The newest ALPHA DIVA to join the family is Catie Jarvis.
She was kind enough to donate her symphonic inspiration to you this week.
ZEN MEETS EDM
For the past few weeks I’ve been obsessed with the Deadmau5 song, I Remember. I
started doing my morning yoga practice to the song on repeat. Though I usually don’t
associate Electronic Dance Music with Sun Salutations, I think that this song
presents something important about the idea and feeling of letting go without
necessarily moving on or giving up. Something we can all work towards and learn
from.
When Kaskade’s words mix with the Deadmau5
beats, there is a perfect atmosphere for release…
One of the most important
aspects of “working out” is that we give ourselves time and space to release
all of the tension that has built up in our minds and muscles. We go to the gym
to sweat, loose weight, but there’s also something more, something deeper that
we achieve when we run, jump, pull up, push up, sit up, downward dog. We give
ourselves a chance to forget about everything else that happened in our day, or
week, or lives, even if it’s just for an hour. We focus on the present moment.
We let go of the attachment to what happened in the past or what will happen in
the future.
It can be hard to explain
this phenomenon to others or even to recognize it ourselves. I think sometimes
the idea of “letting go” can seem oversimplified. We can’t just always release
and move away from the things in life that are hard. In life, just like in our
work-outs at the gym, if we always stopped when something seemed hard or
challenging, we wouldn’t really get any stronger.
“You don’t have to move on to let go…”
Think of how this idea could apply to your
life. What ideas, emotions, situations, people, are you stuck on, unable to move away from? Why are you stuck? Maybe you
can’t release your job because you need it in order to make money. Maybe you
can’t release someone negatively influencing your life because they are family
and you have a commitment to them. But is it always necessary to move on to let
go?
Sometimes you can find a way to stop being
phased or hurt by a situation just by detaching from it. By letting what
doesn’t serve you just slide in one ear and out the other without angering or
saddening you. By not having expectations of the future or attachments to what
happened in the past, you might be able to enjoy a person, place, or part of
yourself that you didn’t expect to.
Maybe if you let go of an idea or an
emotion that you are attached to then your whole relationship with a certain
person or situation will change before your eyes.
“You don’t have to give up to let go…”
How can you manage to keep up all of the
difficult and varied components of your life, all of your precious memories of
the past, and dreams for the future, while still totally enjoying each and
every moment without being clouded by worries, expectations, attachments, fears?
How can you remember and let go?
The answer, I think, has something to do
with the balance of Sthira (effort) and Sukha (Ease) that a really strong yogi
can bring to every yoga pose that they practice. It’s a delicate balance
between working your butt off to deepen and strengthen each pose, and to
totally release any strain or negativity that holds you back from breathing
fully and experiencing and enjoying what you are doing.
Think of tough situations in life like the
last five push-ups in a set of fifty… Maybe you can’t do them because you are
about to pull a muscle and you need to just stop. But maybe, if you breathe,
focus on the moment instead of on your doubts or fears, you can get through it,
do those last five, maybe add on an extra one or two more, maybe even forget
about how hard it is, let go, and enjoy it!
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