YOGA ON THE LABYRINTH

Buddhist Metta Prayer

Darren Main — Wed, 16 May 2012 02:22:22 +0000

For Self
May I be well, happy and safe.
May I be free from suffering and at ease with pain.
May I live in peace and harmony with all beings.
May I live with a heart and mind that is always in balance.
May I accept with understanding and wisdom the events in my life and world.
May I forgive others and myself for the inevitable harms we cause each other.
May I have the patience, courage, understanding, and determination to overcome the inevitable problems in life.
May I experience and manifest loving kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity.

For Others
May they be well, happy and safe.
May they be free from suffering and at ease with pain.
May they live in peace and harmony with all beings.
May they live with hearts and minds that are always in balance.
May they accept with understanding and wisdom the events in their lives and world.
May they forgive others and themselves for the inevitable harms they cause each other.
May they have the patience, courage, understanding, and determination to overcome the inevitable problems in life.
May they experience and manifest loving kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity.
—Modified by Charlie Day after 9/11

This mediation is also reprinted in Darren’s book Inner Tranquility: A Guide to Seated Meditation

A Place Within Me Opens

Darren Main — Wed, 16 May 2012 01:16:42 +0000

Sometimes, during my early-morning meditation, a place within me opens and parts of myself let go that I didn’t even know were holding on. In these moments I feel all the hard places in my heart and body yield to a great softness carried on my breath, and I am filled with compassion for the part of me that is always trying, always organizing, problem solving, anticipating. My mind stops and simply follows my breath. A great faith washes through me; a knowing that everything that needs to get done will get done. My shoulders drop an inch and the small but familiar ache in my chest eases—The moment stretches. There is enough: enough time, enough energy, enough of all that is needed. A great tenderness for myself and the world opens inside me, and I know that I belong to this time, to these people, to this earth and to something that is both within and larger than all of it, something that sustains and holds us all. I do not want to be anywhere else. I am filled with a commitment to, and a compassion for myself and the world.
—Oriah Mountain Dreamer
from the book “The Invitation“

Plucking Pearls

Darren Main — Wed, 09 May 2012 01:08:33 +0000

When we waste our time, it is like plucking the pearls from a dazzling necklace one by one and throwing them away. But when we use time well, each minute adds another jewel to enhance the beauty of our lives. Because time is our life, it is very precious, and we need to learn to treasure it.
— Tarthang Tulku

Forget About enlightenment.

Darren Main — Wed, 09 May 2012 01:08:00 +0000

Forget about enlightenment. Sit down wherever you are and listen to the wind that is singing in your veins. Feel the love, the longing and the fear in your bones.
Open your heart to who you are, right now, not who you would like to be. Not the saint you’re striving to become. But the being right here before you, inside you, around you. All of you is holy. You’re already more and less than whatever you can know.
Breathe out, look in, let go.
—John Welwood

“I fell many times…. I got back up.”

Darren Main — Sat, 05 May 2012 21:06:57 +0000

This video is for every person that has ever told me that they were to ____________ (stiff, old, fat, injured etc) to do yoga and for all my students who once believed they couldn’t do yoga and proved themselves wrong! Thanks Arthur for being my guru today.

Diamond Dallas Page Yoga

Telling Secrets

Darren Main — Wed, 02 May 2012 01:06:52 +0000

“What we hunger for perhaps more than anything else is to be known in our full humanness, and yet that is often just what we also fear more than anything else. It is important to tell at least from time to time the secret of who we truly and fully are . . . because otherwise we run the risk of losing track of who we truly and fully are and little by little come to accept instead the highly edited version which we put forth in hope that the world will find it more acceptable than the real thing. It is important to tell our secrets too because it makes it easier . . . for other people to tell us a secret or two of their own . . . ”
—Frederick Buechner, Telling Secrets

The Greatest Acheivement. . .

Darren Main — Wed, 02 May 2012 01:00:23 +0000

The greatest achievement is selflessness.
The greatest worth is self-mastery.
The greatest quality is seeking to serve others.
The greatest precept is continual awareness.
The greatest medicine is the emptiness of everything.
The greatest action is not conforming with the worlds ways.
The greatest magic is transmuting the passions.
The greatest generosity is non-attachment.
The greatest goodness is a peaceful mind.
The greatest patience is humility.
The greatest effort is not concerned with results.
The greatest meditation is a mind that lets go.
The greatest wisdom is seeing through appearances.
—Atisha

Strength Comes from Within, Not from the Muscles

Darren Main — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 05:25:51 +0000

Concentration on the muscles, as in the practice of mechanical physical exercises, tends to make one think of himself as a physical being only. [Hatha Yoga] instructions teach the science of concentrating on the inner life energy and will power and thus awakening one’s consciousness of his subtle spiritual nature. Strength comes from within, not from the muscles. Life is sustained from the power within; it does not depend solely upon food or exercise.
—Paramahansa Yogananda

The Universe Isn’t Broken and Neither Are You.

Darren Main — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 02:19:42 +0000

If it isn’t broken don’t fix it. The universe isn’t broken and neither are you.
So don’t attempt to fix others until us realize that you yourself are perfect.
A lame man’s crutches are as much apart of him as the wind, the birds, and the sea.
Mediate on this and watch the complicated grow simple.
If you are hugry eat—If you are tired rest.
stop tampering with life and enjoy the ride.
—Haven Trevino, The Tao of Healing

Oakland Tribune Film Features YOL

Darren Main — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 14:33:03 +0000

The Oakland Tribune has produced a beautiful short video about Yoga on the Labyrinth by filmmaker Nick Moon