Emotion in its pure state is utterly sacred. It is a message of the awakened
state. Emotions are a common way that the source comes to call us home. Reggie Ray.
How can emotions call us home? Join us for this yoga class to find out how.
Hi I'm Melissa from Yoga with Melissa. This is Real Yoga for Real People. We're
all about connection. Connection to a teacher and teachings that will allow
you to connect with your true nature and a community of people who were
committed to a genuine path of spiritual transformation. We have a
testimonial for you today but first if you are new here I put out a brand new
one-hour yoga video every single Friday at 9 a.m. Pacific. So thank you so much
for subscribing and turning on notifications so you don't miss this
single class and be sure to press that like button if you enjoy this video and
let me know what you like about it in the comments. If you are feeling
overwhelmed or anxious and you're finding things a bit too much right now or if
you don't like the spoken teachings then feel free to just press that mute button
and follow along visually. That is just a perfect way to not have to deal with
the spoken teachings. I have a testimonial from Jackie today from our membership
community about the first class in our emotional healing series. Jackie says
this class got my attention right off today. I made time for it and I'm so
glad that I did. Thank you for these powerful teachings Melissa. I agree with
the comment I saw on YouTube about your teachings. They are the best part for me
and nowadays I wouldn't be able to go back to a purely physical class because
although of course I could do it I wouldn't find it enriching and it wouldn't
support me on my spiritual path of growth. I'm looking forward to the rest of
this series and I trust you when it's when you say it's going to be
transformational. I can sense it in my body already. So thank you Jackie. That
comment really touched me. You know I can sense the the transformation and the
just the kind of serious depth that we're going to go to in this series and
you know this morning putting the teachings together I could really feel
it and I really appreciate you taking the time to leave your comments in the
membership community about this and also all of your comments. We're just
behind a golf course right now as somebody yelled for so I think we're
okay. Thank you for all of you leave your comments on YouTube and iTunes,
Instagram, Facebook and my website. It's always great to hear about your
interaction with the classes. Thank you to Squeeze Yoga Clothing for my clothes.
Today I'm wearing long purple leggings and a black bra cami and thanks to Dusky
Leaf for our props today you're going to need two blocks and a yoga strap and if
you don't have a yoga strap you can use the tie from your bathrobe. We're gonna
start with our peace mantra.
So that mantra means protect us together, student and teacher, may our
studies nourish us together, may we practice together for the good of the
union of all, may our learning be luminous and purposeful, may we live in
harmony, peace, peace, peace be unto all. If you haven't done the first class in
the Yoga for Emotional Healing series number 390 then be sure to go back and
do that one first. The teachings are cumulative in this series so you want to
do that one and do them all in order and then you can come back and join us for
this one. We're going to start in this one in front-line Shavasana which
somebody told me in the comments that there is another name for that which I
meant I should have written down right when you told me. So tell me again in
the comments what the name is for front-line Shavasana. It seemed really
obvious and I thought I'm gonna remember that and then I didn't. Okay so we're
gonna start in front line Shavasana, lie on your belly, crocodile pose it's also
called I think. So feel into your body just allow yourself to arrive in your
body and notice what's happening in your body. Notice your body from the inside.
Feel your connection to the earth.
Notice your breath.
And just become aware of the emotional tone, the feeling tone of your body.
Emotions are intelligent expressions of energy that
can lead us to our awakened nature. That's a quote by Reggie Ray. We're gonna start
with just a gentle little back bend to open up your chest and to awaken your
spine a little bit. So bring your hands down by the side of your body. You're
gonna roll your shoulders back and up, lift your chest up off the ground, your
palms face up towards the ceiling and lengthen both legs up off the ground.
And then you can lower down, roll your hips from side to side, rock your hips
from side to side, release your back. Emotions in and of themselves are not a
problem. They're simply an expression of awakened energy. Emotional awareness
allows us to experience an emotion and go into that direct experience of the
emotion. We can be immediately present with whatever emotion is experienced in
a direct way. We can experience each emotion in a fresh and new way. Okay,
you're gonna make your body into an X now. So take your arms and legs to the
corners of your mat. So relax your body completely, relax your shoulders, relax
your low back, and then you're going to lengthen your left leg off the ground.
And then you're gonna cross it over your body.
And then come back.
So you're gonna release and relax down, keep your shoulders relaxed, rock your
hips from side to side again, relax your whole back. And then you're gonna reach
your right leg long. And you're gonna cross your right leg over your body.
And then lower down. Okay, you're gonna make your way up onto all fours.
And you're going to place your hands underneath your shoulders, your knees,
underneath your hips. And you're going to exhale, round up through your back. And
then inhale and arch through your back. Breathe out, round up through your back.
And breathe in an arch through your back. So what is emotional awareness? Emotional
awareness, and you know this is just something that I've called it, but being
emotionally aware means being completely open and present with whatever
emotion is arising within you. With emotional awareness, we are free in the
experience of whatever emotion arises. We're with the straight undiluted essence
experience of the emotion. Okay, so walk to the side, we'll do cat pose to the
side, so you get a little side bend in your spine as well.
And then the other side.
And then come back center and open your knees wide, sit back on your heels, come
into child's pose. If that bothers your knees, you can lie on your back and hug
your knees into your chest instead. So what normally happens instead of opening
up to the straight up undiluted essence experience of the emotion, what normally
happens is that we experience an emotion and then there's some level of
shutting down or turning away from the emotion. We retract from the pure undiluted
experience of the emotion and pull back from it. We do this by trying to figure
it out. We try to figure out why we're feeling the emotion, where the emotion
came from, how to resolve it. In short, we start to try to attach a story, a
storyline to the emotion. Okay, you're gonna walk your hands back and you're
gonna come up into lunge pose. So let's start by walking your left leg through.
You could actually use your blocks here if you want.
And then sink down through your front left foot, come up right, reach your right
arm up. And then you can release this side and we'll go ahead and do the other
side. So you're going to step your right leg through. Sink down through your
front right foot, come up right and lift your left arm up.
And then you can release that down and we're going to step back into downward
facing dog. You can do downward facing dog against the wall or using a table if
it's too weight-bearing for your upper body. You're gonna spread your fingers
wide, tuck your toes under.
So you're gonna look at the space between your hands and then you're gonna
walk your feet into your hands. Make your way up to standing. Okay, from standing
we're going to take a big step back with our left foot. Keep your hips facing the
front edge of your mat. Bring your arms straight up. So about a week ago I was
overcome with sadness. It was just completely consuming me. The experience of
sadness was all-consuming. I could feel it in every ounce of my being. So what did
I do? I pulled away from it and I started to try to figure it out. Why am I
feeling sad? Where did this feeling of sadness come from? And I started to go
back through my whole day and all my interactions and I tried to figure out
who I could blame my sadness on. Like I caught it like some kind of flu bug or
something. Okay, so let this posture out of your body on the side and then you'll
take a step back with your right foot.
Sink down through your front left sit bone and lift your arms up for warrior
one on the other side. There's no end to trying to figure out the reason why
you're having the emotion for me to try to figure out the sadness. You can go
back through your whole life and go back through your childhood. You can go back
through all your past lives as well. It's an endless endless endless journey to
trying to figure it out. And my kindle just turned off so I lose my next spot.
This is how futile it is actually. The futile, the futility of figuring it out.
There's no end to pulling away from the intensity of the direct experience of
the emotion. Sadness like any other emotion is simply part of being human.
Okay, so let the posture out of your body. So emotions are just a play of energy and
yet we retract from them. We need to resolve them. We need to explain them.
And in the case of the day where I was experiencing that intensity of sadness,
what did I do? I walked straight into the grocery store. I walked down to the chip
aisle. I got a bag of big chips and I went, I didn't even get, I didn't even make
it to pass the car. I got to the car. Some days I don't even make it at the
grocery store. And I ate the entire bag of chips that day. Not all in one sitting
but the rest, throughout the rest of the day, the rest, the whole bag of the chips.
And then, you know, not only did I feel sad but I also had a stomach ache. So then
stomach ache starts to kind of blend with the emotion of sadness, right? So then,
you know, it's one way to dull the intensity. But anyway, let's come back
up to the top of our mat. This time you're going to take a step back with
your left leg again and you're going to turn your hips to the long edge of your
mat. Sink down through your front right sit bone, bring your arms up and you're
in warrior two. So emotions are not good or bad or indifferent. We label our
emotions. We think joy. Oh, well, that's a good emotion. Or we think calmness and
peace. Oh, well, I'm a yogi. Those are definitely very good emotions for a
yogi to have. I should be calm and peaceful all the time. I should bring
more of that into my life. I'm a yogi. I should be calm and peaceful. Yes, those
are definitely good emotions. Then we think anger, fear, anxiety. No, those are
definitely bad emotions. I shouldn't be having those emotions, not me. No, those
are definitely not emotions that I should be having. And so then we push
those emotions away. Okay, straighten both your legs, turn both your toes to the
long edge of your mat, turn your left toe out, your right toe in, sink down through
your left sit bone. But the thing is that we are delusional and are confused
thinking and constructed stories, explanations, judgments around emotions.
We're distracting ourselves actually from the real experience, labeling the
experience, judging and compartmentalizing them. We're simply using our
intellect to distract ourselves from our direct experience. Each emotional
experience is fresh and new. With emotional awareness we're letting go of
our addiction to the thought process, about emotions, and we're letting go of
trying to figure it all out. Okay, so straighten your legs again and let's
turn your right toes out again and your left toes in, sink down through your
right sit bone, bring your arms up parallel to the ground, drop your left
arm behind and your right arm back. So let's just let go into peaceful warrior
here and we'll do that on the other side. Turn your left toes out
sink down through your left sit bone, drop your right arm, open your left arm up.
Then turn both your toes to the long edge of your mat, roll your pelvis over your
hip bones and fold forward. When we're talking about emotional awareness we are
talking about being present to the energy of the emotional experience itself.
Emotions are boundless expressions of energies and so we exit from the emotion,
the sensation, the direct experience, we attach a story to it, we wrap it up in
reason and logic to re-establish our sense of self. And then what happens is
the storyline makes the emotional experience small enough again so that
we feel like we're in control.
And then from here we're going to come down and we're going to come on to our
knees and we're going to come down on to our knees and you're going to need your
blocks and you're going to place your blocks by your ankles. Okay so for our
back bend today I thought we would do camel pose because for me I don't know
this is like one of the biggest back bends and it's it can be very intense
like emotions that's why I chose it and I'll give lots of options and you can do
whichever one's most comfortable for you along the way but just be with the
intensity of this pose you know without do it in a way that's safe for you but
just allow yourself to open to the intensity of the pose because that's
what we're doing with emotions to be with the direct experience of the pose
without trying to back away from it in whatever way is accessible for you. So
let's start with just placing your hands on your hips, relaxing your shoulders,
tucking your tailbone under and lifting your heart and your throat to the
ceiling and if you've got blocks behind you you could place your hands on the
blocks.
I guess this is where they usually get out. They're looking right at me like you're
in my way. Sorry can you go a little bit around? I could move but we're in the
in the middle of filming a yoga show here and then you're gonna come forward
and rest in Shabasana.
Okay and then we're gonna come and do cow's face pose. This is also a very
intense pose for a lot of people because it's right into the hips.
The way they were drinking the water.
So we're gonna do cow's face pose and this can also be another very intense
pose for your hips. So you can place a block or a bolster underneath your hips
if they're tight. We'll start with your... I'm not gonna mirror you today. I'm just
gonna start with your right leg on top of your left and have your strap close
by. Put it over your right shoulder. You're gonna internally rotate your left
arm. Place it up your back and then you're gonna bring your right arm up and
over and hold on. So I thought we'd do the full expression of cow's face today
so that we were opening our heart center and opening our hips as well for the
full intensity of cow's face pose.
Okay and then you're going to switch sides so that your left leg is on top of
your right leg. If you have any space underneath your hips just fill it with a
block or a cushion. Move your strap over to your other shoulder. This time you're
gonna internally rotate your right arm. Bring your right arm up your back and
then you'll take your left arm up and over and if your fingers meet in the
back great if not that's why you've got the strap. So strong emotions can
actually open the doors of awareness for us. As Reggie Berry says they represent
a point where our awakened nature is breaking through our storyline. So
actually the emotions are cutting through our our discursiveness you know
our storyline the story that we tell ourselves about ourselves and our
limited sense of self. Every emotion then becomes an open-ended opportunity for
immediate presence. You know when those strong emotions come up they're a chance
for us you notice they they kind of break through they ask us to stop they
ask us to come into the present moments they ask us to experience things in a
full-bodied way. So emotions are actually incredibly helpful in our journey of
awakening and then you're going to release this pose from your body in the
strap and you're going to lie on your back for Shavasana and if you have any
back issues then you're going to lie with your knees bent and your feet flat on
the floor and you're going to stay here and rest in Shavasana while I sit up and
redo a poem. So I have a poem for you while you are receiving the class
receiving the yoga postures and the teachings here. In this yoga for
emotional series when you listen to the poems and it's funny because many of you
commented on this last week about the way you received the poem. If you do this
when you listen to poems like the teaching said this week let go of trying
to figure them out trying to analyze them trying to understand them or trying to
resolve them and open yourself to experiencing them and specifically to
how it makes you feel. So be with a poem as it unfolds don't worry about it what
it means and just feel it in your body feel its emotional tone and notice how
your emotional body feels when you hear this poem and this poem comes from the
book poetry of impermanence mindfulness and joy edited by John Bram and I just
wanted to think wisdom press wisdom publications for sending it to me
because it was a book that I wanted to read this summer and I requested a review
copy and they very kindly sent one to me I told them that I read you guys poems
at the end of class and so they kindly sent me this book of poetry so that I
could read these poems to you at the end of class. So this poem is called calm
because I'm unknown by Fernando Pessoa calm because I'm unknown and myself
because I'm calm I want to fill my days with wanting nothing from them for those
whom wealth touches gold irritates the skin for those whom fame blows life fogs
over on those for whom happiness is their son night will fall but those whose
hope for nothing are glad for whatever comes. Okay so you're going to slowly
wiggle your fingers and toes roll to your right side and make your way up to
seated. We're going to sit together for a few minutes with the mudra.
We're going to sit with the dhyana mudra is the same one we sat with last week
with your left hand on top of the right hand and your thumbs touching it's a
mudra for increasing awareness and since we were opening the awareness to our
emotions today I thought it would be a good one for us
and we'll just close our eyes and sit with this mudra.
So we'll transition to our closing mudra series with your left palm up your
right palm down making space with breath and a sigh.
May all beings be happy and free. May the thoughts words and actions of my own
life contribute in some way to the happiness and freedom for all. So if
you're feeling as good as these geese here at the end of the show look at their
legs behind them even stretching and press the thumbs up button let me know
by pressing that like button and if you know somebody else that would enjoy
this class then feel free to share it with them and let me know in the
comments you know I think like that I'm not alone in my story of the way that I
retract and pull away and that we all have our own ways of trying to pull away
from emotions so let me know in the store in the in the comments how you do
that you know do you go and buy a bag of chips or do you try and pin your
emotion on somebody else you know it's not I don't really want to share the
storyline of who I was trying to pin the emotion on but you know just let me know
in the comments you know I think we're all pretty human we all do those things
so that's that's that let me know in the comments thank you so much for your
donations Hillary Sonia from Australia Diane from Nova Scotia Donna from
Saskatchewan Gabriela from Dublin Jenny from Switzerland Sean from New York and
Marie from Australia these weekly videos are made possible by your donations
and also from our supporting members in our membership community in this class
I spoke about opening our awareness to emotions and next week I invite you to
open into a community of people who support each other on a genuine path of
spiritual transformation we come together each week in our live classes
and in next week in July we're going to be coming together for a four-day
retreat on July 10th 11th 12th and 13th and if you're watching this later the
recordings will all be there so you can do this anytime they're always
available 24-7 to we're coming together though in real time July 10th 11th 12th
and 13th to connect with each other and the earth and we'd love to welcome you
into our community and if you're already a member of our community I'll put the
link to that below so that you can join us for the our July retreat and if you'd
like to become a member of our community I'll put the sign up for that as well so
thank you so much for joining us thanks to the geese for adding to the pleasure
of this oh my gosh the way they stretch their legs and their wings it's so
adorable I'm sending you much love from beautiful British Columbia may your
joy be as deep as our Pacific Ocean may you be as rigid as the trees in our
forest may you be as strong as our mountains Om Shanti Namaste
