For me I almost feel guilty because of how much I am enjoying myself in this new versions of the world - I am loving the quiet, the clean skies when I look up, and the pollution-free air when I take a breath in... last time I heard this much birdsong was more than half a century ago when I was a child.
And right now, the way I see it is that we have a unique opportunity - the usual noise and flurry of life has forcibly ceased for what is likely to be a relatively a short while.
And I can't think of a better use of this time to get real, and get down to the sort of practice that is really going to change the quality of our lives for the better.
This for me is the entire point of practice. My adherence to this intention over the last 3 decades, together with applying the idea that "if it doesn't work, then I haven't understood " as a measuring stick for my own interpretations, have both led me to re-evaluate established thinking about common placed ideas.
When I first read Patanjali's Sutras (20 years ago on the TT course I was attending), I was blown away to discover that these qualities, qualities I thought were my own interpretation of the 'Scaravelli-inspired' approach to practice, that they were all there, in black and white, and organised into an ever expanding list of 'things to attend to' in order to discover the true nature that is yoga
( I. Yoga is now, II. Yoga arises when the movements of the mind still. III. At other times, the witness identifies with the mind's movements ....)
The language of most versions I found was a little dry for me, but I felt the dryness was more to do with translation and cultural influence. And for me the meaning of these sutras spoke directly to my own experience of practice.
I didn't go on to become a scholar on the subject because Patanjali's sutras (and any other traditional sources that I tapped) were all things I could assess and interpret through the body's responses.
My way of doing things has led me to developing my own methodology in practice and teaching, which I used to call 'Creating the Conditions' , but currently refer to as the 'Enviro-Somatic' approach - because it works by shifting the way people relate to the earth and space around them, and the outcome is a different sense of self through the body.
And these are the sort of things that have put me in a position to run my own TTs, as well as sharing my work with other Schools, and now I am being invited to teach online workshops for the British Wheel and Yoga Scotland....
I am actually getting really ridiculously busy, busier than I have been most of my life, but I seem to have so much energy, and of course I think its something to do with my practice, which I currently find I have MORE time for, despite my current busy-ness. But I also feel that this time when we have all been dropped very hard into something new, for me there is something about it that actually feels a bit closer to reality. Its a time for all of us to get real with ourselves.
