Embody Mental Health

Posts Tagged ‘monastic’

 

“Serve, Love, Give, Purify, Meditate, Realize.” 

Swami Sivananda

What I expected to find in my foray into a monastic lifestyle and 5 am wake ups was a bit of delirium and a lot of discomfort.  This is true, there is no doubt.  But in the process, even 8 days into my 8 week internment into the monastic protocols of my Sivananda yoga teacher training I have also found a teensy bit of peace of mind that seems to, in my brighter moments, more than make up for complete body and mind exhaustion by day’s end.  Here is a bit inside my Sivananda world  and tandum work experience for a bit of insight into this whole endeavor:

Monday :

5am rising

6am-715am meditation

730 (early) to work-4:30pm TRAUMA THERAPY

5-600pm second work ADDICTIONS THERAPY

630pm Home to write some notes and go to sleep

Tuesday:

5am rising

6am-715am meditation

730 (early) to work-5:10pm (late staying and early coming most days because there is not enough time to come home between the two in the am and pm) TRAUMA THERAPY

5:30-6:45pm Yoga class (take or assist in the class)

7-10pm yoga academics class

10:30 Home for sleeps

Wednesday:

5am rising

6am-715am meditation

7:15-8:45am Yoga class

9-10:30am Yoga class (make up for missed class Mondays because of night job)

IF I can 11:00-12:00pm yoga class (make up for missed class on Friday because of night job)

12:30pm-9:00pm TRAUMA THERAPY

9:30pm Home for sleeps

Thursday:

5am rising

6am-715am meditation

730 (early) to work-5:10pm (late staying and early coming most days because there is not enough time to come home between the two in the am and pm) TRAUMA THERAPY

5:30-6:45pm Yoga class (take or assist in the class)

7-10pm yoga academics class

10:30 Home for sleeps

Friday

5am rising

6am-715am meditation

730 (early) to work-4:30pm TRAUMA THERAPY

5-7:30pm second work ADDICTIONS THERAPY

8:00pm Home to write some notes and go to sleep

Saturday

5am rising

6am-715am meditation

745-845am YOGA CLASS  (take or assist)

9-1030am YOGA CLASS (take or assist)

HOME FOR COLLAPSE J

Sunday:

7:45-8:30am Breathing class

8:30-9:00am Karmic yoga (ie: clean up the studio)

9-11:00am ADVANCED YOGA CLASS (take)

5:45-7:15 Meditation

7:15-8:15pm Vegetarian Pot Luck (mental note, must remember to make something each and every week—when I don’t know!)

WEEK 1 of yoga school completed.  WEEK 2 is moving forward–with or without my consciousness!  I am proud to say I have only had an emotional or exhaustion breakdown 1-2 times per day!  Hoping to maintain or improve over the next week!

“Education is not filling a pail but the lighting of a fire.”

William Butler Yeats

Day one of 57 days of yoga school has just begun.  And tomorrow I have my first (maybe ever) 5:00am morning rising.  I am an awful and vicious morning person–I feel that this experience will either surmount this issue or solidify it.  Hoping sincerely for the former to happen.  The latter would be detrimental to household harmony and inner balance that is the ultimate goal of this whole excursion into self. 

I am a bit intimidated by this intensive monastic retreat into yogic curriculum during which 5:00am rising is mandatory for 7 days a week for 6:00am meditations, as well as 7 yoga classes a week, 2 three-hour sessions of yoga scholastics Tuesday and Thursday nights, breathing class and advanced yoga on Sundays, and no meat, fish, eggs, music, television, internet only sparingly (I count my blog as my one indulgent foray into the cybersphere for this journey), alcohol, smoking, ect. 

The isolative nature of this process is one concern as with my husband a meat-eating, television watching, music listening, internet scouring, smoking (one habit I wish he would leave behind) individual plus both of us avid movie-goers…with my newfound passion project afoot we have little in the way of compatible schedules and extracurriculars. 

This foray into self, into body, mind, spirit and beyond is certainly going to test me and my life on many fronts.  First, and foremost, being COMMITMENT.  This is a 57 day commitment like nothing I have ever endeavored before and one that has to come in conjunction with all those other, already committed endeavors–like my fulltime job, and my recent addition of part-time work at another therapeutic facility.  Plus dogs and husband–oh, my! 

I shall have plenty of room to breathe on this journey but what about down time from my introspection and self-reflection and stretching muscles of mind, body, and will?  My teacher training instructor made a joke at the beginning of our first session together tonight saying, “This is going to stress you all in new and intense ways.  Teresa is a trauma therapist so when you guys have become traumatized by this strenuous experience, everyone can go to her.”  He admitted, with a sly grin, he had waited since I signed up for this program back in August to say that joke. 

My only question–where does the trauma therapist go with everyone coming to her? Hmmm.  I will ponder the intricacies of my trepidation and exhaustion at the thought of exhaustion.  One day at a time, right?  It has to be.  Day 1–check.