Tuesday, September 16, 2008

What is the opposite of yoga?

I was sitting in my neighbor’s yard (yes there are a few yards in bklyn!) and we were talking about deep stuff…like YOGA, and he asked me what the opposite of yoga was.

Good question!, I thought. Really, one no one had asked me that before. I even had to think for a moment, which felt nice in my brain, like scratching an itch in one of its corners.

I’m still thinking about it, but what I have come up with so far is the situation of separation. Like if you pulled apart the small white pedals of this little flower, the flower would be no longer, you would just have a pile of mush.

Separation can take many different forms: like saying yes when you mean no, or that this is mine and that is yours. Or grades in school. Chapters, pages of a book. Raindrops. Chocolate chips.

But separation can’t be all bad. In the womb we start out as one cell and keep on separating. And that little flower's separate petals are connected to its center.

So yoga is what connects the pedals to the yellow part. Or your mind to your breath to your body. The opposite is very lonely, and precarious too.

Ha!, and you thought you were just standing in warrior 2!

1 comment:

Karen in FL said...

I love this! I am a beginning "yogi" and I am enthralled with the clearness it gives my mind and body. Everything comes together with yoga and meditation...the opposite, mind and body fall apart.