Finding yourself and Making Changes
“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”
~ Rumi
I have come to understand that if I want to make positive change in the world, it has to begin with ME, taking responsibility for my own impacts and being the change I want to see.
In order to make any changes, we need to know this person that’s called “YOU”.
I am not a psychologist and such, so I can’t prescribe all the steps to help you find yourself. However, I would like to share a bit about my own journey and hopefully to shed some light on yours to unite with your true self.
At the beginning of my yoga journey in 2008, I was only doing yoga for its physical benefits, strength, flexibility, balance, to name a few. I would not say “Namaste” back to the teachers because I did not like the spiritual connotation of the word. However, I was wrong because “Namaste” literally means “I bow to you”– a respectful way to greet people.
I did not care about meditation and hated staying still in savasana, the final resting pose. I would do them just out of respect for the teachers, but my mind was all over the place, from what to have for lunch, to what to wear for an event, or to why some friend suddenly stopped talking to me.
But one day in 2010, during savasana, I fell asleep….
It was a blissful 5 minutes.
And I wondered why?
I realized I was actually following the teacher’s instruction and rested my mind on the breath. That quieted my brain which led me into a quick sleep.
Savasana is not really meant for you to sleep, but that can happen quite often when your body and mind are both completely relaxed, and that is not a bad thing! Sometimes, it could be exactly what you need. Don’t feel like you HAVE to resist it.
On that day, I realized yoga is not just about poses.
I took my initial yoga teacher training in 2016. It was from then I started to bring attention inward while I was doing yoga. I slowly developed this focused attention on breath, when I was moving through poses, holding in a pose, or resting in savasana.
Instead of checking how my pose looked like in the mirror, I began to bring attention to how it felt in my body. Sometimes, I would close my eyes for most of the practice just to feel the sensations.
This mindful approach to yoga cultivated my ability to stay more present with a focused attention, on and off the mat. Later on, during my mindful meditation trainings, I practiced noticing, investigating, and processing thoughts and feelings with openness and curious attention.
It was hard at the beginning. My defense mechanism would override some of the difficult thoughts and feelings, by sending my mind somewhere else where it did not have to deal with them.
Uniting with your true self takes time and grace.
When I was finally able to sit with my thoughts and feelings, it felt like I was drowning in emotions. Fortunately, the more I tried, the more manageable it became. One day, I noticed that I was able to watch my thoughts come and go as if I was just an observer. Surely that wouldn’t happen overnight. But if I can do it, you can too!
Becoming the observer is a critical step toward making personal changes
Becoming an observer can bring you mental clarity and lead to a cascade of mental shifts.
You’ll become aware of what triggers you, how fast you react, how you tend to react and why you react in certain ways. You’ll get to know yourself better.
Because of this mental clarity, you’ll be able to find space between stimulus and response. This is my turning point - when I realized that I have freedom and power to choose how to respond.
It was so liberating and empowering.
This power is within all of us.
You just need to quiet your brain enough to see it.
“Mental restlessness can be like wind on the surface of a pond, making ripples and waves that hide the still, clear mind below. Introspection calms the waves so that we can once again see through the still water to the bottom of the pond.”
- The Mindfulness Revolution
Your happiness lies at the bottom of that pond.
