This practice teaches us many lessons, not the least of which is the importance of showing up for this life - even when we don’t want to. Many years ago (2004, I think) my first teacher, David Life (co-founder of Jivamukti Yoga), said something in an all day workshop that has stuck with me always. He said, “Do what you don’t feel like doing, and do it good!”. In the moment, it resonated and it has on so many days since.

Together we gathered in the cold of the downstairs kitchen with bright yellow walls and the single bright light bulb sticking down from the ceiling. It’s a very simple set-up. A sink and two two-burner gas hot plates line one wall, a dusty cupboard spattered with spices, vegetables, and pots lines another, and then a long table with a bench and 2 chairs and a dish cupboard along a 3rd wall under the windows. This is where I sat, quietly observing as the ani’s, in their long red robes with short aprons tied around their wastes, busied about preparing dinner. At one point, Ani-too got up from the blue plastic chair she had been sitting in as she chopped vegetables. Seru quickly hopped up in the chair and curled up, tucking her nose into her belly, to enjoy the residual warmth.

It’s hard to tell who starts the chanting or if it’s the same nun each time, but with some of the nuns in their seats and others still making their way in, the low, deep rumbling murmur of chanting began to take shape. At times it sounded quite similar to the monks down at the monastery. With the various instruments mixing in and coming back out it created quite a cacophony of sound. And then, here and there, without warning, it transformed into beautiful, feminine, melodic, trance inducing harmony. Those mesmerizing moments are powerful and the resonance felt as though it moved right through me.

During lunch a little nun came in and passed out candies – smiling from ear to ear. There are many young girls here now, in part because they were orphaned by the earthquake and also because the nunnery began accepting and educating children some years ago. Some of them will grow up to become nuns and some, of their own volition, will opt out. I think they generally stay to about 16 – 18 years of age. Ani-too brought the girl over and told us that it was her 6th birthday. Maiike, my new Dutch friend, and I sang her happy birthday bringing huge smiles to her cute, round, pink-hatted face.

Afterwards, when everyone had exited the room, I approached her to express my gratitude. Tears began flowing fast and furious as I approached Ani-la and as I bowed and held my hands in prayer, she reached out, took my hands in hers, and pressed her forehead gently to mine. My mind felt so expansive – a rush came over me that is, again, hard to explain. She then looked at me and said “you come back, for retreat”.

Our body is our personal, birth granted, house. In Sanskrit the word used for the body is “upadhi”, meaning vehicle. Our body is our vehicle for yoga — the home to our unique spirit. Buddhist teachings refer to this body as “precious” — becoming so when one chooses to take up the torch of yoga turning this otherwise mundane, temporary flesh and bone casing into something extraordinary. We set out to explore, find our dharma and uncover our light.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what we’re all going through and pondering the best ways to cope and carry on in a positive way. This concept of REFUGE comes up for me often - and it’s a daily part of my personal practice - a solitary sacred act of taking shelter in the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Sangha - the teacher, teachings and community. A symbolic act of accepting protection, safety, respite, reprieve, and support. In doing so, I’ve thought about what this means, how it feels and when I’ve felt this way at other times in my life.

This conversation is both the heartbreak—and heart opening—of the series that re-imagines the world of HP Lovecraft, a widely known racist and anti-Semite. Do his views require us to be so offended that we don’t read his stories? Are his novels not capable of sparking the imagination of black and Jewish folx? Do these facts necessitate that we cancel him? The HBO series defiantly says: "No. But we will retell the story, and we will take back our agency."”

These days it seems there are so many valid reasons to give up — to throw in the towel, so to speak, and turn away from the world. And as a yoga practitioner one may even justify doing so in the name of practice. Pouring more and more of one’s time and energy into the work on the mat/cushion, going further inward and staying there longer. Because that’s the ultimate aim, right? Detach from the world and find liberation through one’s soul. Right?

He said that the “Om” represents the body, speech and mind of a Buddha - the result or goal of the practice being to reach buddhahood. This is what Buddhists believe, that each of us is progressing through many cycles of birth, life and death (samsara) in many different types of bodies until we develop spiritually and reach the awakening experienced by the Buddha himself. We all have that potential and we all have within us this capacity or “buddha nature”.