om spirit
I
t was the day before my wedding and I was
overstressed. The ongoing ear-full of windy
chatter and push notifications were oppressive.
While noise and compulsive talking has become a
normal aspect of our world, that day it reached a
saturation point.
I needed to escape the commotion and I found it
when I dived into the deep end of a hotel pool. Nestled
below, under water-pressure but released from the press
of social roles, I took solace. Water had finally silenced
elevator music, noise, and chatter.
Silence ... it doesn’t seem like such a tall
countercultural order, but it is. Think of the last time
you were in a group of people when you were all silent
together. It happens rarely. Quiet is so unnerving that
some people actually feel unnatural in silence. Isn’t it
odd that a quiet outdoor setting has become, for some, a
scary venue. This is why I believe silence is one of yoga’s
overlooked benefits.
In yoga classes, there is usually only one voice, the
teacher. Other yogis are present and encouraged to
breathe through the nose. Mobile phones are put on
hold and the artefacts of our professional lives are left
outside the container: costumes, jewellery, and shoes
are put away.
Certainly, social talk is welcome before and after class,
and that is good. But during class, everyone is relieved
from the expectations to speak or to appear happy or
witty or social. In class, everyone is invited to give in to
the refreshing and sometimes uncomfortable lull of not
talking. Tongues fired by Red Bull are put on silent.
On occasion, I’ve experienced a two-minute Savasana
in the middle of class and then again silence during a
repeat Savasana at the end of class. It’s an unexpected
rest but good pedagogy. The field of teaching talks about
this with the term pacing. It’s important to build in time
for the mind and body to digest what it has experienced.
Savasana looks unimpressive to the fitness crowd.
It seems easy as people lie on their backs while at ease
physically. But looks can’t tell us how the silence may
impact the human being in that moment.
This quiet may be the most important 120 seconds in a
busy day because the tide of quietness washes the noisy
cacophony of daily commerce by giving our ears a break.
Those two minutes are anything but business as usual.
They are the sweet inarticulate hush of spiritual space
opened by silence.When I moved to Hawaii, I learned to enjoy free diving.
Free divers thrive on ease and quiet and go below
without air tanks. It requires putting one’s body at ease
before the dive, and that is accomplished by meditation
and breathing exercises before divers enter the water.
When I was learning to free dive, I was agitated by
the slow pace and that we were spending so much
time onshore in breath work and mental preparation. I
wanted to get in the Pacific and go down to swim with
dolphins and octopuses. But I learned in time that one
must be truly quiet and at ease before entering the
water. It became a most important life lesson, and one
I’ve applied in yoga.
Both free diving and yoga require a closed mouth,
both require stillness and concentration, both require
training, and both give relief from an ongoing windy and
vociferous cacophony that is often gibberish.
Silence in my practice is important, even if it’s brief.
I see it as the pregnant pause, for in the community of
quiet, I come to new understandings and I lean into it
just as I do when stretching in ease swimming down to
the muted fathoms.
I’ve noticed that the yoga world can be noisy. Some
might like it loud with rock music, drums, and lots of
words. That is a viable choice...but not for me. I look
forward to Savasana. Sometimes I follow a guided
visualisation to a deeper silence where my small self
brushes up to the all-encompassing Self. In those quiet
moments, through a deep inhale, and a long, slow
exhale, my body remembers how I was at ease in the
deep end of the hotel pool and diving in the stunning
blue of the Pacific.
Eventually, we must rise and go back to the world’s
commerce because we need to communicate. But when
we’ve learned to employ silence and slow time, we might
be refreshed in order to be at ease in the midst of many
voices coming our way.
Talking’s soft-pedalled sister, silence, is necessary. She
holds out silence and slow time as a countercultural music
of ease and calm. Dive into silence and remain at ease.
Your Self, and your peace, is quietly waiting for you.Gregory Ormson teaches yoga for motorcyclists in
Arizona and leads Yoga-Breath, Breath of Life workshops
accompanied by his bhakti-style band, Sat Song. He also
maintains a writers website where he blogs on yoga, music,
motorcycling, and landscapes (gregoryormson.com)“hink of the last time you were in a group of people when you were
all silent together. It happens rarely. Quiet is so unnerving that some
people actually feel unnatural in silence. Isn’t it odd that a quiet
outdoor setting has become, for some, a scary venue? his why I believe
silence is one of yoga’s overlooked beneits.”
I lay,
in peace,
in one piece,
in the only perfect moment of stillness I own.
Meditation (courtesy of Michelle Lipper)