I have had several students reach out to me recently about the current political state and the fear they feel and a Ram Dass quote continually comes to my mind:
“I can do nothing for you but work on myself. You can do nothing for me but work on yourself.” ~ Ram Dass
Yoga philosophy teaches that one of the main causes of suffering is our misidentification with physical form. Most of us believe we are our physical body, our thoughts, the events that happen to us. The teachings explain that we are none of these but the conciousness/energy/life force that flows through all of these. Unless you were born enlightened this is hard to comprehend without deep meditation practice and reflection.
What’s even harder to comprehend without practice is that there is only one consciousness. The same force that flows through my body flows through yours and through everything in existence. When we realize this, we gain the ability to recognize ourself in others. This is the beginning of true compassion.
The current political state is symbolic of egoic living. The ego believes everyone is separate and that it has to fight and compete with others for resources. The higher self believes we are all one and knows how to live in harmony. Sometimes focusing on large issues can hold us in a state of anger and despair and stop us from doing work we can do. It may seem small, but the most powerful work we can do is shift our own state of mind and begin to release our own internal battles. Explore forgiveness towards those we are harbouring resentment towards, let go of our attachments and judgments of others and begin to see God (or life-force, love, energy) as the source of everything.
Little by little one travels far and the most powerful gift we can give to this planet is to work on ourselves.
Ram Dass was an incredible teacher who passed away last month. If you are interested in learning more from him I highly recommend his documentary Ram Dass, Going Home on Netflix or any of his talks on YouTube.