OCTOBER – KINMOKUSEI
When I arrived in Berlin in October last year after returning from Japan, I found myself between fronts. The political climate after October 7was tense and the polarization was particularly prevalent in my field of work, the cultural sector. This feeling of division, the pressure to take a stand, to have to choose for either one or the other “side” felt like dense walls building up around my body. The horror of what had happened and what was going to unfold was shaking me up. My initial reaction was a tendency to withdraw, to shut down and avoid.
That week I went to a dance class. We explored spiral movement, twisting and turning as an alternative to frontality. The class was joyful and shifted me into a curious, creative and present state. I was immersed in the experience. The following week I found my body was returning to spirals in my somatic practice.It was longing for spirals. Especially afterwork days that were hard and involved difficult conversations and decisions, I tended to my body. In my practice, I took up the spiraling patterns to shift away from the frontality of things. And not just then,these patterns began to permeate my everyday life. I felt their presence in the bus, in the office, in the supermarket.They were a daily reminderthat I have the option to not just be stuck between front and backor diametral sides. In fact, the possibilities to move and twirl in between were endless. I could twist and turn and subsequently, new and unforeseen options would present themselves;in movement but also in my thoughts and in my ability to interact with people and react in difficult situations. Through this embodied practice, it became easier for me to start engaging with the political discourse and relating to it. I could see things from different, seemingly opposite perspectives more easily. I was more compassionate towards the pain that people felt and more observant about my tendency to judge or to put people in boxes. It became possible to endure conflict and to welcome ambivalence.
This week in October, I marveled at my body’s intelligence. It knew what I needed before my mind knew. I was suffering from my inability to cope with an experience and my body gently nudged me into a new direction. Buddhi could emerge andmy mind and actions could follow and align.My practice in the last years has become more and more about letting my body speak. A conscious de-hierarchization between knowledge that is embodied and experienced and the more “Western”construct of knowledge that is cognitive, written down and scientifically measurable. In this process, it was interesting to learn that in Samkhya, both the body and the mind (Manas) is matter (Prakriti), so there is no hierarchy between both. I was also drawn to the fact that Samkhya makes a clear distinction between the mind (Manas) and intelligence (Buddhi), because in my cultural context the mind is often understood to be an equivalent of intelligence, when it’s clearly so often not making intelligent choices. For a while I had been playing with a practice in which I investigate my mind by imagining its state and thoughts as form, shape, color and movement, consciously materializing it. Understanding the materiality of my mind and taking it from its pedestal helps me to experience it in a more abstract way and to remove myself from it a little, when it feels very overbearing.
JANUARY – SNOWDROPS
Entering the Samkhya course, Navtej invited us to inquire what we were looking for and to sit with our questions. I entered with three main questions. One was how I can perceive and process theoretical knowledge through my body. I sensed a wish for being touched by theory. Hence, I very much enjoyed the somatic approach Navtej offered and the meditations. It was good to be reminded that sitting with a question does not mean thinking about it, but it’s a much broader practice. When I find that something interests mebut is hard to grasp, I find it fruitful to go in and out of inquiry, letting go of the question when the contemplation becomes too forced and letting it find me later, sometimes when Ileastexpect it. There’s a great deal of trust involved when following this non-linear process of inquiry. It requires committing to thenot knowing as well as the path toknowing.
My secondinitial question was what the relevance of Samkhyaphilosophy for me today is andhow it translates into my current time and context.In Samkhya class, we were discussing whether a yoga practice fosters self-centeredness that can stand in the way of political activism. I don’t think it has to, as long as I don’t mistake detachment with ignorance. Instead, I remove myself slightly from an experience to get the distance I need for seeing more clearly. I withdraw, collect myself and then I go back in. Each time I am getting in contact with the external after I have practiced, I am entering from a different state than before and subsequently, I have different options to assess a situation, connect and act. From my experience, self-realization can bring me closer to the external world as I understand myself better and I am aware how I relate to it.
The third question was about the relation of theory and practice.I especially wondered how the theory will inform my practice. Being rather new to Indian philosophy, apart from studying theYogasutra, and not knowing Sanskrit or Hindi, it was not easy to memorize and grasp the words and corresponding theoretical concepts at first. Initially, words did not make sense in relation to words. They did not fall into an architecture that supported itself. Words did make sense in relation to my practice, though. I realized, that it was lesser the theory that informed my practice, but rather my previous practice that informed my understanding of theory. In that sense, the theory didn’t feel completely new but in many ways it confirmed and reassured my embodied experience. I do think one can practice without knowing the theory and I agree with Navtej, If I remember him correctly, that practice comes first and theory follows. Yet it gives mypractice a much greater depth to contextualize it and fill it into this bigger vessel of theory. There’s a sweetness to experience being contained by theory.
As natural as my personal inquiry of my own questions felt, I felt a resistance to ask questions to Navtej and the group and I inquired why. I long to ask questions out of curiosity and a desire for knowledge. I have a difficult history with asking questions ingroup and learning settings though, having being told my whole life (mostly by men) that I need to present myself and my abilities more aggressively even though that’s not my nature. In university, we were literally rated by how many and “good”questions we asked and we were scolded if we didn’t live up to the professor’s standard. Today, I realize that my intention to ask questions in learning settings is often driven by fear and ego (Ahamkhara), out of a need for outer validation or to meet an expectation. This realization came roughly around the time we started talking about the seer (Drshtritvam) and the self-witness (Sakshi). It is still not easy for me to differentiate both, but I feel that the seer in me noticedmyconundrum and the witness was able to look behind its curtains. Once you see, you can decide to leave the curtain shut or to open it again and start investigating how the play is staged. If you investigate, you can see what the causes are of the effects you are experiencing. You can never unknow that there is a curtain though. That ship has sailed. I have caught myself in my own act.
APRIL –GREEN LEAVES
I am writing this reflective essay one week past my endometriosis surgery. This surgery could have well been an event to causeme suffering (Dukha). Yet, at no moment have I suffered, despite having felt excruciating pain and sometimes fear. Some parts of it I have even enjoyed, like being taken care of by strangers at the hospital, my family and my friends checking in. I enjoy that I was able to accept help and care. I take pleasure in witnessing my body heal, day for day a little bit more, wounds closing, tissue softening, scars appearing. I actually feel a clear absence of Dukha, a great clarity. Why haven’t I suffered? Maybe because I have been confident and trustingabout my ability to handle this.I was able to uphold a sense of belonging and connectedness to my body, even though it had to endure so much. And this was work as I have been somatically working on trusting my body for years now. It didn’t come easy. It is a practice.
What is Dukha? Why haven’t I suffered from this event but yet sometimes suffer from other things that seem much smaller and less severe? When Navtej invited us to sit with Dukha, I remember it was at a time where I could very clearly feel its presence. For me it feels like there is too much and too little movement at the same time. My body feels numb and frozen and my cluttered mind is racing in endless loops. I long to rest and yet I cannot find it. Yoga has always been a tool for me to deal with Dukha. To make sense of it and investigate my relation to it. Why I sometimes cling to this state, even nurture it, though it brings me pain. I find it helpful to understand which purpose it serves and then to see if the underlyingneed can be met differently, in a non-harmful, constructive way.I am also consciously feeding my body joyful, pleasurable experiences, reminding me of my sensuality, inviting Sukha (pleasure) in as often as I can.I don’t think the absence of Dukha is Sukha, it’ something much more peaceful and permanent. And yet, I can be more available for Sukha when Dukha is quiet. At this very moment in early spring, I sleep like a baby. I enjoy my own company. I immerse myself in little tasks. I let the healing happen.
Maureen Noe (she/her)
Having spent much of her childhood in her mum’s yoga studio, Maureen is a lifelong student of yoga. She fell in love with Somatics during her Somatic Yoga Teacher Training at Somatische Akademie in Berlin and has deepened her experience in further trainingsin Body-Mind Centering® and trauma-sensitive yoga.She lives in Berlin and offers movement classes that integrate yoga, embodiment and somatic methods. Being affected by endometriosis, she currently focuses on accessible offerings for chronically ill people. She also works in music, which brings her a lot of joy. Maureen values solidarity, community and a self-determinedpractice that liberates from social limitationsand invites to deeply investigate the self.