The Baseball Sutras by Barbrahma

It’s October. Which means, my meditation practice includes the World Series, and my mat is diamond-shaped.

Before I raise the Phillies’ ace Cliff Lee to near Hanuman status, let it be known: I am setting my energy on an ultimate Yankees’ series. I’ve got my buddhi based reasons (October is fitting Alex Rodriguez like a glove, Andy Pettitte’s face is the face of focus). But Lee’s skill in effortless action on opening night 2009 zoomed my awareness in (a yogic action in itself) on why I fell in love with baseball to begin with. I now have a new answer to the question, What is yoga? Baseball, yogis, it is baseball.

I love baseball for the very reason those that hate it, hate it (same could be said of my love of cats). “It’s too slow.” “Nothing is happening.” My take = it’s about the subtleties. So is yoga. Contrary to what many beginning (and even continuing) practitioners believe, the more “advanced” the yogi, the more subtle the practice. Large, athletic, twisty/bendy asana do not necessarily an advanced yogi make.

Patanjali’s The Yoga Sutra, which I now muse-ily mix with baseball, is about the stilling of the mind, quieting the waves of the chockfull storehouse of our thoughts. Just watch the exchange among pitcher, catcher, and batter.

Patanjali mentions asana in only three sutras. The first sutra on asana (asana means seat–what else is the pitcher’s mound?) is how to do asana–with steadiness and ease. It is to remain in a “good place,” or sukha, and not let anything in your space. The next sutra tells us how to master asana, which is, to, while in that good space, meditate on the infinite. Loosening your effort into the infinite… The third sutra illumines what happens when we do master asana in this way: you will remain stable in the midst of change.

Cliff Lee aced sutras 2:46-2:48 last night. Which my fanciful muse finds delightful. Baseball is brilliantly subtle, while vastly complex. It is filled with nuance, defined by detail, and when manifest in its true adepts, an equanimity of fearlessness and joy. So’s yoga.

Yoga is skill in action. Baseball possesses the quietude, timelessness, and the opportunity for stillness which defines such skillful action. But that is another yoga study. If you like to be prepared, dear student, get out your Gitas.

I’ll leave you with one of my favorite yoga teaching mantras, one I hear is held by the best hitters in the business of baseball:

Be Patient at the Plate.

Barbrahma

Autumn leaves, left.

I’ve just spent my first, and surely only, fall in Helena, Montana.

Yes, it is only October 9, but fall has given in, has acquiesced to winter.

There wasn’t much at all of a fall leaves scene here, save for a few mildly yellow ones of some sort, which marks this as the palest of all falls I’ve witnessed since moving away from central Florida after autumn of 1989.

1990-1995. Greensboro NC had fall splendors that stopped me in my tracks, This became hazardous at times. (Native Floridian that I am, I’d gawk at the shameless maples while driving, to the point of slowing down to about 10 mph, not so safe.) And when fall break rolled into town (yeah, it puts spring break to shame for one such as myself), I’d set my car west, and be-dazzled, on the Blue Ridge Parkway each October.

1996-2007. Missoula MT had gorgeous, if not indigenous, maples. And larches. I remained entertained, peeping wise.

2007-2008. Sonoma. Sweet Sonoma. Grapevines. Crepe Myrtles. And others, which while more innocent than those raucous east coast types, made me smile. For hours and hours.

Sonoma Fall

So, this being the first fall in 20 years that has been less than eye-catching, I’m recalling fall in appreciation. Of  colors past. And future. Yep, I’ll find them.

Cat, napping

I’m finding that many people think I have only the one cat, Jai, as I tend to give him more press…

There is another. Bitchy, lovesick, jealous to the nub of a tail she has (being Manx), here is Fanny.

Fanny, napping

The cat (and human) infirmary

I’m infirm. The surgery on my broken clavicle not quite two weeks ago, I’m still in an arm sling and have restricted movement. Doing well, but not exactly up to par. Or typing. Or preparing my own, and my cats’ meals without consideration.

So, what does life present, but another challenge. Jai, my giant, sweet, and at times, aggressive, tabby cat.

Case in painful point: Following a cat fight–don’t know with whom or when– he developed an abscess on his tail and I had to get him to the vet yesterday (thank you, Joanne, for helping me get the 17-pounder there) for a procedure: shaving around the base of his tail, lancing, and insertion of drain tubes. And the requisite wearing of an E-collar.

Jai with E-collar

Poor kitty. I brought him home yesterday evening, whereupon Fanny, my other cat, and at this point the only member of this three-individual household who is not infirm (save for her neurosis) saw and smelled this odd monster I brought home and went into full-fledged Chicken Little mode.

Jai needs meds and hot compresses on his very sore tail twice a day, plus some navigation management. (Getting around the house with the vexing E-collar is adding a component of beside-himselfness that doesn’t exactly add to the calm we all need right now.) I’m still recovering and caring for myself…

I take comfort where I can, which right now includes the comic effect of one woman and two cats, two of them recovering from invasive surgical procedures and in need, the third falling from the occasion into the depths of her neurosis.

writing after clavicle surgery

In short, I can’t. Between it hurting to type and my brain als0 and necessarily taking it easy right now…a challenging break…to pause…

Mad Men opening sequence quotes Robert Longo

What I love about curating:

When new fascinations recall previous ones, and there is that “That makes me think about…” moment.

I think Mad Men is unabashedly brilliant. Mesmerizingly, keep-me-in-the-moment so. (My yogi me would say when that happens, it is Kundalini.) In the mid-80s, I had the same reaction to artist Robert Longo’s Men in the Cities series. Enough so that one Halloween, I dressed as one of the characters. (Hey, I was 30 and full of myself in the good way. Actually, being full of oneself is living right, not a social misdemeanor.)

Curating fills me with myself, with my soul’s way of connecting delights to delights, and sharing that with others….”Hey, look at this!”

Matthew Barney house cat

I did not consciously quote Matthew Barney when I snapped this shot of my sleeping cat, Jai, but it does bring the Cremaster’s work to my mind…

A further curation in Nine West’s fall hosiery.

The cat in the window

I met the cat in the photo on my banner five years ago in Paris. Having just spent a week in the south of France for my first teacher training with Rod Stryker (there have been, and will be more), and then another cycling through Burgundy (there have been and will be more tours, and wine tastings), I found myself in Paris for three days, where I stayed with my American friend Joe, and his Parisian wife, Babette.

Their flat was very near the Pere Lachaise cemetery, which was one of my favorite haunts (that just typed out, I did not intend the pun, but, well). The gray kitty with the lively eyes would appear each day at Babette’s kitchen window, and I happened to grab this sweet snap of her…I love the panorama effect here…
And love the memories of five years ago this very day, when I began my studies with Rod. And. I will be attending another five day teacher training with him in one week! The training is “Prana,” and will take place in Dallas. I’m ecstatic!

Joni Mitchell’s “California”

My heart’s broken to wide open for the first time in oh, so long…it is divine.

Divine.
I’m transfixed with serene, grounded glory.

Thank you. (We are indeed all connected, we, as universe, so all, everything plays into my peace and happiness. Thank you.)

The Flight of the Conchords

Have I ever been more delighted than I am when watching this show?

I cannot imagine…