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Namaste - An End to Ignorance - September 2002

In yoga, we close each class with a greeting that comes from India, 'namaste'. Namaste translates roughly to, "The divine in me acknowledges the divine in you - and when we meet in that sacred space, we are One." The sentiment conveyed through this one word, sums up the teaching of yoga, and beckons us to heal at the very source of what ails us: Our perceived sense of isolation and separateness. It is this that closes our hearts whether to illusory enemies across the ocean, or to ourselves, and drives us towards destruction and despair.

As I write this note, it's nearing 9-11- 02. In reflecting on the future after the sorrow-filled months of the past year, I am reminded of the movie, Fastrunner, which centers around a generational feud among an Inuit tribe in the vast wild of the Arctic tundra. The movie tracks the egosparring between two archetypical rivals from the time of their fathers, through their own childhood, and the inevitable suffering which ensues as they become adults.

However, at the climax of the story, when the hero has come to avenge the death of his brother, the rape of his wife, and his own harrowing near-death at the hands of his enemy, the story takes an abrupt turn from the typical motif. Positioned to strike the fatal blow and wipe out the "bad guy" (who is so bad, we are rooting for the ax to fall on him), the hero slams his weapon down without drawing blood and proclaims, "IT STOPS HERE!" With that single benevolent act, he ends the legacy of violence. The power of will needed to make this shift in consciousness is of "Gandhian" proportions, and left me and the rest of the audience stunned.

On NPR I listened as Israeli and Palestinian children who have lost parents in this recent bloodletting, were interviewed. Their grief was matched only by their mutual hatred and desire for revenge. Their joy for life has all but been obliterated by exploding bombs.

The question, "Where does it end?" in my mind loops back to, "Where does it begin?" For that answer, we needn't look to the Middle East, or The White House, or to any religious or philosophical doctrine. We need look no further than our own hardened hearts. What does it take for any of us to stop in the tracks of our aggression and see the divinity in another? From my own experience, I know that when righteous fury is burning inside, my convictions fan the flames. The global fires we are experiencing today really are just a mirror for the way in which, as my teacher puts it, "We orbit around our own self-image." The more we cling to our culture, our beliefs, and our stuff, the more formidable the barriers between us.

The yoga sutras call this mistaken sense of separateness avidya, and claims it is the seed source of all suffering. Avidya is the soil we fertilize when children grow up nursed on hatred and the world appears safer from inside a barbed-wire barricade than from inside a school bus.

Two days ago, my youngest daughter, a newly licensed driver took her eyes off the road "for a second", veered to the right, overcorrected and flipped her car, totaling it. She walked away with a few minor abrasions on her hands and knees, shaky but alive. As she replays the event to family and friends, she's bewildered by the incredulous reality that it only took a moment of distraction to topple her world. "It happened so fast," is all she can say.

It does happen so fast. The dividing line between life and death is a breath's length. We're at the point where if we continue to remain ignorant to the ways in which we co-create world wide suffering, we're in fact careening down the interstate blindfolded. The crash is inevitable.

Moksa or liberation from suffering begins with remembering to greet one another with namaste; in our own language, but with the same quality of respect for the sacredness of life that unites us. Peace results when, at the moment we feel anger and fear start to take root, we choose not to react with habitual aggression. It's about making the choice every moment, every day to stop the legacy of violence in our own individual lives and thereby contribute to the cohesive healing of the planet and ourselves.

The Yoga Barn, Inc.
Robin Rothenberg, Certified Yoga Instructor
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