'There is something profoundly valuable in a person who persists through adversity—who steadfastly claims their place in the world, despite the forces that try to shape or break them.'
Yesterday, I led a class that ended on the theme of Samskaras, the negative imprints left upon us after painful experiences. To be honest, I had no idea what I was going to share. Life has been challenging, and I'm working through many Samskaras myself.
With the recent losses in my family, life and death have weighed heavily on me. At the end of practice, I shared a familiar line, unexpectedly adding something I needed to hear and hoped my students would too:
Shavasana is translated as Corpse pose. It symbolizes the death of our past self, our samskaras or negative imprints, and the birth of what remains—what is. Through our practice, we learn to feel and know ourselves, and through this knowing, we recognize our imprints as separate from our true selves. The burning away of samskaras involves both the physical movement of energy (Chi) and the progressive (psycho-somatic) development of deep self-understanding. This understanding of yourself IS the most empowering tool you have.
Remembering this for myself and being able to share it with my students, to be able to persist in a meaningful way, made this one of my favorite classes and one of those moments of self-study, community, and wholeness. (If you were there and are reading this, thank you. Your presence, support, and shared time with me was a movingly meaningful part of my day.)
In the midst of loss, we're tasked with picking up the shards and creating our own ikigai. In other words, our search for meaning—part of an examined life—is the effort to reconstruct these broken pieces to create purpose.
This act embodies the essence of amor fati—the embrace and love of our fate. Through objective acceptance, we find the strength and courage to navigate our path forward. As challenging as it may be, by accepting and integrating our vulnerabilities, we unlock the profound potential for healing, growth, and ultimately, wholeness. Together we rise, divided we fall. Thank you for reading and moving with me.
-MM
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