Burning through resistance by learning to feel

The Yoga Sutras offer a set of practices - the yamas and niyamas - to support us in becoming more masterful. These yamas (the 'vows') and Niyamas (the 'hows') invite us grow stronger and more intentional in our practice on and off the mat.For me, one of the most important (so far) has been the Niyama known as Tapah, a Sankskrit word meaning 'to burn.'On the mat, Tapah is the willingness to stay in a deep squat in Chair Pose or hold my arms over my head in Mountain. We learn that the edge of our comfort zone is not necessarily the limit of our ability - and that sometimes, that edge is the beginning of freedom.Off the mat, Tapah is the restraint that I apply to help me resist cravings - when my favorite binge-foods and binge-watches start calling my name. Tapah fires up the will forces, inviting us to stand firm and keep holding the inner 'pose' of a person who makes heather choices in food and entertainment.Though some may describe Tapah as a way of firming our resolve, a conversation with willpower. For me, Tapah seems to be more about softening into willingness.The willingness to believe that I can.The willingness to let myself try.The willingness to make free choices .Which is what I did today, when, while driving toward the office, I was ambushed by a burning need to stop at the thrift store.Thrift shopping, for me, is not about saving money - it's about discovering that glittering jewel in the pile of castoffs. And when I feel 'called' to the thrift store, I often experience it as guidance - as if that 'jewel' is sending out a bright beacon to make sure that I find it.Which may or may not be true.But that's how it feels. It feels important. It feels imperative. It feels, if I am honest about this, like an addiction - complete with cravings and, as you will see, desperation. Which is how I know that even though it FEELS like I want to go to the thrift store, it's more likely that I am avoiding some other feeling.And with me, it's likely that feeling has something to do with standing in my power.I don't notice this at first - and, so today, as the beacon from the thrift store began to take over, I began altering my route. I skimmed the edge of the highway instead of getting on. I choose the side road that could more easily slide me over to Route 59. I made several other tiny adjustments to make it easier to stop at the store - just in case I decided to.But then, at a critical juncture - I stopped at a stop sign and woke up.What am I doing? I thought. I already made this decision - I'm going to the office. Instantly, I felt the pull of the opposing narrative. I saw myself walking through the thrift store, falling into the sensations of color and texture.I felt uncertain, unsteady. I felt anxious.In the past, these unsettled feelings like these would have triggered a reaction - I'd HAVE TO feel better  so I'd choose the thrift store.But sitting at that stop sign, realizing that I was sitting at an edge, I pulled out Tapah - the willingness to feel uncomfortable and immediately, I became curious.What is here to see? I wondered, feeling into the question. Feeling into the nature of the thrift store, the office. Which is when I began to experience, consciously, the nature of craving.I saw how craving lies to me: - about what I need (to always feel pleasure, to never feel empty, to always be satisfied, to never feel discomfort).- about my ‘lack’ and my ‘brokenness’ and my ‘incompleteness’.- about my ‘history - the so-called evidence of my inability to follow through, to finish things.I saw, at the same time the nature of willingness. Willingness listens:- to what is really here. Me sitting at a stop sign. Profoundly uncomfortable.Willingness waits:-  patiently letting me settle down and get used to these feelings.Willingness sees: - what I really need (engagement, freedom, self-expression.)Willingness offers it, unconditionally- when I simply let myself feel.At the stop sign, I realized that the 'jewel' that was calling to me from the thrift store was a shadow image of the jewel that was waiting in my office. A shadow that formed when I hit the edge in myself - and my willingness to engage a project that feels this lovely, this special, this .... loaded.Cuz wow, it's uncomfortable to be driving toward a promise like that.When I let myself see - and feel - the terror (and pain) of not being sure I can live up to that promise, I was able to face it. Facing it, I was able to apply Tapah - the willingness to feel uncomfortable. Let's see what happens, Tapah invited me, just as it does on the yoga mat,Which is how I made a free choice: To try.As the craving let go, I felt the pleasure I could have received from shopping slide away and I felt the profound emptiness of sitting in a room with my own ideas and not knowing how I am ever going to make them into books.But I felt something else, too, something new. Courage. Burning courage: aka the Tapah of willingness to do hard things.I drove to the office.I put my key in the lock.I opened the doorand there,waiting on the desk where I’d left it last night,was my work.