Comfort in the Uncomfortable

Transcript

So today I’d like to talk about finding comfort in the uncomfortable.

So many times I’m going to yoga and I’ll be in a new posture I’ve not tried. Or I’m doing some stretch trying to keep my legs back while bending my hips towards my face or something like that and my instructor Luis will say “find comfort, find the position, find the posture.”

It’s not so easy to do to begin with but sometimes, sometimes I find that level of comfort especially breathing and focusing on the breath and that body part.

I think, I suspect what is going on physically is that the breadth and focus directs blood to that body part.

It helps us to feel more comfort in that position because it’s actually healing, inducing a type of stress but then bring in blood and oxygen, on a spiritual soulful level bringing in prana, chi or life energy.

So you can feel more comfortable. So you can repair what needs to be extended and moved into greater depths of vitality.

I noticed this too when I’m in the gym, today, I did a new max on bench press, lifting 125 pounds over my chest.

At the time we had Akira the Don playing this Alan Watts type guided meditation saying everything is relaxing, noticing the sounds around you.

So I’m trying to be just as I am in the yoga studio, trying to maintain strength and relaxation at once.

Trying to have all of my body that needs to be exerting effort pushing itself to the limit.

Where the rest of my body, completely relaxed. Yin and yang together at once.

But that’s the kind of control a person can get by practicing yoga and other physical exercises.

It’s pretty interesting, we don’t necessarily think about that. I didn’t think about that for the first few months in the gym but it makes sense.

Trying to be more relaxed at the same time exerting all the effort.

Reminds me of that old teaching which dates back before the Bhagavad Gita before the vetas, where it’s a person intensely focused on their goal, focusing all of their energy and effort towards that goal and at once having no attachment to it.

They’re ready to do everything they can to achieve it, if it doesn’t happen they will not be disappointed or discouraged. Just like in the book the Hustler by Walter Tevis describes Minnesota Fats character, this almost zen like quality to these characters he describes.

Walter having a lot of experience in the pool hall playing pool, practicing the same shots over and over again. Sometimes a hundred times and maybe you make the shot, maybe you make it one in 100 times.

Every time relax, take a deep breath and reconsider what the move was, your action was and what the result was and how that might bring you closer to your goal.

Of course a lot of people might find that uncomfortable, failing. We call it failing, it’s not really failing just a part of the process. Many people would be uncomfortable failing over and over, not getting the ball in the pocket. Over and over.

Tens of times, scores of times, hundreds of times but we keep going comfortable in that moment without frustration, without necessity of frustration.

Comfortable in the uncomfortable.

In our lives, things get strange, emotions surge. Difficult situations we could not have predicted because we were not at that level of comfort. Now we move through them, breathe through them, comfortable in the uncomfortable.

Thanks for listening, have a wonderful day.