Teaching is talking

As I was subbing for a friend, I was asked to talk about the famous Gandhi quote: “Be the change you want to see in the world.”
As I thought about I'd want change about myself, the answer came fast from within: I want to talk less. Which is funny, considering that I talk for a living. Teaching yoga is mostly talking.

This may well be what attracted me to it in the first place. Teaching yoga includes weaving a web of words to describe movement, sensation and thought patterns. I love finding the ideal image for a specific coordination, so that the body just falls into place.

The way we measure and intonate with our voice creates a rhythm for the practice. It is so much like writing poetry, or even like writing in general. Which obviously is another thing I am drawn to.

Different teachers have different qualities and use their skills differently. I like to make the most of my verbal cues. I feel that it carries the room, and it also carries me.

Words are my gift and also my curse. Sometimes I'm too enamored with words and I end up talking too much. Teaching becomes over-teaching and over-explaining.

It is not about information, it's about experience

If you are a teacher yourself – any kind of teacher – this will sound familiar: At the end of the day, it is less about the information or the knowledge you impart. It is more about the atmosphere you create for people. It is about the experience they are taking away.

If you keep talking at people, there's not a lot of space left for self-exploration. They never get the chance to just feel for themselves. Too much information takes away from direct personal experience.

One of my most influential teachers says very little. His classes are almost eerily quiet. And also always, always packed. It seems that most of us appreciate a little bit of silence. A short break from the constant overwhelm of information out there. We have so little time to just feel.

The world throws so much information at us: We are told what and what not to eat, how to be a good mother, which therapies for what ailment, what a fulfilled sex life looks like, which gemstone is going to balance our mood swings, we are told how to speak in the politically correct way, how to handle our finances, which shoes with which lipstick... We need a break.

Only in the gap does change occur

Very rarely do we take the time to sit quietly and take note of what we feel inside. We override our emotions with our intellect, editing them until they fit some lofty expectation. How are we supposed to know how we feel and how to react if we are always chewing on some information or other?

I think this is why a lot of people try yoga or meditation. It is simply a quiet space where we can feel whatever we are feeling right now. As the yogis like to say, we can just sit with whatever arises. Once we know what's going on, we also know what we need and how to answer.

Ayurvedic psychologists say that a skilful yoga practice should be one third about the body, one third about the information or the knowledge, and one third should be silence. For only in the silence can the soul unfold. Only in the stillness of a deep Savasana do true shifts in consciousness occur.

In my experience, moments of clarity that arise during silent reflection slowly add up to bigger changes. They draw circles. They affect not only us, but gradually also the way we behave with our family, our friends, our co-workers, people on the bus. And so we become a change in the world. Maybe the one we wanted to see.

But there's no point in me telling you, really. You have to experience it for yourself.

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

One night after showering and before bed I felt the spontaneous need to meditate after a long day. So I sat down on the bed, recited a mantra and then settled in for a moment of silence with my eyes closed.

Only seconds after that, my husband came in and slipped into bed next to me. He started fumbling for his phone and soon a lot of clicking and whooshing noises were reaching my left ear. I felt that this was extremely irritating, not to mention rude. My reaction was strong, probably because I am quite addicted to and enslaved by the phone myself. But isn't that a meditation classic? The first moments, when we have to get accustomed to stillness, we encounter resistance and we start looking for an excuse to escape. So there I was, getting irritated. I got so angry that I was on the brink of telling my husband – very brusquely and in no unclear terms – to please take his phone somewhere else. Right before I did, I remembered that meditation doesn't mean being still in the perfect silent environment. It means finding a little bit of stillness no matter what.

I also became aware of my returning visitor, as Jack Kornfield likes to call them: Most of us have one go-to emotion when things get rough or tricky. An emotion we immediately resort to when we stand with our back against the wall. For me, it's anger or irritability. You could say it's my Italian temper or my Ayurvedic constitution, called Dosha, which is quite fiery. The element of fire (called Pitta, in Ayurveda) has certain qualities also reflected in  our personalities: It is easily enflamed, flaring out, it devours and unfurls. It rages. Other people are more airy (Vata, for air/ether) or down to earth (Kapha, for water and earth together), so they are more unrooted or melancholy. Their tendency may be to react with sadness, depression, cofusion and indecision (for Vata) or stubbornness and inflexibibility (for Kapha). No matter what our go-to emotion is, meditation (especially difficult meditation) usually brings it out and offers a great opportunity to investigate it. Meditation is also a safe environment to quietly observe how emotion evolves.

In every day life, emotion often prompts us to act or react. For me, that usually means that I snap and someone ends up baffled or hurt. That evening, because I was meditating, I was a bit more observant and I could see that pattern unfold. I also could stop short of reacting and focus on me being a sealed container for my emotion. Instead of directing it outwards, I turned my gaze inwards.

I literally imagined myself as a closed glass container with a fire burning inside. And what happens to fire after a while when it is not fed with enough oxygen or fuel or wood? Correct. First it burns low, then it dies out. The same happens with any emotion, when it is not fed. This may sound like we are swallowing emotion and holding it in, but that's just a pessimistic way to phrase it. What I mean is quite the opposite: We can experience every fibre of our emotion without acting upon it. If you wait long enough, the emotion transforms or subsides. Even if it takes years, the emotion will change eventually. Or, as my teacher used to say: “If you give it space, it also has room to transform.”

This is why, especially to someone as impulsive as I am, meditation is a true gift. I'm still angry, I still get upset, but I now know ways to contain the fire. Sometimes I manage, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I still lash out, sometimes I can control my combustible being. Whatever happens, though, I am aware. I see it happen or I can at least say: “Oh here I go with my go-to emotion again!”

That is very different from blaming it on someone else, from looking for reasons to escape and the chance to look away. Meditation gives us a closed container so that we can stop to watch before we go on autopilot. That right there is the gift of meditation. We get to consciously decide: Which wolf are we going to feed?