Hold onto your Drishti
Alright… as we close out 2022 and usher in 2023, let’s have some final words on drishti, our gazing point or focus. I recently came across this quote that I’ve always heard from my ashtanga teachers that I just really loved. It said,
“Eyes closed and sleep is coming.”
I just remember this so poignantly in the practice because the idea was that if you are not allowing yourself to tune in and hold your focus in your practice, by closing your eyes, you kinda miss some of the pieces of the practice. The good stuff of the yoga practice that happens when you are fully present in your body. Not tuning out! Tuning in.
Let’s think about where our drishti is as we are wrapping up the year and how we want to set our focus on for the year to come. Are we only allowing ourselves to notice the challenging parts of this past year? The painful parts?… OR are we allowing ourselves to also see the joyous parts… the lighter and playful parts of this past year? And when you think about the year ahead, what’s our gaze? Are we allowing ourselves to have a clarity to our vision? This can be by NOT setting intensions that are hard to attain or going to be too stressful.
One practice at the end of the year that I love to do, is opened eyed meditation. I love this practice because it allows you to tune in and focus on something, but not tune OUT the rest of the world. So the idea behind the open eyed meditation is that you have something out in front of you that you can focus your gaze on. My favorite is having some of my dried bougainvillea flowers from my yard that I’ve saved. As you slowly allow everything around you to slowly pixelate and fade away, you notice this one focal point out in front of you, without staring it down or being really intense, just allow a soft gaze. So that clarity and softness together would carry you into this open-eyed meditation. Try it. Stay there for 5-10 minutes and see what comes up for you. And then just see if you can bring that into your day… and the year ahead of you. A sense of clarity and softness with our gaze that guides us through each day.
Sending so many well wishes for the year ahead!
