love) songs we sing - part 2

    Before we get to the part where we go on our first date all the way to the pacific ocean, which was sort of our third date, let me tell you about our first date, an afternoon coffee...

    It was freeeeeeeezing. February something, I can't remember for sure. I had decided that I should be friends with a man, someone that felt safe and that could restore my faith in the notion that men are safe to be around. I remember the texts, I remember rolling around on the floor of my third story subsidized apartment after writing: "Well, I guess you could see me sooner if you asked me to go for coffee or something." I didn't know then of his oppositional tendencies. He never did ask, he asked what days would work for that and then I followed up with the actual: "How about..." was it a Wednesday? 

    We went to a place near the river, just in case we wanted to incorporate a nice walk, but, the freezing. I arrived first, ever the punctual rooster, and he appeared not too much later carrying a water bottle filled with NGW. I thought it odd when he refilled his tea with water from it (how could cool water re-steep a tea bag?). Now I agree that it is much safer to drink steam distilled water. But the more remarkable thing about the bottle was that it said "Nathan" on it. It was purple. I had not long before prayed to Creator holding the Eagle feather that had belonged to my brother-in-law's brother. I prayed hard, crying, praying for my Beloved to be sent to me. The feather of Migizi had belonged to Nathan. 

    I felt shivers when I saw the name. Of course, I didn't tell him. I don't think it is advisable to reveal that our love is fated to be on the first coffee. He spoke though, telling that he saw an Eagle on the drive over, flying just over the graveyard on 107ave while Bob Marley asked him: "Could you be loved?" over and over through his car speakers. Eagles. Nathan. I needed very obvious signs from the universe to break free from fear. 

    I feel it has taken at least three years of sometimes struggle, having me hum while the words "nobody said it would be easy" while I hear him bursting with "I still want the hard life!" to reach the point of really knowing, deep in my bones, that: "Love will lift us up where we belong, where the Eagles cry."