Do not get sucked into fear

For most of us, pain and suffering are so intertwined that we find it impossible to separate them. When things go wrong, we may feel like victims or assume that we're receiving karmic punishment—that we "deserve" what is happening to us. We may express our feelings or stuff them, but few of us know how to process the pain of loss or failure without getting hooked by our suffering.

There is not much that rocks my world, but once in awhile someone does something to knock me off balance. A good friend of ours was diagnosed with dementia, I offered to give Bob a Thai Therapy for free to see what he thought. I sent him and his wife, Norma, the link to my blog so they could read a little about what I do. Later I got an email from Norma saying new medications were helping Bob right now so they were going to pass on the Thai Therapy. I continued to send my emails and blog links, as I do for my students and clients. I received another email from Norma asking me to take them off my email list.  When I got the email I was embarrassed, then I was angry, then sad, then I chose to let it pass right through me, as though I were transparent, so that it would not hit that solid wall inside of me. I did not want them to have power to control my inner state.

Yoga has taught me to untie the knots that make me identify with my suffering self. yoga practice is meant to teach us how to untangle these inner knots. Often, you don't realize how much difference your  practice has made until the day that you find yourself dealing with a crisis without going into an absolute meltdown. The kids are screaming or your office mates are panicking, and yes, there's a little bit of fear and irritation in your mind too, but there's also a witnessing awareness, an inner compassionate presence that lets you stay present with what's happening without getting sucked into the fear or the anger.

I had a little sample of this a few years ago when I was showing off a handstand for a group of family members. I had looked around the room for a wall to kick up against, not finding one I chose a door instead, I pulled the door shut and stepped back to kick up. As my heels touched the door I heard the door unlatch, panic struck me for just a moment, the door started to fall away, I knew if I let fear control me I could be seriously injured. I let the door slow my fall, I stayed completely calm and straight, I brought that witnessing awareness, the compassionate presence let me stay present with what was happening so I did not get sucked into the fear. Everything slowed down as I felt my body slowly lower to the floor, at least it seemed slow to me, I was unharmed and tried again at a more solid door.

I know these examples seem small compared with what might be going on in your life right now, but the process of pain, loss or failure is the same.The great spiritual practitioners all offer the same basic prescriptions for undoing inner knots: Find out who you really are, do the practices that purify your murky mind, and discover how to work with everything that happens to you. Then difficulties become your teachers, and pain and loss become occasions for profound and positive transformation.

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Yoga Therapist

and Ayurveda Consultant

          These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.

It’s okay to figure out and eradicate the reasons why we suffer

More than 50 million Americans suffer with chronic pain, and chronic pain doesn't just hurt in the physical sense. it can also be responsible for loss of sleep, weight gain, anger, depression, despair and irritability. Yet I find people who chose not to get help for themselves because they think this is their trial in life, and they must ride it out to the end. What if, part of the test is to try to find a way to fix whatever is wrong? Patanjali states that yoga has two distinct purposes or goals. In Chapter II, verse 2 of the Yoga Sutra, he states that yoga's "purpose or goal is to cultivate the experience of equanimity  and to unravel the causes of negativity." Patanjali tells us, in effect, that yoga will help us figure out and eradicate the reasons why we suffer, even as it leads us to feel the deepest of human experiences.

We all live in the midst of forces that we do not perceive because we suffer from “Paradigm blindness”; what I mean is we do not perceive things that exist outside our currently accepted set of beliefs and experience. Let me tell you what I mean. Gary and I lived in Germany for a year and a half when we were in the army. When it came time to return to the states we could not travel together, some crazy army thing, so I flew to South Dakota with my good friend Lila, because I had three kids and I did not want to travel by myself, and then my parents were going to pick me up from there a few days later. When we landed in South Dakota we were exhausted and all three children were asleep, Lila, carried the baby, I carried our 20 month old and the pilot carried our 4 year old off the plane. We began looking for Lila’s parents when a woman came up to me wanting to take my 20 month old from my arms, I could not figure out what she was doing, who did she think she was!! It took me several, it seemed like forever, seconds to see that it was my mother.

I did not expect my mother for many more days, I could not perceive the thing that existed outside my currently accepted set of beliefs. I believe this is also why Mary did not recognise Jesus when she went to the tomb, He was dead, she could not perceive the thing that existed outside her currently accepted set of beliefs.. The scriptures teach that we are designed to go through a paradigm shift, a perception change, just as I did with my mother. We can expand our mental and spiritual context, we can get outside the confining mental structure that human language, thinking, and experience have created, and receive new knowledge and new experiences and greater consciousness. It is okay for us to figure out and eradicate the reasons why we suffer, and, it is okay for us to accept a different set of beliefs and experiences to help make ourselves whole again.

Resistance is an inner contraction, a hardening of the shell.... You are closed. Whatever action you take in a state of inner resistance (which we could also call negativity) will create more outer resistance, and the universe will not be on your side, life will not be helpful. If the shutters are closed, the sunlight cannot come in. When you yield internally, when you surrender, a new dimension of consciousness opens up. If action is possible or necessary, your action will be in alignment with that whole and supported by creative intelligence....You experience a state of inner openness. Circumstances and people then become helpful, cooperative. Coincidences happen. If no action is possible, you rest in the peace and inner stillness that come with surender. You rest in God.

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Yoga Therapist

and Ayurveda Consultant

These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.

Ayurvedic treatments can heal disease

A couple of blogs ago I mentioned how our doshas compare to the three main forces of the atmosphere, air (vata), fire (pitta), and water (kapha). And how they are responsible for our well being, but they are also responsible for disease, diseases are caused by an imbalance in one or more of the doshas. Each dosha type carries positive traits and strengths when in balance, but when out of balance, may demonstrate a set of predictable negative signs or conditions.

One of the ways to balance the doshas is with thai therapy. The most important part of thai therapy is stimulating what is called the “marmas.” By stimulating these pressure points I can adjust your energy flow, release toxins and bring the doshas into balance. Toxins, stress, and negative emotions get stuck in the  marmas and are held, sometimes for years.. Disease is manifested in pain, blockage or swelling in these areas even before it may manifest outwardly in the full range of disease symptoms. Through the right use of marmas our entire physical and mental energy can be consciously increased, decreased or redirected.

The sen lines are paths that connect the marmas to one another. If the marmas become overly full with toxins, or the sen lines going in or out of the marmas gets blocked, the toxins will then flow into the sen lines. these sights are very painful to the touch. Stimulating the marmas through pressing also helps to clear the sen lines where they intersect the marmas. Ideally there is a healthy free-flow of energy through the sen lines that helps the marmas stay healthy and strong.

It is not uncommon for you to feel an almost indescribable feeling of centeredness and balance following a thai therapy. This unique feeling of peace and optimism is because all doshas have come into balance in the right way for you.

Thai therapy, a dosha balancing diet, combined with other Ayurvedic treatments can heal disease. When our energy channels are healthy and strong, we feel emotionally balanced, happy, and awakened in mind, body and spirit. In fact when all three are all in balance, they actually cease to be separate aspects, and merge into the soul. Living from the soul level makes it possible for us to live from our pure potential.

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Yoga Therapist

and Ayurveda Consultant

These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.

Be smart and feel good this summer

This is the time of year when everyone starts to get back to running, biking, hiking and many other sports. My husband and I just got back from Zions where we did some hiking and horseback riding. I am very sore. Any time you work out in any way it is important to stretch completely, so your muscles can return to normal and begin to heal. Your muscles shorten as you work out, if you do not stretch them out completely, the next time you work out they will shorten more. It’s just a matter of time before your knees or hips start to hurt from not stretch completely.

Your nervous system uses a stretch reflex, this reflex regulates the length of your muscles. Whenever you elongate a muscle beyond a certain preset length or unconsciously stretch it too fast, this reflex makes the muscle automatically contract so that you can’t lengthen it any further. This does not mean you can only go so far, people have a hard time stretching because they think they are done when it starts to feel uncomfortable “hurt”. What I am going to tell you is stuff you really need to know if you want to workout hard and feel good after.

You can feel this reflex in action when, let’s say, you go into a forward bend, you sense a strong stretch in the backs of your legs, and cannot bend any deeper into the pose. Keep in mind no matter how well you condition your nervous system; you also need to change  the way you perceive stress. Forward bending can produce strong sensations even in those of us who are very flexy one common response is to ignore sensations and force yourself forward, fighting against your tight hamstrings. Another is to come out of the pose to avoid the challenge entirely. Both strategies are variations on the same theme: fight-or-flight. This creates tense muscles and rapid or held breathing.

Try this instead, get to a comfortable stretch, you have to use your conscious intention to override this automatic stabilizing function. Once stretched, all receptors adapt, meaning that if you hold them at a fixed length, their signaling slacks off over time. Stretch only a tiny bit at first, this will barely stimulate the sensitive receptors. Then hold very, very still until all the receptors adapt and the already weak signals they are sending to the nervous system subside to an even lower level. And then you can move a tiny bit more into the stretch, be very, very still again. If you repeat this sequence carefully at least 3 times, you can gradually move into a very deep stretch without ever activating your stretch receptors much, and you never feel a strong sensation of the stretch. You have to be extremely attentive, sensitive, and patient to make it work.

Paying attention to how your body and mind react to the stress of any pose offers clues about how you typically react to stress in your life. By training yourself to actively observe while staying calm in poses, you’ll be able to do the same thing when difficult sensations, thoughts, or emotions arise in the face of stress. Instead of going into your habitual reaction mode, you’ll notice what’s happening while staying present enough to chose an appropriate response. Practice attentively and be responsive to what is happening in your body and mind, rather than to what you expect to happen.

If you feel like you are losing your flexibility, or you can’t get past a certain point, get someone to help you stretch, they must be kind, move, slowly, and take your direction to move more or less.. You can get a really good deep stretch with a partner. That’s what a Thai yoga therapist does, I help people get ready for competitive sports by keeping their muscles long and free of injury.  I also help them recover more quickly after their competitions. Be smart, stretch when you workout and feel good this summer.

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Yoga Therapist

and Ayurveda Consultant

These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.

The love of a personal trainer

I just got finished watching the biggest loser finale, what an incredible show! I love it,  it keeps America motivated. and they had kids on this year, how cool is that. What I love mostly about the show is the way the contestants love their trainers, but, this year it was very evident how much the trainers really love the contestants. Maybe I notice more because I am a trainer. I love my yoga students, sometimes I get personal training with them and sometimes they are in class. But, there is something to be said about helping someone change their life, as the biggest loser trainers get to do every season.

I don’t help people lose weight, or at least I haven’t yet, I help people restore their health. It is very much the same, the people on the biggest loser are sick not only physically, but mentally, and spiritually as well. You can see it in their eyes at the beginning of the season, then, you can see them come alive as the season progresses. This year we head the trainers say more that once “open your eyes!” You have to open your eyes to connect. I get to see this same transformation in my Thai therapy clients as the therapy balances their doshas.

We can compare the doshas to the three main forces at work in the atmosphere, Vata as air, Pitta as fire, and Kapha as water. These same elements create all the weather patterns on Earth. The doshas are responsible for all weather and climate as they fluctuate throughout the season. Similarly, the three doshas rule over our internal climate by their ever changing interactions of movement (Vata), heat (Pitta), and Moisture (Kapha) through the rhythms of time and the aging process. Disease is caused by their imbalances, excess and inappropriate movements.

I also see transformation in my yoga students as they discover the connections between each part of the body and mind. As they overcome the fear of being in a balance, or going upside down. And most importantly they realize that the same strengths and weaknesses they experience on the mat are the same strengths and weaknesses they exhibit in their daily lives.

The contestants on the biggest loser come to the realization they are exceptional beings through the process, and that is why the trainers love their job. I try to instill that same awareness in my clients and students. Because bringing that awareness to another being is the ultimate gift. Please know you are exceptional beings!

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Yoga Therapist

and Ayurveda Consultant

            These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.

Meditation can make your brain work better

A regular meditation practice can make your brain work better. People who meditate capture information that others miss when presented with a series of visual cues in quick succession.
just as repeated practice of Sun Salutations builds strength and stamina, so regular meditation enhances the capacity for perception, awareness, and efficiency in processing. It can ease anxiety, depression, high blood pressure, and many other health issues.

The greatest benefit meditation offers may be freedom from the tyranny of thoughts that occupy the mind. You know those negative thoughts that tell you that you aren’t good enough, or that he’s wrong and you’re right, or that you don’t have time for yoga or meditation in your busy life.

I know, I sound like a broken record. But, I have been doing this for a long time, I see the results, not only in my own meditation, but in my clients. When a client comes to me I am usually their last resort.  I know meditation is the number one place to start for any kind of healing, I’ll be honest, I lose some of them, because they can’t see how something so simple, as Ayurveda, can make them well. But the ones who follow my guidance, find themselves, and wellness in meditation.

Meditation has both short-and-long-term benefits to brain structure and function. Long time meditators have a thicker insula, the part of the brain that links the emotional center with the thinking center. The amygdala, the part of the brain tied to the fight-or-flight impulse, is more active than in non meditators.
But meditators also seem to be better able to calm that response than others.

We become what we meditate on. All we are is the result of what we have thought. Now, I’m sounding like a broken record again. Every illness you have started with a thought first. What happens in meditation is that we slow down the furious fragmented activity of the mind and lead it to a measured, sustained focus on what we want to become. As the mind slows down, we begin to gain control of it in daily life. For most of us staying present for even a minute is challenging.

Approach your mind as if it were a toddler learning table manners, you wouldn’t seat a two-year old at a linen-topped table and expect her first meal to be a quiet, graceful affair. You have to repeatedly show her what to do, gently reminding her to focus on getting the food in her mouth and patiently asking her to settle down, eventually, perhaps after years of loving reminders, she might sit with poise, employing the techniques you showed her those many, many times. Your mind needs the same kind of love, attention, and care you would show your toddler.

Its first attempts to stop its wild ramblings and  to focus on one simple thing will likely bring up resistance. Your mind may be exhausted by a few minutes of focus, throw a temper tantrum, or try very hard to do as you ask but still wander off, since that’s the life it’s used to, just sit with it, like your child at the table, acknowledging how well it’s doing and noticing when it goes astray but never punishing it, just bringing it gently back to the task at hand. Don’t expect it to get the hang of this new idea in just a sitting or two--but know that if you stay with it, your mind will become more and more able to stay focused and do as you ask. Despite the oft-heard instruction to “still the mind,” the practice is not meant to help you get rid of all your thought--and you wouldn’t want to. Your ability to think is one of the greatest gifts in life, something to truly cherish. You are simply training yourself to become more aware of your thoughts and more important, of how you relate to them--a process that can change the very landscape of your live.

Nancy Adams Certified Thai Therapist

and Ayurveda Consultant

           These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.

THE REST IS HISTORY

I definitely had some fear last year when I turned 59. What was I afraid of? I can’t even tell you. I have never put much stock in age. I don’t even really think about my age, until last year. I really do believe you are as old as you feel, and I feel good!. Yet I let fear get the best of me last year, for a moment.
being fearful goes right along with accepting someone else's opinion as our own and implementing it into our belief system. We will all face fear at one time or another. Courage is that quality of heart that lets us do it.
I haven’t always realized that I am brilliant and amazing.When I was in high school I was terrified to hand in my home work. I was sure it was all wrong and the teacher would laugh at me.This belief led to other beliefs that caused me not to participate in class, and at times not to attend. I read my first book after I was married. My husband joined the army, we were stationed in Germany for a year and a half. I couldn’t watch TV or listen to radio because I didn’t speak the language, so I joined a book club. I instantly fell in love with reading and have had a book in my hands ever since. With every book I read, I realized I really am smart, and precious moments of my  life--moments that could have been full of love, creativity and presence--were taken over by the fear I created in my own head..

While the basic experience of fear is that “something is wrong,” many people turn that feeling into “there is something wrong with me.” We feel as though we must live up to certain standards in order to be loved, so we constantly monitor ourselves, trying to see if we’re falling short. When you live in this trance of fear, you instinctively develop strategies to protect yourself. The efforts you make to avoid fear and prove yourself worthy only reinforce the deep sense of being inadequate. When you run from fear and take false refuge, you miss being in the very place where genuine healing and peace are possible.

When it came time to certify in yoga, I am self taught so, I had never attended any yoga classes, I took my same high school beliefs with me. I did all my online essays and school work with ease, but when it came time to hand in all the work, those dreaded thoughts came back to me “I’m sure it’s all wrong, the teacher's will laugh at me.” Mindfulness is the clear recognition of your moment-to-moment experience. Here the inquiry to use is, what is happening inside me right now?

Compassion is the spacious quality of heart that allows and holds with tenderness whatever you are experiencing. It seeks to answer the question; Can I meet this moment, this experience, with kindness?
It took me a few days, to realized that the same beliefs that kept me from getting good grades in high school, may, now, keep me from being certified in what I love so much, and worked so hard to accomplish. Being mindfully attentive means that you are aware of the stories you are telling yourself and the feelings and sensations in your body. I walked right up to my fear and looked it in the face. Then, I put my paperwork in an envelope and mailed it to the school. The rest is history. I am Nancy Adams, CERTIFIED! Yoga Instructor, Thai Yoga Therapist and Ayurveda Consultant. AND I AM GOOD AT IT!!!! Take time today to reflect on the fears you have overcome and what you are good at.
These are my own thoughts. I sometimes take writings from others to support my own ideas.