There is no try!

Day 193
Originally uploaded by ArjunaWeeping.

"Do, or do not. There is no 'try.'"

Yoda in "The Empire Strikes Back"

Continuing my thoughts on commitment, a student emailed me the other day after her return from a trip abroad. She had read my post and thought I had been thinking about her when I wrote it, which I hadn't. Still, it's quite interesting that someone should see a bit of herself in a post that was largely about me and my own interaction with this concept of commitment.

I wrote this post because discovering this "attitude" has been helpful to me in "getting my act together" in many ways. You know, like everyone else I end up skipping practices and not doing stuff I "should" and up until now I've tended to say, "That's fine, just let that go, it doesn't matter." Which is true to a certain extent - if you don't really want the things you say you do, it doesn't matter at all.

But if you DO want them, then it DOES. If you want them, really actually honestly want them, then you DO need to do the right practices to get there. I am always thinking things like, "I wish I could do that" or "I wish I could have that" and so on. You know what, that kind of attitude isn't worth shit -wishing in itself doesn't work. There comes a time when you have to say to yourself - do I REALLY want this, or am I just messing about?

If you're just messing about, that's fine, but you're wasting your time pretending to be committed to something that your heart isn't really into. You'd be better off doing something else that takes less effort and just being happy with that. So stop wasting your time and go be happy doing something else.

If you are committed then there's only one thing to do - move on from only wishing and just simply DO IT. It's like the Yoda quote says, which is another version of the Nike slogan, "Just Do It!" Nobody else is going to do it for you - that doesn't mean you're alone, but if you need/want someone's help, you have to DO it by asking them in the first place.

If yo uare ill and want to feel better -fine, then DO IT. Take the steps to feel better, don't just loll around feleing sorry for yourself waiting for doctors and other medical people to find a "cure" or sort your problems for you. The "feeling better" side rests firmly and squarely in your hands. You want to be rich - fine, the DO IT. Take whatever steps are neccessary to get there (within the bounds of your personal ethics of course ;-)

And so on with every change you could wish for - turning it into reality starts with a wish (a visualisation, a dream, a desire) but the next step MUST be action. The truth is, if you really want something badly enough you will do it. You will put every possible effort into making it happen. If an obstacle comes along, you will find a way around it, or over it or through it.

If you don't, then the truth is that you didn't really want it enough anyway, you were (to some extent) happy enough with things the way they are.

Some people may be offended by this, asking why I am saying that they are happy with a chronic ailment or an unhappy situation? Because there's always something you can do about your suffering. Even if you cannot change the event or situation, you can work to change your perception so that you suffer less. This is what Yoga offers us when there is no "cure" to the situation - a way to remain in that situation but to suffer less.

At the end of the day, it's all about being honest with yourself about what you want from life. And being true to your honest goals, by making the efforts to turn them into reality.

On Commitment

Day 208
Originally uploaded by ArjunaWeeping.

"The attainment of wholeness requires one to stake one's whole being. Nothing less will do; there can be no easier conditions, no substitutes, no compromises."

C.G. Jung

Something I've been contemplating a lot of late, both on a personal level and in terms of a few students (and ex-students).

The very first sutra of Patanjali's Yoga Sutra-s is often called the Pratijna Sutra - meaning the Sutra of commitment. Essentially, Patanjali says here (among other things) that if you are not committed to the path of Yoga, to take your transformation to the end, don't even bother starting. It is too difficult a path to waste your time on if you are not totally committed.

I see this all the time. Students come in, want a certain change in their life, and so in that very first session I ask them to consider their commitment. It takes a long time to make some of the major changes they want. If they're not willing to work at it for a long time, better not to start. All of them nod and show their enthusiasm face - few of them stick at it, as they realise how difficult it can be (even though the practices are not so difficult).

Truth is, just like Jack, they're after the magic beans. They don't want to work for their changes, don't have what it takes to commit to the long term slog - are really just looking for something magical that will make the change just happen so effortlessly and without any challenge. They forget that even Jack had ot climb the beanstalk, avoid the giant and then chop the damned thing down before he got the golden eggs. When they realise that there's no magic beans, they wander off to try something else, usually some no-effort therapy where they don't have to do anything as someone does it to them. And I'll bet when that doesn't work they wander off to the next, and the next and so on...

I guess I used to be like this, jumping from one 'pastime' to another - and I still question my commitment daily. I never do enough to keep myself happy, always being self-critical. "Could do better" is what I'd write on my own report card.

But here I am - years later, still with the Yoga, no plans to jump ship. And lately I do feel I've been refining my own commitment, making some headway into the changes I know that I want to make. It's time to give my all, in order to find out what my all really is, to "stake my whole being" as Jung would say.