This commentary is a reflection on Elliot's recent piece called The War on Weeds. You should and can read that here.  I wanted to expand upon his writing about the travesty of pesticide use on the bounty of natural goodness. I find this a deep metaphor for understanding our bodies and psyches. 

You see, I believe that your yoga must elicit some kind of action in our world. Yoga for the sake of yoga does not really exist in my book. Let your yoga make you passionate about something that makes the world better. I know that means mixing politics with yoga and opinions with yoga and some people really want that to be separate. Thats not what I am doing here. Its not what my family is about. And thats not what I teach. My husband has a deep passion for the Earth and for protecting her, relishing in her beauty and bounty and serving her deeply.

But what he has deeply in his psyche which many of us have lost is this...

Trust In The Earth.

You see, my husband trusts the earth is inherently good. He looks for the good in every weather pattern. He sees the bounty where others see weeds. He sees power where others see problems. He experiences awe where others experience fear.

These are guiding principles in his life and psyche. And ones we could all use to learn. This field of re-establishing a deep trust in the earth and the metaphor of the earth for healing attachment wounds and so much more is often called Echo Psychology fyi.

Anyways...
Reestablishing trust....

I often see people practice yoga in a way that is deeply untrusting of their body. The body is a problem. The body is uncomfortable. The body is lacking. The body has too many weeds to count. The body is aggravating.

And so the practice of yoga becomes a kind of pesticide if you will. A way to kill everything you dont want. A way to force out the mental and physical believed toxins. A way to control the garden you want.

But the body of your earth is far more intelligent than you think. There are some patterns that exist that ultimately enable the great magic to come through.

For example, my bodies design allowed me to carry my baby girl for 10 months exactly. Some doctors were alarmed by this and they wanted her out. The did not trust my body or hers. Ultimately, with a little coaxing, like the way you might need to manually go in and sort your garden, she got the memo and my body got the memo to come on down and out.

So you see, if you want to fight the War on Weeds and let good growth happen as it needs to, to be a little wild, then stop making your yoga just another product to cut, destroy and eradicate.

(Well and maybe consider the grass underneath your feet at your next yoga festival. Ironic right?)

To continue this metaphor further, weeds are weeds when they aren't what you are trying to grow. So take meticulous care in your practice. It takes time and effort and tender loving attention to pluck the weeds from your mind.

I know this because I have to constantly pluck those buggers. Yoga makes us more sensitive. And that sensitivity can allow neurosis to grow. Like the dandelions that spread their seeds in the wind, the sensitivity cultivated in yoga can spread in the wind of your breath. Meaning, sometimes you get things you don't want. So spend some time weeding and pruning. Maybe use some of them in another way, like a tincture for the mind and spirit.

I recently went through an intense narrow around fear. And as it turned out tasting a bit of that bitter and pungent weed in my mind helped me move through with more ease and awaken me to a more clarified understanding of purpose. Thank you fear. I don't want you overtaking the garden but, I'll use you as medicine.

The War on Weeds is real people. Not just for the dandelions and burdock. But right inside your own body. Everything in our culture wants us to buy products and services to fight these weeds...but thats not really what is attempting to be eradicated. It is actually a war on the deep trust in the earth--the inner and the outer earth that is your human birth right.

I remember the evening this photo was taken in February of 2015. Elliot and I had landed ourselves in Baja, on the Sea of Cortez. Olive was a glimmer moving closer to us like the brightest Star in the sky. I would be pregnant with her three months later. This trip, where we learned to sail together, work together, and get from Island to Island together, I am convinced is what tended to my resentful and confused heart, that made our marriage feel whole again and what reminded me of why I choose, again and again to spend my life with this man. I learned to love the earth the way my husband does. And I learned to love him all the more for the way he tends to Her. 

My husband, Elliot, has always fastidiously made sure we are connected to the whispers of this planet earth. And for years he had been asking me to go on a prolonged wilderness trip with him. In truth, I am not a backpacker. I like my bed. I like fresh food and kind of think trail food is gross. I love being outside all day. But I like sleeping at home. Elliot, on the other hand adores sleeping under the stars and I would go so far as to say this is not just a love, but a deep core need of his Soul. Like the way I long to be alone inside my body. It is not just a love, but a need for the quietude and solace of my own body home. Elliot loves the home of the earth. I love the home of the body. And so our union has always been about marrying the inner and the outer, the need for home and the longing for adventure, the pleasure of being earthly and the discipline it takes to tend this. 

And having a child. 
Parenting.
This is the union of DNA.
And Samskaras.

Anyway, back to Baja...

What I learned (or perhaps re-learned) on this trip was the importance of the wild, the rhythms inherent in the wind and the sea. And the importance of letting yourself be changed by the one you love. The pace of mother earth is slow but fierce. She demands your exquisite attention. And in return she will rock and cradle you with an ever-lasting spirit and love. The pace of evolution is also slow and attentive. We do not become enlightened with a pill or miracle drink. And when we surrender to the one's we love and also uplift their passions and soul's journey, we also remember that this life is not just about our own dreams. We learn that stewarding someone and something else is also a great gift. We orient toward a North Star as a glimmer of hope and chart a corse through all the elements towards that glimmer of fastidious shining light.

It is far too easy to forget that we are made from this earth. It is far too easy in the age of sole-preneurship, to forsake an evolution as a collective expedition into the unknown sea of becoming. It is easy to forget in those challenging seas why we love our partners in the first place and why we brought our kids through. But we must remember. We must. Maybe this Earth Day sends you outside. Maybe today you surrender to the rhythm of your kids. Maybe you take a big leap with your beloved.

When we remember the majesty of our earth we literally Re-Member ourselves.
 

I was a teenager once and trust me I was no peach.

I understood two emotional states. The first being the absence of emotion, as in some monotone neutral state. The second being anger. I was angry when someone tried to extend love and angry when someone didn’t. I was angry when someone made a mistake effecting me and I was angry when they apologized.  Otherwise I was dull, keeping all my thoughts and feelings trapped inside. I never smiled. God forbid a smile crossed my face indicating a hint of happiness.

The only ways I understood how to express my anger was through explosion or implosion. Now, I never pulled a knife, physically abused or threatened harm. But I lashed out. I yelled. And when I say yell I mean screaming banshee yelling. The kind of yelling and slamming doors that would make you call the cops.  But the yelling was a reprieve from the lashing in at myself. My chosen knife were the two fingers I stuck down my throat daily, sharpened by my stone-cold willpower to shut out family and friends and experiences.

I did not just grow up and out of this.

I learned other emotional options (like happiness, sadness, etc) as I matured, but frankly it wasn’t until my late twenties that I actually truly developed the capacity of emotional literacy.  I am still learning this. Emotional understanding seems to be forever evolving. Though I do believe we can learn the foundation well. At least I have that, even though I am still becoming. We do not one day understand how our emotions work and how to best express ourselves. The expression of our emotional repertoire is a practice. If yoga helps us to stretch and expand our bodies then there must be ways to stretch and expand our capacity for emotional expression.

By emotional literacy I mean the capacity to identify, experience, and express emotions productively in oneself as well as seeing that and withstanding that in others.

I will never forget the argument I had with my husband several years ago where he shook his head and said to me clearly, kindly, but very firmly, that my anger was welcome but my explosive behavior was not. It was the first time I not only understood how abusive my behavior was but that I could actually DO something about it to be better. I was incredibly touched by his statement that my anger was welcome. I was never in a relationship (other than one with my therapist) where it was overtly stated that my anger was welcome. In fact, I bet that because he said my anger was indeed welcome and okay in such a tolerant way, I felt I didn’t need to expressive myself in such dramatic fashion. Trying to shove someone’s rage into a corner does not work. Fire must run its course.

As a society we have become sterile and compartmentalized in the expression of emotion and then it leaks out like sewage or explodes in fits of disaster. Unlike my enlightened husband, We do not allow people to feel anger or rage. And by people perhaps I mean anyone other than a white man. White man expresses rage and he is showing power. But if a woman expresses wrath she is a bitch. The black man becomes a menace to society and the trans youth becomes mentally ill. Grief, quietude, melancholy, downtrodden is more the acceptable box for those of us not in the white male iteration. It is a birthright to experience emotions. Not a burden. Often when we acknowledge, welcome and work with emotions within tolerable ranges we grow and we sequence through their healthy and useful expression.

Most people I come in contact with have some pretty significant wounding around base emotions such as fear, anger, grief, and excitement. Most have stories about being too big or too much or too emotional or not enough forth giving in their emotions. It is a human skill set to identify and move emotions. It takes skill to steward ourselves and so often we need the help of others to help us cross at first. Over time though, we learn to navigate our emotional riverbeds and we can cross the raging rapids skillfully and often alone.

When was the last time someone celebrated your capacity to express your emotions fully? We have put a valence on our emotional life. Something akin to happy equals good and sad/angry/spiteful equals bad. In the body at a cellular level these emotions are electrical charges not value judgments. We made the value judgments.

I wonder how different our lives would be if we learned how to effectively direct our emotions not necessarily at each other but just as a natural process of releasing a charge. Imagine all the free space possible when our emotional lives are given voice overtly instead of suddenly, subconsciously and covertly taking us over and co-opting our lives.