INTENTION: I purify my life in both small and profound ways that help me feel lighter, more expansive, alive, and more connected to All.
Yoga is so much more than the shapes we make on our mats. It is an ethical theory and offers an invitation to live in alignment with ourselves, others, and the planet. Yoga is a roadmap to live our lives in a way that invites us to peel away the layers of conditioning and remember who we are - the truest version of ourselves. Before society told us who we should be. Before the hurts and traumas.
Patanjali offers us this roadmap in the Yoga Sutra. The niyamas are five practices that invite us back to our center. These five personal observances, or the “do’s”, are daily practices that sustain us and keep us walking a path toward liberation and freedom. They are an evolution toward balance, harmony, and ultimately peace. Last week in our MINDFUL MONDAYS blog we looked at the quality santosha. This week let’s dive deeply into saucha.
Saucha is the first quality offered in the second limb of the niyamas. Saucha means cleanliness or purity and operates on many levels. We aspire to treat our whole bodies with kindness and respect. We aspire to cleanliness for our bodies by washing ourselves, maintaining clean and orderly homes, eating healthy food, and drinking clean water. We aspire to cleanliness in our minds and speech by not polluting our minds or speech with negativity or grasping after emotionally and physically charged obsessions. We aspire to become the observer of our thoughts and emotions and what we are allowing to enter our minds. We let go of the clutter that takes up space in our lives and the residue that is left behind from unhealthy conditioning only to discover a calm and relaxed state of being. In other words, we find a balance that gives us a way to experience clarity and cleanliness both externally and internally. Yet this can mean many different things for each one of us.
To practice saucha, we may ask ourselves:
What can I clear out of the way to make room for who I am meant to be?
Are there thoughts, behaviors, actions, or relationships that are creating residue, or clutter, in my life?
What am I taking in through my senses that is causing me discomfort, or worse, suffering?
In the practice of saucha, we want to clear the Self (physical, physiological, energetic, mental/emotional, and spiritual aspects of who we are) of anything that causes discomfort or suffering.
As we practice the niyamas we are also consistently practicing the yamas or ethical guidelines (the don’ts) of the first limb of Patanjali’s eight-limb path. We are invited to practice saucha with compassion for self, others, and the planet; to practice with profound honesty and without stealing from others; and to practice both non-attachment and moderation in all that we do.
Ways to practice saucha:
Assess what you are taking into your senses. What is causing suffering? What brings more ease and joy? What shifts can you make? Take small steps each day to bring you more ease and joy in your life.
What are you watching? Reading? Listening to?
What are you eating? Drinking? Using?
What is wasting your time during a day (i.e., binge-watching)?
Practice asana and pranayama help to purify the body and mind.
Perform any other movement that benefits your body to help clear away stagnant energy.
Declutter your space. Start with a drawer. Then maybe a closet or a whole room.
Create intentional space for your spiritual/contemplative practices.
Cleanse your senses: use a Neti Pot or nasal cleansing and stimulate your sense of smell by using essential oils, sage, or incense; listen to calming and soothing music or immerse yourself in the sounds of nature – even better!; take a walk – trees swaying, birds flying, shadows dancing, oceans crashing; dry brush your body, then apply oil or go outside and feel the grass under your feet as the breeze caresses your skin; clean your teeth with a toothbrush and your tongue using a tongue scraper and offer yourself foods that excite your palate.
Take a luxurious bath with salts that invigorate and/or calm the body and mind. Jump into the ocean or stand in a waterfall. Observe how it invigorates, cleanses, and clears on many levels!
Write to help move clutter out of the mind and create space for the good to enter.
Be mindful of your thoughts. Disrupt harmful thoughts before they become words and actions.
Clear your mind. Get quiet. Meditate.
Observe your habits. What brings ease? What causes harm, to you or others? What could you change or let go if it does not serve you?
Clarify your boundaries in your relationships. Refrain from gossip.
Find a work/life balance.
Forgive. Holding on to resentment can be harmful to your entire being.
Sleep. A good night's sleep enhances the same positive feelings and states of being that we achieve through our yoga practice. Good sleeping habits play a direct role in how full, energetic, and successful our lives can be.
Limit time on social media and/or watching or listening to the news and binge-watching shows.
As we practice saucha and cleanse our outer body and purify our inner self, we lighten our load and open ourselves up to the vast power of the Divine. Anything done with spiritual fervor, whether sitting for an extended meditation or washing dishes, can move us forward, bringing us closer to the immensity and luminosity of our true selves and our connection to spirit and each other. The practice of saucha is not about adding to your life anything you do not already have. It is about removing what gets in the way of appreciating the abundance that is already yours.
Love & light,
Jeanne and John