“Tomorrow is a thief of pleasure.”
~ Rex Harrison
Good morning, and what a lovely day for Spencer’s return from vacation! Me and the cats have missed him <3.
Today, we continue our exploration of the yogic code of ethics, and the 3rd Yama or restrain: Asteya, or non-stealing.
On a surface level, practicing Asteya can mean literally not stealing money out of someone’s pocket. But on a deeper level, the practice of Asteya implies not taking anything that has not been freely given.
Non-stealing includes not only taking what belongs to another without permission, but also using something for a different purpose to that intended, or beyond the time permitted by its owner.
It can also mean not hoarding materials you don’t need, mindlessly consuming natural resources, coveting other people’s possessions.
Perhaps we steal when we rob ourselves of our own potential by neglecting a talent, or by letting a lack of commitment keep us from practicing yoga.
Last November, I provided some practical tips on not robbing the most precious and non-renewable resource of all: Time.
You can find those tips for respecting other’s time — in your work and in your communication – here:
http://www.reflectionsonsunrise.com/2013/11/26/asteya-not-stealing-others-time/
What does Yama & Niyama expert Deborah Adele have to offer us in regards to the finer nuances of this 3rd Jewel of Yoga?
The following is an excerpt from her book The Yama’s and Niyamas: Exploring Yoga’s Ethical Practice, along with some more thought provoking questions for exploration regarding Asteya or the principle of non-stealing …
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The third jewel, Asteya, or nonstealing, calls us to live with integrity and reciprocity. If we are living in fears and lies, our dissatisfaction with ourselves and our lives leads us to look outward, with a tendency to steal what is not rightfully ours. We steal from others, we steal from the earth, we steal from the future, and we steal from ourselves.
We steal from our own opportunity to grow ourselves into the person who has a right to have the life they want.
Do you often compare yourself to others? Our attention on others from a place of discontent within ourselves can lead us to live vicariously through
others or to try to control, manipulate, or manage them in order to boost our own sagging ego. We may find ourselves trying to “trump” or “one-up” their stories and successes and experiences by coming behind them with our own more fabulous tale. We steal their thunder, all in an attempt to make ourselves look better.
Or perhaps we steal from others by not paying attention to them or discounting them?
In all the instances where we steal, we have made the situation about us, not about the other. The intent has been to serve ourselves, not the other.
Yogi Bhajan is quoted as saying:
“Be a forklift; you should always be lifting people up.”
The question we can ask ourselves in our encounters with others is, does the other person feel uplifted and lighter because they have been with us, or do they feel like something precious was taken from them? Have we brightened their day by taking a moment to listen, to sincerely compliment them, or simply to smile?
I watched a wonderful “feel-good” movie last night on Netflix entitled, The Letter Writer, which deeply demonstrates one man’s ability to uplift others with words and his young protege’s ability to find her voice, to uplift through music. You might want to check it out ….
http://www.netflix.com/WiMovie/The_Letter_Writer/70264015?trkid=13465977
Not only do we steal from others, but we steal from the earth. We are visitors to this land, to our bodies, to our minds. To fully appreciate this reality is to accept that nothing on this physical plane truly belongs to us. This guideline asks us to view everything in our possession as something precious that is on loan to us. And for the time that it is on loan to us, we are asked to care for it. Watch today how often you use the term “I,” “mine,” and “my”. How much care are you giving that which has been loaned to you?
Not only do we steal from others, the earth, and the future; we steal from our own lives. We are captured in a culture where our very identity is tied up with our accomplishments. We wear all we have to do like a badge on our shirt for all to see. In this rush to get to the next thing, we have left no time for ourselves to digest and assimilate our lives; this may be our biggest theft of all.
We need time to catch up with ourselves. We need time to chew and ponder and allow the experiences of life to integrate within us. We need time to rest and to reflect and to contemplate.
In the yogic language of Sanskrit, the word opposite of Asteya is Adikara, which means the right to know or the right to have.
This word challenges us to the reality that if we want something, then we better grow the competency required to have it. We can dream and wish all we want, but we only get what we have the competency to have and keep. Anything else is stealing.
Think of CEO’s who run companies into the ground because they don’t have the skill to manage a huge corporation. In both of these cases, these people are stealing; they are trying to have something beyond their competency. Our outcomes in life are consistent with our abilities, not necessarily our wishes or goals.
A colander is an excellent example of adikara. We may seek something so earnestly and yet, if we are full of holes like the colander, what we want will always elude us. Building our adikara is plugging our holes by growing our competency in the area of our desires. Building our competency takes practice and learning.
If we are not prepared to contain our deep desires, we can easily find ourselves stealing in all kinds of inappropriate and destructive ways. This jewel asks us instead to focus on our desires and then build the competency to have them.
It leaves us with the question, “Are you available to what you want?”
It opens the door for us to seek out mentors and learn from people who have already accomplished what we are seeking; it also opens the door to the fun of learning new things.
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Lot’s to ponder! And today, I am grateful for the opportunity to share with you. I write every morning, not just to uplift myself, but to hopefully share something of value, and to uplift you too …
So get out there. Don’t waste time. Enjoy today. Don’t let the worries of tomorrow steal your peace of mind. Be conscious of all that is on loan to you today. Find beauty in this world. It’s all around you if you take the time to look. Go out, be a forklift. Work to bring smiles to people’s faces, to lighten their load if at all possible.
Namaste!
If you enjoyed this post, you can find the beginning of this series,
Exploring the Yamas and Niyamas: The Yogic Code of Ethics, here:
Permalink: http://www.reflectionsonsunrise.com/2014/03/07/finding-more-meaningful-restraints-for-lent/
