5

The Edge

When I became interested in yoga I wanted to learn it all in 28 days as my first little book on the subject suggested.

As I began to try the various postures, I noticed how incredibly inflexible my body was. It would hurt a lot when I tried to place myself in the various positions described in the book. I began to doubt that yoga was really for me. Of course I had absolutely no idea of how to coordinate my body and my breath or how to use my awareness and focus it internally. So I experienced pain. I also knew nothing about “the edge,” which I will soon explain. I bumbled along on my own for some time and did not give up. I began to practice the breathing exercises in the book and one day discovered the connection between the breath and the postures. When I used my breath to relax my body just as I was entering the threshold of discomfort in my body, my body would somehow open up a little more and it didn’t seem to hurt so much. Later, I found I could actually focus my attention on the discomfort and just be present to it, rather than think about how painful it was and how I would never be a yogi, no matter how long I practiced these postures.

Later, I discovered what was probably the most significant single concept that was to open up my yoga practice and my life. It was the concept of “the edge.” Shortly after I arrived at Kripalu, Yogi Desai initiated a system of morning sadhana (spiritual practice) for all residents of the ashram. A one-hour yoga routine (the same postures every day) was followed by a guided meditation, often led by Yogi Desai, and sometimes accompanied with chanting. I was committed to the morning practices and would make my way faithfully to the designated room for my group each morning at five o’clock. Some postures were held for a long time. It was during some of these longer periods when I experienced the most difficulty. I noticed that I could endure the pain of the postures that were held for a short time.

One morning, after a somewhat restless night, I found I was reaching intolerable levels of discomfort even when in the postures we were holding for only a short time. I found myself coming out of them ahead of the rest of the group and feeling very frustrated. I was trying to be willful and my willfulness was not working. It was clear to me that this was meant to be a willful practice. I was supposed to push a little to get in there and experience the discomfort. This was the only way I would progress physically and spiritually. At least that was what my mind was saying even though my body had a different story.

Luckily I was pragmatic enough that morning to conduct a little experiment with myself. I tried not trying so much. I let myself ease into the postures to a degree that I experienced only mild and tolerable discomfort. After doing this for a while I began to feel guilty. I was not doing my best. I was taking the easy way out. I felt terrible. So the experiment failed and I went back to trying again. My guilt gave way to the same old frustration, anger and pain.

Then I had a flash of inspiration: how about finding some feelings in between? Excited by this new possibility, I eased my body into the next posture and tentatively sought out that place in between. At first it was hard to find. I had to resist the tendency to try harder and then the temptation to back off too much. After practicing this a while, I began to find it and was soon holding postures at this new “edge.” The results were amazing. I began to enter a state similar to what I had previously experienced only in meditation. I was able to become a witness to myself. I was able to feel the same uncomfortable, yet also inviting, feeling of entering a void. Then in the void, images, sensations and even new awareness would come to me. I was not the doer of the posture, I was the receiver. Within days my yoga practice began to take on a whole new meaning. It was at the edge that things really started to happen. At the end of each day’s practice I would feel renewed. I began to connect with myself at a much deeper level. I became aware of things in my life that were in the way. One day I had an insight into my relationship with my children. I saw my fear of fatherhood. I let myself soften into being an inexperienced, sometimes insecure, but loving father. I did not need to be anything else. What exquisite liberation!

Later in the development of Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy, I discovered that there was one thing better than being in a yoga posture at the edge. That was being in a yoga posture at the edge with someone else supporting me there. There was no effort even in holding and supporting the posture. I was free to give all of my attention to what was happening. The whole process became even more profound. Time and time again I have seen this happen with clients. Once they were able to enter and stay at their edge they often had experiences that were life changing. I became convinced that transformation happens at the edge.

Soon, I began to see amazing connections between the edge in yoga postures and the edge in life. Until I had discovered my edge and been able to accept it, I was forever striving for some conceptual result or goal. Once I’d accepted the edge, I learned that there was no need to get somewhere. Everything I needed to “get” was right here. That doesn’t mean that I stopped setting goals and working to reach them. In fact, the more I accepted my edge the better able I was to achieve anything I set my mind to. I had learned to stop struggling. The process of striving to achieve something became simply choosing a direction and being with the experience moment-to-moment, making adjustments when appropriate. Had I not learned this valuable lesson I would never have created Phoenix Rising. Using my old pattern, I would have been far too willful for my own good, would have set unrealistic goals and then given up because they were unattainable.

On television I saw an interview with an ace jet fighter pilot who, in the face of extreme odds, had single-handedly taken on six enemy fighters and won. The interviewer asked him what he thought made a hero like himself. Was it a requirement to be a little crazy, or to have a disregard for life to be willing to put one’s self at such extreme risk? The pilot responded that it was neither. To him it was about assessing a situation and knowing where the edge was. To him the edge was that place where he would certainly still be at risk but where, because of his honest self-assessment of the situation at hand, his own skills and the skills of his opponents, he would be able to take the risk with the odds slightly in his favor. It wasn’t a question of bravado or heroism, but simply a fine-tuned awareness of what he was really facing. He knew where his edge was and he played from there.

You may find that success in every facet of life is based on the same thing. Unless you find your edge, there is no growth, no learning and no change. Too far back from the edge is boredom and atrophy. Too far out from the edge is self-destruction. Another discovery, both in the body and in life, is that the edge is always moving if we are willing to play it. It is always expanding into new unknown areas. Personally, as I learned to explore the edge in my body I learned to explore the edge in life. In the last eight years, in my forties, I have learned to ski cross-country and downhill, to create and give to the world a new body/mind therapy, to run a rapidly growing organization, to fly an airplane, to teach others how to teach, to marry again, to be a father twice more and to write this book. I have accomplished these things with relative ease. That same ease is available to all of us. You may discover that your ease can come from being as aware as you can of your edge in each and every moment, playing that edge and growing beyond it. My body and my yoga practice, and the focused awareness that came with it, taught me all about my edge. Integrating it within my life was the easy part.

Finding your edge requires a high level of presence. You can’t find it if your mind is somewhere else. This means that in your body (and in your life) you have to be willing to go into and to be with what is happening in the moment. You then have to be willing to stay there long enough to tune into it and make the necessary adjustments. This is really the process of transformation. It’s the process of using your awareness first and foremost—and then accepting what you’ve found. It doesn’t work to become aware and then go into denial or self-flagellation. As a private pilot, I’ve read many aviation accident reports, and I’m amazed at how many deaths have resulted from denial—an unwillingness to accept what is happening—particularly in relation to the elements. For example, a good pilot flies a perfectly sound airplane into an ice storm because he or she desires to get home that night. The pilot was in denial of what was really happening and consequently went beyond the edge to the point of no return.

In Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy sessions I have seen clients who, as soon as they become aware of the edge in a posture, will begin to become self-critical, unaccepting or unwilling to be with what is: “Why can’t I go further?” “I’m so inflexible,” or “I’m really not suited to this—it doesn’t work for me.” It is only by accepting what is happening, no matter what it is, that you can then choose where to go from there and how to be with it. Then, you can truly play the edge. Playing the edge is about making adjustments or fine tuning how you are, moment to moment. This takes us even deeper into the experience, be it a yoga posture or a life experience.

You tend to hold two kinds of tension in your body. First, there is natural tension. This you need. Without it you would fall over. Then, there is what is called fear-based tension. This is the kind of tension you purposely create to keep you safe—out of harm’s way. You begin to do this at an early age. Sometimes you give it up as soon as the danger is gone and sometimes you keep it. For example, if you are about to cross a busy road and a car passes close to the sidewalk before you step off, your body will stiffen a little. After you have safely crossed the road it will relax. If, however, it was a particularly frightening moment, you may find that every time you go to cross a road from that day on, your body will tighten in fear.

A small child, who I will call Emma, is from an abusive family and she has learned how to use her body to hide. Her shoulders lean forward, her head tilts slightly toward her chest, her eyes are cast towards the floor, and her solar plexus is drawn slightly inward. This posture creates less than a full presence and so, she believes, makes her less visible and lessens the possibility of her being noticed and possibly punished. It works for her. It helps to keep her a little safer. Thirty years later though, when she no longer needs to do this, her body is still doing it. She sometimes doesn’t realize she is doing it. It has become a learned strategy and not easy to give up. Her body is still holding this fear-based tension. The first time Emma enters a yoga posture that opens her chest, she meets face-to-face with this old fear. At first it is frightening. If guided to find an edge, she may be able to be present to it. In fact, she may be able to explore it to the extent that it becomes a source of liberation for her. As the feelings and memories are released as the edge moves deeper, her body learns a new way of being; a way of being without the fear-based tension. Surprisingly, she discovers she can let it go and still be safe. The edge has served her well.

 

Phoenix Rising Yoga therapist Nancy Nowak helps colleague Stefi Shapiro “let go and be supported.”

Exercise

FINDING YOUR EDGE

Drop your head down to the left side bringing your ear toward your shoulder. Notice the stretch this creates on the right side of your neck. Feel the sensation. Breathe into it and let the exhale fall out. Play with the stretch by extending the left arm downward. Imagine you are using the middle two fingers on that hand to reach into a deep pocket for a dime buried deep inside it. Find an edge in the stretch. The edge is the place where any more stretch would be too much, and any less would be not enough. When you find the edge, hang out there for two or three more breaths. Just be with the edge. Notice if it shifts and go with it if it does. Come out of the stretch with your eyes closed and take your inner awareness to both sides of your neck. Check in with yourself physically. Check in with your total awareness of yourself in the moment. What do you find?

Try finding the edge in other body positions. A good one is to explore the edge in the hamstrings by hanging forward like a rag doll with your head hanging down toward your knees. Bend your knees and then slowly begin to straighten them until you find an edge. Use many breaths for this one. As you get better at finding your edge, take it to your yoga practice and then, after a time, see how it translates into your life. How do you tend to play the edge? Do you prefer to push forward or to hang back? How does that serve you? What does it keep you from discovering? How do you choose to be with the edges in your life from here on?