Friday, November 29, 2013

Wake up! Elevate your Consciousness

I was talking with my oldest daughter, Judy, one day. I said “why does life have to be so hard?” she said “because Adam and Eve partook of the fruit”. I started to laugh, then I realized she is right! I have students ask me all the time, why does my body hurt all the time, even after yoga? It is true if you don’t have the bad times you can’t appreciate the good times. I ask them, you have days where they feel really good, right? then they realize they do have days where they do feel really good. We don’t notice those days so much. We only notice the days that make us uncomfortable.

It always comes back to the stress, if we could manage our stress we would always feel good, or rather,  if we could manage our thoughts we would not have stress, then we would feel good always, it’s our thoughts that cause the stress, and  it’s the stress that makes our body’s hurt, and eventually sick. Physician and Yoga Journal medical editor Timothy McCall says that “stress may fuel chronic illnesses, such as obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. If you are continually stressed, you leave the door open to a variety of health conditions." Yoga is an effective stress reducer.

The Law of Cause and Effect says: for every effect in our life there is a specific cause. Thoughts are causes, and conditions are effects. Our thoughts are always the primary causes of the conditions or effects in our lives. What is it that causes our thoughts? it’s our feelings! So, how do we fix it? First you have to get in touch with your internal dialogue. What you are saying to yourself, and what you are feeling inside. Our feelings and our thoughts are what determined where we are today. If what is happening to us now, both physically and emotionally, is undesirable, our feelings and our thoughts are what need fixing.

Last year I took my Thai mat to Judy’s house to work on some of her friends for a weekend. She made appointments for 8-10 of her friends that had been asking for me to come to Idaho and give them Thai therapy. Judy had a neighbor that she hadn’t invited because this neighbor is one of those people who has one health problem after another, maybe you know the type, these people can be found in the doctor’s office every other week, looking unsuccessfully for the answers to their problems, they then keep the aches and pains alive and well by talking about them to whomever they converse with. This neighbor saw on facebook that I was coming to town and called Judy to get in on the action. I did give this woman a Thai therapy and for the 2 hour session she didn’t stop talking about all her problems. What she doesn’t understand is that the more she talks about her aches and pains, the more energy she gives them and the more she reinforces her illness.

Too many of us have not been taught, or we have forgotten how to be aware of what is going on inside our mind and body. We are so used to turning our pain and hurt over to something (drugs) or someone else to fix that we have turned off our ability to be aware--to be sensitive or mindful. We have every ability to heal ourselves everything we are today is the sum total result of all the thinking that we have done to this moment. What are your thought? What are your feelings? If the negative conditions in your life are ongoing and the patterns are repeated over and over again, this is telling you--screaming at you--that you are definitely out of harmony with natural Laws...God’s laws…the laws of the Universe. It’s time to wake up! Elevate your consciousness and locate the cause of your effects.

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Yoga Therapist
Certified Yoga Instructor
and Ayurveda Consultant
These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.