We live in a world that teaches the importance of ambition, efficiency, expediency, getting things done to produce the quickest results. It does not teach or encourage us to relax and just be where we are. In fact, if we are not crazy active and doing a million different things, we get labeled as lazy or unambitious. As a culture, we are uber-active, always trying to reach somewhere. The irony is that for the most part, nobody knows exactly where they are trying to reach. We’re obsessed with trying to go better and faster to get there, without really knowing exactly where “there” is.
Not surprisingly, we bring this paradigm to the mat. Sometimes, while teaching, Baron will walk around the class and approach someone who looks like they are really struggling and trying hard. He’ll quietly ask, “Just checking in, and curious about where are you trying to get to in the pose?” Typically the response will be something like, “I’m not sure where I’m going exactly but I’m doing my best.” We get that. In a way, that’s all of us. Our whole life we’ve been going somewhere, but just like in the pose, we don’t know where we are going…not really, at least not in the big picture.
We keep looking to get anywhere other than right here where we are. Being where you are is a scary place for most. Can you be where you are and not freak out? Can you go to that scary place called “right here where you are” and not meddle, interfere or need to fix anything? On the mat is the opportunity to be where we are totally, intimately, whole-heartedly and from that space allow the next move, the next possibility to arise.
