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Being Present

by Heather Antonissen

Being present and aware is an ongoing practice that opens incredible doors of peace and experience, and yoga is a powerful tool in developing that awareness.

They say the first part of solving a problem is becoming aware of it. Well, I have become exceedingly aware of just how much I am NOT present. For example, I just dropped my mom off at the airport. We had a great weekend together-we stayed in a bed and breakfast, talked, did yoga, and relaxed. It was a full and rich weekend even though it lasted only three days. Looking back, I realized the only time I wasn't perfectly content was when I was worried about her-if she was bored while I took care of some work that needed to be completed, if she was ok with the activities I suggested. I of course asked her about these concerns and each time she said she was fine. Looking back, I realized that when I wasn't worried about her, I was with her having a great time. When I was "thinking" and wrapped up in my thoughts, I wasn't with her, and I missed out on some of that time spent together.

The reason my mom came down to visit was to attend some performances I was in. I love singing. Like a great yoga session, I am completely centered and open and connected to everything around me. I feel closest to my "essence" when I am working with music. But this production is the last one I am in for awhile. On the one hand, it is a little scary not knowing when another company will offer me a chance to perform with them. During the past two weeks of rehearsals, I realized that there was nothing I could do about that reality. I have been practicing, I have been auditioning, I have been networking; yet this is how things have worked out. Fighting that reality and desiring things to be different was causing fear and frustration. Then I realized that here I was, doing the very thing I loved; and I was missing out on the bit that was left, because I was caught up in my head worrying about the future.

As if these examples weren't clear enough, I was driving around listening to a swing station based out of Menlo Park. It doesn't have a broad radius, and as I was driving around, the station began to cut in and out right in the middle of a neat song. As I followed the line of traffic, I started focusing on the intensity of the static interruption and before I knew it, the song was over. Didn't even hear it since I was thinking of something else.

I know I am not alone in this. So many incredible things are happening all around us, yet much of the time we are too busy thinking to be aware of these phenomena. I know I get caught up in my thoughts; we all do. Yet it is this being swept up in the drama, the dreams, the worries created by our imagination that causes suffering. The mind is a powerful tool and learning how to use its power instead of being ruled by its power is the whole point of yoga-the union of mind and body, enlightenment. By being aware of our body, we become aware of our mind.

Awareness is the first step in achieving this union and we as yogi/nis have a wonderful tool to help us on this journey. By observing the body and the breath in our asanas, we start to become aware of our thoughts. Meditation is also an important part of our practice that helps us further explore and observe the mind.

There can be other tools that awaken our awareness. For me, I have been struck with nature. As I have been driving to my rehearsals in Fairfield, I have passed through miles and miles of beautiful green hills, grazing cattle, trees and spring blue skies. There is something so endless and present in nature. It isn't running around, getting stuff done. It doesn't have some purpose it has to fulfill or some past to overcome. It just is: open, lush, naked to the sky, just as I want my heart to be.

Another technique suggested by Eckhart Tolle in his book "The Power of Now" is to take everyday activities and be truly aware of them-when you brush your teeth, notice the texture of the brush on your teeth, the taste of the paste, the temperature of the water, the tingling of the gums. When you walk the stairs at home or at work, notice the pressure on the bottom of the feet, the movement in the many joints of the leg, the breath, the muscles contracting. By really being with every sense stimulus, an almost intoxicating experience of life is available-and it's real! It's not a fantasy or a dream or projection. It is just observing and being with what is.

This obviously doesn't happen over night, but each little moment of choosing to be present and aware, moves us down this path of union. Every time we come to our yoga mats, we reinforce this opening of the heart and body, this state of being present, this ability to be aware. It is more alive and powerful and breath-taking than anything that can be imagined. All it takes is letting go and being present and aware.

I leave you with a poem from Lalla, a 14th century poet from Kashmir. May you have a blessed being day….

The soul, like the moon,
is new, and always new again.

And I have seen the ocean
continuously creating.

Since I scoured my mind
and my body, I too, Lalla,
am new, each moment new.

My teacher told me one thing,
live in the soul.

When that was so,
I began to go naked,
and dance.

Heather Antonissen, March 2002

Write to Heather at heather@yogaisyouth.com

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