Graphic and Web Designers spend so much time behind a computer that they are starting so suffer from eye strain. Take a four-minute-break and do this video to help your eyes and neck.
Yoga for your eyes
Monday, February 15, 2010
Quick Quote
“Fall with awareness and acceptance.”
-Brian Kest
Falling is a way to learn, a way to grow. If you fall out of headstand, tuck your chin and be aware. And accept that it is okay to fall. If that first logo design isn't great, go back to the sketchbook and redesign it. The first time you do something you work out the quirks. My yoga teacher says they secret to yoga is to do everything twice. This is the secret to most things. Work out the quirks and get a feel for it. Use awareness and acceptance the first time, so when you do it a second time, you may not fall and your design may work.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
Oddly enough
I just found a new yoga blog site that was tweeted. It seems delightful called,
Namaste, Bitches Confessions of a recovering yoga teacher.
At the very top of the page is a quote that fits so perfectly into what I discussed in my last posting. So perfectly in fact, that I have to repost it:
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
- Nelson Mandela
Fear of artistic power
Yoga mama posted this quote today:
We have a fear of facing ourselves. That is the obstacle. Experiencing the innermost core of our existence is very embarrassing to a lot of people. A lot of people turn to something that they hope will liberate them without their having to face themselves. That is impossible. We can't do that. We have to be honest with ourselves. We have to see our gut, our excrement, our most undesirable parts. We have to see them. That is the foundation of warriorship, basically speaking. Whatever is there, we have to face it, we have to look at it, study it, work with it and practice meditation with it.
Chogyam Trungpa
I speak purely from myself here, but I find that when I fear facing myself, it's not because I don't want to acknowledge my undesirable parts. I am fully aware of these chunks of myself that are on constant display for the world. I lament on them, they consume me. I am in constant self-reflection attempting to "better" my self, and yet find I fear success. I fear being able to do something well. I fear my true artistic power. I opened my closet last night and realized I have a ton of art materials. I have some dating back to my first college class ages ago. What this tells me though, is that I have a lot of materials I am not using. My friend, has one book and a few watercolors and one paintbrush. Maybe a set of pastels. But he has portfolio upon portfolio upon portfolio of work. He sits down and commits himself to his art. He does not fear it. He knows he has talent and shares it with the world. Me? I'm so scared of trying that I am not even sure what my preferred medium is! My place is a disaster area so I am constantly cleaning. This is really just a defense mechanism to help me avoid sitting down and doing art. I even have am a graphic designer for a company and yet fear graphic design when I get home.
How do you get over your graphic design fears? I sit down in front of my computer, excited, inspired, millions of ideas filling my head. And POOF! all gone the minute I open Illustrator or Photoshop. And then I find myself wondering what my idea was and what program should I be doing it in. I will fail if I cannot figure out how to focus and not fear my creative energy. If you do things, things get done. And I am not getting anything done b/c I fear doing things.
Another example is bakasana, though this is a successful example (but I hope it doesn't take me as long to get over my artist fear). For a decade, I couldn't do bakasana. This was totally my water break. I couldn't even try for the longest time. Well, that's not true. The first time I was introduced to bakasana, I was tricked into doing it. Clever yoga instructor. She led the class through the movements step-by-step without us any the wiser of what we were moving into. Place your hands on the ground, shoulder distance apart. Start to really bend at your elbows finding a drishti slightly in front of you. Place your knees on the back of your triceps and then lift your feet and bring the big toe mounds to touch. I was in bakasana without even realizing it. And I was soaring. I was confident and zestful. But when I tried to do it again I couldn't. I tumbled forward. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't do it. I showed my friend what I was trying to do, someone who had never done yoga before, and she gracefully moved into bakasana with ease.
A decade later I am only once again experiencing the pleasures of bakasana and can nearly hold it for five breathes. Of course, now there is eka pada galavasana or eka pada bakasana. There's always something new to try and something new to experience.
But, to bring this back to the beginning quote, it isn't my fear of the darker parts of my soul that inhibit my ability to accomplish, I'm aware of the darker parts. In fact, my issue is that I am so aware and so deep in them, that I fear the brighter, more vital parts. The parts of power, the parts of graceful poise. I would like to not fear success. I would like to actualize the artist power I feel slumbering inside of me. I'm just not always sure how.
We have a fear of facing ourselves. That is the obstacle. Experiencing the innermost core of our existence is very embarrassing to a lot of people. A lot of people turn to something that they hope will liberate them without their having to face themselves. That is impossible. We can't do that. We have to be honest with ourselves. We have to see our gut, our excrement, our most undesirable parts. We have to see them. That is the foundation of warriorship, basically speaking. Whatever is there, we have to face it, we have to look at it, study it, work with it and practice meditation with it.
Chogyam Trungpa
How do you get over your graphic design fears? I sit down in front of my computer, excited, inspired, millions of ideas filling my head. And POOF! all gone the minute I open Illustrator or Photoshop. And then I find myself wondering what my idea was and what program should I be doing it in. I will fail if I cannot figure out how to focus and not fear my creative energy. If you do things, things get done. And I am not getting anything done b/c I fear doing things.
Another example is bakasana, though this is a successful example (but I hope it doesn't take me as long to get over my artist fear). For a decade, I couldn't do bakasana. This was totally my water break. I couldn't even try for the longest time. Well, that's not true. The first time I was introduced to bakasana, I was tricked into doing it. Clever yoga instructor. She led the class through the movements step-by-step without us any the wiser of what we were moving into. Place your hands on the ground, shoulder distance apart. Start to really bend at your elbows finding a drishti slightly in front of you. Place your knees on the back of your triceps and then lift your feet and bring the big toe mounds to touch. I was in bakasana without even realizing it. And I was soaring. I was confident and zestful. But when I tried to do it again I couldn't. I tumbled forward. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't do it. I showed my friend what I was trying to do, someone who had never done yoga before, and she gracefully moved into bakasana with ease.
A decade later I am only once again experiencing the pleasures of bakasana and can nearly hold it for five breathes. Of course, now there is eka pada galavasana or eka pada bakasana. There's always something new to try and something new to experience.
But, to bring this back to the beginning quote, it isn't my fear of the darker parts of my soul that inhibit my ability to accomplish, I'm aware of the darker parts. In fact, my issue is that I am so aware and so deep in them, that I fear the brighter, more vital parts. The parts of power, the parts of graceful poise. I would like to not fear success. I would like to actualize the artist power I feel slumbering inside of me. I'm just not always sure how.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Endurance
A quick note:
I am still working on using yoga techniques off the mat to improve my relationship with my boss and I came across this quote:
Yoga teaches us to cure what need not be endured and endure what cannot be cured.
~B.K.S. Iyengar
But I should focus less on improving the situation and more on enduring the situation. Learning how to endure and maintain my own souls' serenity.
I am still working on using yoga techniques off the mat to improve my relationship with my boss and I came across this quote:
Yoga teaches us to cure what need not be endured and endure what cannot be cured.
~B.K.S. Iyengar
But I should focus less on improving the situation and more on enduring the situation. Learning how to endure and maintain my own souls' serenity.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Yoga off the mat - is it always beneficial
One of the things I find interesting and difficult is bringing my yoga practice off my mat and into the real world. I find maintaining serenity is easier in a yoga environment than say my office environment for obvious reasons:
But how do you bring this peace, this tranquility, this...acceptance and understanding off the mat and into your workplace? I struggle with this concept. I mean, I understand the concept...it's the actual doing it that I don't understand, and also if it always benefits me. For example, I have a boss. And she really isn't a very nice person. She only criticizes me and doesn't provide me any positive comments, energy or anything that makes me excited to work for her. (And let me state now, I am job hunting, but it is a rough market and I haven't found anything to be able to leave my job.) I understand that being a young boss is probably difficult, but she only makes it worse by being rude, narrow-minded and egotistical. And in yoga, we know that it is the ego that gets us in trouble, it is the ego that causes controversy. So how can I bring my yoga into this situation??
For several months I meditated on this. At night, I would sit on my meditation pillow, with Gregorian Chants, Krishna Das, or simple silence and reflect on my terrible relationship with my boss. I would place my hands in Namaskara mudra (prayer hands) at my heart, breathe deeply and look for answers.
I had read on yoga.com that Four Simple Steps to Less Stress by Taking Yoga "Off the Mat" were:
Each morning I would be excited thinking that I was going to improve my relationship with my boss and enjoy my job again. And each day I found disappointment. Something is not going right. I will have to continue to think about this and will share my experiences.
In the meantime...how do you bring yoga off the mat? Have you found yourself in similar situations? How did you respond?? Please comment or let me know if you would like to post a response!!
Shanti!
- We are not in competition with each other
- We maintain an understanding of peace in the moment
- We are reflecting internally and usually just want to share our energy, not interact
- We don't actually have to communicate with each other.
- And for a myriad of other reasons that, I'm sure you can provide
But how do you bring this peace, this tranquility, this...acceptance and understanding off the mat and into your workplace? I struggle with this concept. I mean, I understand the concept...it's the actual doing it that I don't understand, and also if it always benefits me. For example, I have a boss. And she really isn't a very nice person. She only criticizes me and doesn't provide me any positive comments, energy or anything that makes me excited to work for her. (And let me state now, I am job hunting, but it is a rough market and I haven't found anything to be able to leave my job.) I understand that being a young boss is probably difficult, but she only makes it worse by being rude, narrow-minded and egotistical. And in yoga, we know that it is the ego that gets us in trouble, it is the ego that causes controversy. So how can I bring my yoga into this situation??
For several months I meditated on this. At night, I would sit on my meditation pillow, with Gregorian Chants, Krishna Das, or simple silence and reflect on my terrible relationship with my boss. I would place my hands in Namaskara mudra (prayer hands) at my heart, breathe deeply and look for answers.
I had read on yoga.com that Four Simple Steps to Less Stress by Taking Yoga "Off the Mat" were:
- Experience
- Awareness
- Self-reflection
- Elect
Each morning I would be excited thinking that I was going to improve my relationship with my boss and enjoy my job again. And each day I found disappointment. Something is not going right. I will have to continue to think about this and will share my experiences.
In the meantime...how do you bring yoga off the mat? Have you found yourself in similar situations? How did you respond?? Please comment or let me know if you would like to post a response!!
Shanti!
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