Compassion On and Off the Mat
20 Oct 2011 1 Comment
If you cannot be compassionate to yourself, you will not be able to be compassionate to others. – Thich Nhat Hanh
Whenever I do something wrong or “stupid” (however I may happen to define that in a particular moment), my tendency is to beat myself up over it for a long, long time. Over the years, I’ve found the time on my yoga mat to be an ideal place to begin learning how to forgive myself and to practice compassion towards myself. When I first started practicing, I would judge how well I did at the end of every class. But slowly, as my practice evolved, I cared less and less about rating my performance; instead, I focused more and more on how I responded to the challenge of a pose(s) I was not yet ready to do. While I have worked to cultivate a certain quality of non-attachment which has then allowed for an easier relationship between myself and the poses, what I have been really surprised to discover is the shift in how I deal with those times when I am unable to do a certain pose. I neither judge myself for not being able to do it nor do I give up. I just accept that, perhaps, today isn’t the day to that pose.
This practicing of compassion on the mat may seem inconsequential at first; after all, it’s just a yoga pose. But what I’ve discovered is that the effort of being compassionate with myself about the bigger things in life — all the stuff that happens off the mat — is getting easier because of all the time I’ve practiced being compassionate on the mat. And the more I can be compassionate with myself, the more I can be compassionate with others.
Oct 20, 2011 @ 17:52:18
everything we do, think and say is but an outcome of what is going on inside of us. being compassionate and caring is a high state of being to ourselves and others.