when people become too emotional and
emotion is almost always from a yoga
perspective considered a negative thing
we're not we're not saying that you
become emotionless or cold or anything
like that but when people experience
different forms of emotion whether it's
jealousy or envy or anger or great
disappointment these types of things we
tend to become swept away by them we
tend to become consumed by them and in
the state of an a highly emotional state
we often say and do things that don't
help us and don't help anyone else and
so a really important part of this yoga
process is to engage in mindfulness what
is mindfulness I mean it's a kind of a
hot buzzword isn't it what is
mindfulness
huh awareness the most important thing
about mindfulness is to realize that you
can actually step back that in life when
you are becoming overwhelmed with
sadness anger even extreme happiness
because all of these things are hard do
a letí's you're going to experience one
the other will surely follow just as
night follows day and day follows night
you will experience them both and some
people think that's a great thing you
know that if you didn't have all the
sadness you wouldn't be able to
experience the happiness I'm sorry I
don't buy that that's that's not what we
are looking for that is true but it's
not what we are looking for we are
looking for another type of transcendent
happiness mindfulness means to become
actually aware that I don't have to
follow this right now I find myself in
the middle of a storm whether I consider
this good or bad I find myself in the
middle of the storm and I don't have to
follow my mind I don't have to embrace
everything that's going on in it as if
it is such amazing truth I don't have to
side you know this is a amazing thing in
one of their great yoga texts known as
invalid gita it says for one whose mind
is unbridled the mind is the greatest
enemy that's like what my own mind can
be my greatest enemy this becomes very
evident when somebody falls into a state
of
fashion where they are so they've pulled
their mind in on them and they are just
totally living in the world of the mind
when a person becomes overwhelmed with
rage or anger they have completely
surrendered to whatever's going on in
their mind and they're going with it and
they are physically doing things or
verbally saying things that they
probably shouldn't and I'm not going to
result in happiness why do we do it
because we have been conditioned to
simply follow the mind and the society
in which we live is just like ridiculous
I mean the greatest one of the greatest
examples is um Nike what's Dell what's
their logo I got this little thing what
does it say just do it
well when I was a kid that was the
Beatles why don't we do it in the road
you remember that what why don't we do
it in the road it is kind of like
letting everything hang out whatever
comes to you to instantly act upon it
the era of instant gratification and
gratification is not just good things
it's also the negative things if you
feel a negative emotion you just let it
out the fact that you are disturbing
everybody else is irrelevant because I'm
the center of the world right it's all
about me and so real mindfulness is when
you find that you've lost pause when you
find that you're losing control that
you're heading in a direction that's not
good that you take a timeout you take a
timeout you
hit the pause button you say sorry I'm
not doing this right now and you go
outside and you walk around and whether
it's counting up to 100 deep breathing
or engaging in some meditation just like
we did earlier and what we'll do a
little while so that you can get
yourself into some state of equilibrium
and deal with situations with calmness
and with clarity mindfulness should help
us in our life to seek better outcomes
we don't even ask the question if I'm
going off if I'm really upset or I'm
losing the plot about something I don't
ask myself is this actually going to
help me get what I want is this going to
help the situation is it really going to
help it I don't even ask that question
because I have so much lost control I
have so much given into my mind and
being pulled left and right and every
every whichever way it's going so one of
the things that you can really add to
your life is that in these moments and
it should go beyond just the extremes of
you know whether it should become more
of a regular practice to be able to step
back to be able to step away from
confrontation or extreme situations and
really think about is it in my interest
to go there is it in this other person's
interest to go there and the greatest
tool that you can use to help you
through these processes a tool that
actually brings about transformation in
your life is the process of meditation
the process of meditation is not just
about clearing your mind
that's actually premeditation or just
relaxing that's premeditation you need
to take your mind and submerge it in
something that is completely an
experience that is completely spiritual
in transcendence so that your mind
begins to take on the quality of
spirituality or or transcendence so that
you begin to live differently you begin
to see things differently
these are the possibilities for anyone
you don't have to become a great yoga
master you can be the most ordinary
simple easygoing
agitated whatever the most just spaced
out individual and achieve the actual
goal of yoga a full spiritual
realization