Awakening awareness is a transformative journey where one’s consciousness expands beyond habitual perceptions, leading to a profound understanding of the interconnectedness of all things. It starts with introspection and mindfulness, shifting from ego-centric views to a holistic perspective filled with empathy and unity. This process not only influences personal experiences but also extends to relationships and communities, enhancing global consciousness.
In this journey, individuals recognize the present moment as the fundamental reality, learning to live in the ‘now’ with peace and contentment. This awareness fosters a deep appreciation for life’s mystery and beauty, inspiring creativity, deepening spirituality, and encouraging a harmonious existence with oneself, others, and the environment.
One of the most valuable lessons that I’ve learned is that I am not what I think. So many of us believe that our mind is the most powerful tool that we have to function in the world.
Did you know that our intuition is developed before our brain is? Our intuition is never wrong, when we start tuning in to what it has to say to us. Many of the those I have worked with have trouble with that. It takes practice to hesitate, take a breath and sink into our intuition. Our minds will always start chattering to ignore that interception and listen to it instead. The mind is like a petulant child that wants more attention and will continue screaming until they receive it.
“The mind is a bad neighborhood. Stay out of it!”
from the Big Book of AA
Meanwhile the intuition is silently waiting for our attention. The source of most of our thoughts is rubbish. The mind feeds on our fears, our cravings, and our desires. When we continue to feed it, by letting our thinking process lead us by our nose to more complications in our lives, we waste precious time which could be used to ask our intuition what course we should take when we are pressed to make a choice.
In summary, before a decision is made, just take a breath, and feel yourself sinking into your diaphragm where intuition lies waiting for your question. Ask, and there is the answer. Maybe not the one you want, but in the long run, the perfectly crafted, very personal, answer that will benefit you.
Among many spiritual practices, there is one word that stands out as authentic. This word is Sadhana. To me, it means a practice that one does on a daily basis to hold and honor the inner light that we all have. It can be as simple as repeating a prayer, a mantra for a specific number of times. It can be taking five conscious breaths the moment you wake up and then again in the evening just before you lay your head on the pillow. It can be more complex as doing a particular meditation at the same time every day of the week. Each of these activities carry there own individual benefits.
All religions at one time or another have built their faith on a daily practice as a testament of their faith. The Sikhs are known to rise at four am and take a cold shower to start their day. The Catholics use to refrain from eating meat on Fridays. The Orthodox Jews carry on their lives through a well-traveled, very specific way of living as their ancestors did before them.
Sadhana, as a rule, divides the disciplined from the undisciplined. Who does this “act” for their divinity or for the divinity that is before them; on an altar or in a temple? If asked by one of my yoga students what is it that they could do in a daily practice that would be considered as “doing sadhana”, I caution them to start off with something small.
My Guru told certain students to do a particular sadhana anywhere from 30 days to one year, and if they forgot to do it for one day, then they had to start all over again.
In summary, it is a mystical, spiritual practice that is done on a daily basis that fuels the desire of an individual for the divine and increases their awareness.
Swami Laxman Das Jaya aka John Shinavier, MA, 500hr RYT
As we age, we shrink. When your spine becomes tight and stiff, it slows you down as you begin limiting activities that once you did easily. Now you might find yourself running after your children, and doing a lot of lifting and playing with them and this activity alone requires a Spine that needs a daily tune-up.
I have continued to do Yoga for almost forty years now. Through several careers, injuries, sports etc.. I did Yoga because no matter if I was running miles everyday, earning a Black Belt in Taekwondo, weight lifting, playing Tennis, or ocean swimming, I always remembered how my body enjoyed itself as a child and I wanted to keep myself as close to that ideal as I could. So no matter what activity I did I always included Yoga. As I continued, I learned the mysteries about how one can use the Breath for energy, vitality and then, a door opened to Meditation. I have all these tools that I have shared with individuals and groups. Now, I live in Los Angeles and am looking for private clients who not only want, but need to have something that they can integrate into their lives that will bring it back into balance. I have clients that require only a session for a refresher, and I have those that I teach for 90 minutes a week. I am as thrilled as my students that what took me so many years to understand they are getting much faster than I did. That is what a true teacher is. Their lessons, teachings are written on their bones (as my beloved teacher use to tell me.) So when someone in session asks me a question, the answer comes and it is like I am hearing the answer in the same moment that they are.
Imagine if you can, that there is something else that you could tap into for positive responses to your requests, prayers, wishes? Now imagine that you have already received what you have asked for. Wouldn’t you at least say; Thank You?
Imagine still, that it wouldn’t make any difference what mood you were in or how you were feeling when you were doing the asking?. All you simply had to do was ask once, from your heart. No begging, pleading, bargaining or tears were involved. You merely take a moment before you make the request, and really take some time to properly get all the words lined up so that whomever or whatever is listening will know exactly, very specifically what it is that you want.
Here are a few examples of not quite, well thought out appeals:
I want to be healthy.
I need a job.
Would you send me a partner?
If I had only one shot at asking for what I wanted, using the above three examples, they would sound like this.
I want to be healthy in body, mind and spirit in the now. Thank You!
I need a job that fuels my own passions and expands my talents in ways I never thought possible and I would like at least a six figure salary or payment, and please let me recognize it when it comes in the now. Thank You!
Would you give me a partner, now that I know what it is that I need in one, that would be in their thirties, well adjusted, empathetic, healthy, funny, attractive to me and attracted to me, with financial security and most of all, let me recognize them when I see them in the now. Thank You
There is a universe that has no emotions, no agenda and doesn’t judge or dislike anything or anybody. It also doesn’t hold to our concept of time (hence the words “in the now”.) It’s just there waiting for our requests. Suspend your mind and your beliefs, and know that this is nothing new, but perhaps edited a bit simpler so that more people can easily understand and access it. No books by Tony Robbins, or Ted Talks or the hundreds that write it in self-help books and lectures saying the exact same thing, but usually in three hundred pages or more.
It is the practice of bringing in the moment what one needs, and “as if” you already have received it. This is what I learned from this practice. It may or may not come in the time slot that you have asked for. It will hear you and might place you somewhere where you would not suspect that you would ever visit, much less live. It may not come in the guise or appearance that you would expect. It may need to shake up your life, habits, beliefs etc.. Many times things may have to change in us to accommodate it. That’s the price that you must be willing to pay. My teacher often warned us to be careful for what we asked for, for she would give it to us, pretending not to know that we were just pretending. Sage advice, I think.
“It doesn’t get easier as you get older, but that’s your choice. Move your body or the alternative is, you’ll probably end up in a wheelchair.” Words of wisdom from my beloved 72 year old yoga teacher who was still teaching until a month before her death of cancer. If you’ve come to the same decision in your life and you’ve chosen to begin or continue working out, walking, dancing etc., then chances are you’ll still be able to push through most of what aging puts us through and continue living a life of quality.
I’ve done many of the disciplines of body movement in my life, tree climbing as a kid, ocean swimming, Taekwondo, weightlifting, dance and yoga are only a few. As I age, I find that for me it’s important to practice yoga everyday, and swim when I can find a pool or a fresh body of water.
Which brings me to yoga. Yoga can be practiced in any space, no matter the area; in you’re in bed, or in the smallest of studio’s apartments. Rotating the head, carefully, in neck rolls while sitting at your desk can release much of that tension that is held in the shoulders and neck areas. Removing your shoes to point and flex your feet will keep your Achilles tendon from hardening. Abdominal breathing oxygenates your blood quickly when all breathing is done through the nose. Learning this is simple. You lay on your back, place a book on your stomach, breathe through your nose and direct it to you diaphragm. When you see that book moving up and down as you inhale and exhale, then you’ll be able to practice it while sitting at your desk or waiting for a light to change in traffic.
Lately my model for perfect flexibility is a baby, specifically toddlers. Watch a baby struggle to stand; they use their hands as much as their legs. Look how they play with their toes, swing their arms forward and backward etc… You’ll never get younger, but if you can learn a few moves from a toddler and you practice them, like they do, your body will respond, and you’ll never again lose that sense of gratitude when you incorporate movement into your daily life.
John Shinavier - MA, RYT, LC 
