This week's Instagram live conversation with good friend and soul sister Amanda Brown-Lesperance really got me thinking about consuming. And I’m not talking about what we’re eating (although that is part of it), but what we’re looking at, what we’re hearing on a daily basis, and how this is all affecting how we progress through life.
Becoming conscious of, and connecting with our true divine nature is the essential essence of yoga. I don’t blame you for thinking that yoga is about tree poses or holding your breath for awkward amounts of time- these are all vehicles to bring you to the ultimate goal of uniting with the divinity that’s inside you and all around you in every moment. But often, we are too frequently drawn away from this state of being by what we are consuming. Some of it we’re conscious of, but for the majority of the time, we’re completely unaware.
Looking but not seeing
How often is your tv ‘on in the background’? Are you watching that box set because you’re invested in the storyline and characters or just watching it for something to do? How many times a day are you picking up your phone and scrolling?
These are some of the questions I find myself asking more and more as I furrow deeper and deeper down into this never-ending burrow called yoga. And, like me, if you’re on this path too, you’ll be finding that you’re becoming ever more acutely aware what kind of content you’re allowing yourself to consume. I’m becoming sensitive to the news. I can’t bear to watch those graphs over and over again. And when the tv is just playing to itself, I can feel myself getting drawn in to those addictive, monotonous storylines of hollow portrayals of life that are bringing nothing to my life by watching them.
But all of this isn’t your fault. It’s no ones fault, really. It’s just a fact that we live in on the material plane, in a world that functions on an economy basis and where value is determined on a monetary basis. And because of this, squeezing in more adverts, holding your attention for a few more seconds on Facebook and getting you to watch ‘just one more episode’ means more money in someone else’s pocket. Okay, done with the doom and gloom, here’s the good news: you can opt out at any time. Literally anytime. You just decide. You put the phone down, turn off the tv and do something else. Go outside, call a friend. You have so much power to say no to a culture of consumerism and take back your right to be in the control seat of what you let into your sphere and what you don’t want there any longer.
I mean, I hear you but..
It’s the same with your sense of hearing. Do you register the lyrics of the songs you listen to or do you just like it for the catchy melody? Did you notice that every other word was a swear word or that it’s just about sex and chasing after women? Is that the kind of subconscious messages you want turning over in your brain?
Per day, each person has on average 60,000 thoughts. 60,000 thoughts!! And I can tell you from experience, most of these are there because of what you’re being exposed to throughout the day; consciously or unconsciously.
I remember when I did a 10 day silent meditation retreat and the first seven days I spoke to no one; looked at no one. Then on day eight, there were a small group of women talking in a corner and I just couldn’t resist eavesdropping. For the following 2 hours of meditation, my mind replayed their conversation over, and over, and over again. And the most excruciating thing was that I could see every single thought. I could see how my mind expanded the conversation, added bits to it, extrapolated, added my own commentaries, replayed the whole thing relentlessly. It was unbelievable how that one little snippet of interaction turned my internal world upside down.
And that is happening constantly with what we’re consuming through our ears every single day. Have you ever listened to news on the radio and it instantly dampened your mood? What about listened to dance music while you’re driving and suddenly start wanting to overtake and get extremely close to the person abiding by the speed limit in front of you? Once we start to tune into what we’re consuming, we can start to unravel how this all affects our mood and emotions. And then, we can begin to consciously choose what we want to be exposed to.
Just one more piece..
When we think consuming, we think of eating and what we’re fuelling our bodies with. But one thing I learnt from my conversation with Amanda was that creating a healthier environment in your mind comes first; then you can start on creating a healthier environment in your body.
Diet and eating are so intricately intertwined with our ability to control our senses that if we lack consciousness in this area, you can bet that our ability to control our eating and create healthier habits is going to fall flat. And you can’t blame us. As humans we just want to skip to the good part; skip to the part that’s going to transform me. Teach me how to headstand. I want to be able to meditate for an hour. These things don’t happen overnight and, like pretty much everything, it’s small steps. It’s stopping after 23 squares of Dairy Milk Fruit and Nut (my personal choice) and then tomorrow, stopping after 21 squares (I mean, if there’s any left..).
And I wish I could give you a recipe for immediate transformation but I’m sorry to say that I don’t have one. It’s constant work. It’s looking back at the journal entries and appreciating the progress you’ve made during that year. It’s waking up the day after a Netflix and Chill binge and saying “this is a new day and I’m going to try again”. But what I can guarantee you is that you’re not on your own. That there are thousands of people around the world walking the same path as you and the best part? Some of them are right here reading this too. We’re part of an amazing community right now and if any of this is resonating with you right now, I humbly encourage you to get involved in this community as much as you can. And in that way, we can begin to move away from the endless consumption and move into an awakened consciousness.
Further Reading
Dhammapada – Eknath Eraswan
The Katha Upanishad
Nutrition, Eating + Mental Health with @ablivingg (IGTV video on grace_knighton)
The Yoga of Discipline – Gurumayi Chidvilasananda
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