The unbridled joy of a truly open heart

I was really tired today. I almost didn’t go to yoga. I thought of a whole slew of reasons why I might not go, gave myself tons of possible excuses for bowing out.

When I got home from work I cleaned up the kitchen and then tried to take a nap. I might have gotten twenty minutes, I’m not sure. I was still so exhausted and wasn’t sure if I wanted to go but Wednesday nights are yoga nights and I felt the routine of it seeping in. I signed up online for class. I told Mi.Vida to be home by 6pm. I started putting on my clothes while Isa took a bath and before I knew it I was walking to class.

I’M SO GLAD I WENT.

Yoga tonight was great. The pace of the class was prefect for me. I felt strong even though I was obviously challenged. I remember thinking multiple times that I was so glad I had come.

And then we did savasana.

That’s when it happened.

During savasana, or the final resting pose, I had what can only be described as a transcendental experience. I was lying there, focusing on my breath, when an intense feeling of joy and gratitude overcame me. The only way I can describe it is to say that my heart felt truly open, fully and completely so. I suddenly saw everything in my life and was overwhelmed by the bounty of it, by all that I had, by the limitless love I had the great honor of sharing with others. Everything in my life seemed absolutely perfect, just as it was, my family, my daughter, my partner, my parents, my job, my apartment – things I generally complain about seemed faultless, utterly perfect. My apartment wasn’t small or moldy or cramped or messy but warm, inviting, bright and safe. I literally could not conjure one negative thought about it.

As I sat longer and longer with this open heart, and realized it wasn’t vanishing as quickly as it came, I started testing other people and things that I was generally disgruntled about. The woman at my work whose political views chaff and who got pregnant on the first month trying, both times and who gets to had free child care from her in laws for the last five years, the one I can’t really stand? When I thought about her all I felt was love and an intense desire for her continued happiness. It was the strangest thing I’ve ever experienced. It was like she was a different person in my eyes.

This experience couldn’t have lasted more than five minutes but I feel like it transformed my life. To know that opening my heart in that way is possible, and to know how good it feels, has changed me. I came home and immediately sat down to write about it because I never want to forget how incredible this experience was or how momentous it seemed to be. I need to remember that a path towards that kind of awareness, either via yoga or mindfulness meditation or something else, is a path worth journeying.

Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu

May all beings everywhere be happy and free, and may the thoughts, words, and actions of my own life contribute in some way to that happiness and to that freedom for all.

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~ by Esperanza on January 25, 2012.