Yogi am I

When people hear I do yoga twice a week (I'd do more but the schedule does not provide for that), they think a number of thoughts and as much as I do not believe anyone should feel obligated to explain the motivations behind their practice I am going to. Yoga is humbling, freeing and altogether for me a way to release tensions I hold against myself and say internally thank you and sorry and I love you all at the same time to myself. I'm thankful you bend, you move more or less freely, I am thankful for my health. I am sorry I make you do things you don't like, like wearing those shoes, sitting like that, eating that food, going without a constant intake of water and clear liquids. I love you, I am okay with you, with that little tummy part that pudges out when I'm bent over, or those toes that won't always behave, because you're me, I'm you and we're created as a being in it's entirety to be whole, free and at peace with the world and myself. There is a freedom in coming into that space and acknowledging all those parts, coming to love all the parts I fight with, all the parts I lament, and all those parts I should love more.

There was a poem read during shavasana tonight that I found interesting:

Lost

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you,
If you leave it you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

~ David Wagoner ~

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/angelrays/2094861208/

Interesting...

I realize this maybe only interesting to me and maybe Jocelyn too, but I noticed something missing on the UN Millennium Development Goals, seniors. For years world health has been concerned predominately with infant mortality and rightfully so, however, now with changes to infant mortality and the increased, though yes not readily, availability of retrovival medications and general development of developing nations, there is now an aging population. The issue is while Alzheimer's and related aging problems associated with the old-old population are not relevant, the issues that baby boomers are dealing with are, obesity, high cholesterol and diabetes as diets around the developing world do as they have in North America - turn towards processed and away from traditional diets for various reasons - decreased crop land in India and China due to dam projects and the Westernization of cultures both in relation to food and work. Labour based jobs are traded for more lucrative/stable US outsourced jobs. There are economic issues as well - is a social safety net necessary? In countries like South Africa there is no social safety net for those with lower SES, like there is in Canada and even then there can be the argument that our pension system is not effective, in that for those who work outside of the regular work force - everyone one from stay-at-home moms, to illegal workers or even family employees are left out of CPP.

Regardless when will we change our perspectives on older populations from a burden to a societal asset and treating them accordingly? We are a long way from that transition - sati still does occur in India (Deepa Mehta's Water is poignant on a related issue) and similar feelings permeate all cultures, even our own.