First You Do the Practice, Then the Practice Does You
For many years, my relationship with practice was ruthless—sometimes forceful.
Waking up before sunrise to be sure I made it into the temple of silence and space. Worried that if I was late or missed it, I would be skipping out on something essential. Something that resourced me for ‘the rest of life.’
Simply put, I was under-resourced. Practice made life more manageable—even if it was riddled with hierarchy and force.
As time rolled on and healing ensued, I became sensitive to the energies driving practice took away from the point of practice itself.
I released the reigns. My body took a much-needed sabbatical called sleeping until it wanted. I released resistance. I questioned what was truly feeding me and only did that. I began to see more than just my early mornings as the temple.
I began to smell the knowing of how intertwined a calm and joyful system is with receiving benefits from anything. Fleeting moments brought tastes of this.
But in most moments, I carried on—riddled with my personal survival strategies cocktail overlaying a moth-winged nervous system.
As time rolled on and healing ensued, my system began to absorb, beyond concept — the meaning of all of Life as practice.
“First, you do the practice, then the practice does you.”
I came more into my body. I touched a consistent pulse of safety. Storehouses of survival energies slowly dissipated.
Within these spirals of healing, a rhythm emerged. My rhythm. Gosh—so defiantly different than what the world had me entrained to.
This rhythm had a clear voice.
Wake up now.
Come back to your breath.
You’re beginning to repress an emotion.
Eat this now.
There’s tension in your knee.
Reschedule next Friday.
Go outside.
Don’t lift weights today; do yoga instead.
This clear voice, paradoxically and comically, brought me back to the beginnings of my journey with practice.
The promised land I had once pined for in my ruthless early mornings—flow, nourishment, spaciousness, began to emerge from all things.
I still force practice—just less.
I still get overwhelmed by the life of a householder, business-owner, woman, practitioner, wife, friend, daughter—just with a much swifter return rate.
I still place hierarchies on my day—it just more quickly reveals itself as a joke.
Bowing to you and your practice as perfect just as they are in each moment.
