Quiet the Mind and the Soul will Speak

“The body benefits from movement and the mind benefits from stillness." Sakyong Mipham

As I thought about what I wanted to write this week, I kept feeling stuck. My goal with my emails and themes for classes each week is to spread positivity, calm, and motivation. I often sit down on Sunday night and write the emails or at least sketch out what I want to say. If that doesn’t happen I wake up early Monday morning and write it before the kids get up. But when I sat down last night and woke up this morning I couldn’t figure out what I wanted my message to be this week, or what I personally wanted to focus on. These past few days, I haven’t been feeling the most optimistic, the most calm, or the most motivated. So maybe that’s my lesson for this week. It’s ok to not always be ok. We have to endure through the difficult days to get to the sunny days. 

So when I thought about how my brain and mood were feeling a little jumbled, I brought myself back to my yoga practice. And to the idea of keeping it simple. So for this week I’m going to focus on quieting the mind so the soul can speak. And if what my soul speaks this week isn’t all roses and optimism, I’m going to ride it out. I’m going to sit in the emotion and just be. What I know is that returning to the breath, returning to the quiet inside always helps. So I offer you this week the ability to know it’s ok to feel sad, it’s ok to feel unsure, and it’s ok to feel a longing for what life used to look like. And when you can’t find the answers, I offer you a moment or a few to sit with your breath and just let yourself feel that emotion.  

Here is an excerpt from an interview I read with Tara Brach, a meditation teacher, that spoke to me about this idea.

Sigal Samuel: In your new book Radical Compassion, you also offer a short meditation practice called RAIN, which I’ve found helpful. Can you spell out what the acronym means?

Tara Branch: Yes, I use the acronym because It’s an easy-to-remember handle if you’re getting caught in fear. It stands for recognize, allow, investigate, nurture. 

First, just recognize, “Okay, I’m feeling fear.” Mentally whisper it, and that helps right away.

Then allow it. Just let it be there, don’t try to run away or fix it or control it or judge it.

Then investigate it. Begin to come into the body and just feel where the fear is in the body. Find out how it feels and breathe with it, with a gentle quality of attention.

And then nurture. You might just put your hand on your heart and offer a kind or soothing message to yourself. You can say to the fear, “Thank you for trying to protect me; it’s okay.” I sometimes will say to myself, “It’s okay, sweetheart.”

I know that connecting with you in my classes this week will help turn my mood around, as I always find such joy in teaching. I appreciate all of your support of me and my small business as I try new ways to help bring calm into your houses. I will certainly be trying out the RAIN practice from Tara this week and I hope it may also help some of you!