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Writer's pictureImogen North

Can Creativity Trump Chaos?

The art of being a perpetual student is not always easy. It is not always easy to admit we don’t know all the answers, that we need to change and grow.


Some of us become obsessed with ‘educating’ ourselves taking course after course…but not actually absorbing of infiltrating what we are learning into our lives.


I have been thinking a lot about STUDENTSHIP recently after spending the last few weeks teaching retreats and workshops and then diving into my own training (as a student).


The word STUDENT first appeared in English around the 1350s and derives from the Latin word ’STUDERE’ which can be translated as : ‘to study’ (of course) but also ‘to pursue’ or ‘to be eager for’.


As students of yoga (which is the study of life), it is important that we stay eager for learnings, and pursue new ways of thinking, new ways of approaching what we thought we knew.  


When we are taught something new it is important that we ask the question… why?


I think it is important also to approach yoga now more than ever with a non-dogmatic approach so that it is accessible to the modern audience.  Of course we want to respect the lineage, but what is the lineage?  


There are so many different routes from which ‘contemporary’ yoga has developed.   

There is no one place that it has come from and there is no one place that it will go to.


‘Yoga' has gone through 1000s of years of change.  When ‘modern’ yoga begun to be developed in the 15th century it was developed by men for men (namely men of Indian origin) and now as the white western European culture has been dominant for the last 600 years or so - whiteness is being blamed for colonising yoga.  


People often say to me yoga and politics?  How are the 2 even connected?  And yes, I can understand how when working in an asana class in our Sweaty Betty leggings on a cold winters evening in northern Europe it might feel like that BUT it is inextricably linked.


Because yoga is about LIBERATION…


What are we liberating?


Our bodies YES.

Our minds YES.

Our joy YES.


But what are we liberating to? 

 

And when does that personal act of liberation reach further?


How often do you get out in your community to help to liberate others?


I ask this question, especially in the light of the global changes in the last week. 


When (for those of us on this quest for liberation for all) the world seemed to implode again, we feel… defeated, conquered, lost.  


On reflection how can we get out in our communities to help liberate others?


I ask this question again because if you are reading this it is likely you want the world to be better…


But how can WE BE DIFFERENTLY IN THE WORLD?  

How can we ACTUALLY and AUTHENTICALLY contribute?


One of my teachers said to me last week the game of winning over people you don’t respect is unsustainable. Things are changing and it’s not about “keeping up”….. 


So for now we have to live in the CHAOS - because chaos is creativity - chaos forces CREATIVITY …


When we are forced to get creative … polarity ceases to exist … right or wrong, push or pull, black and white.  


As we get creative we explore different ways of being…


As we get creative we unearth where we go next…


And as we unearth and we learn, so others are learning through us.


So what lessons do you want people to learn through you?  Through your presence?  Through your love?


What lessons do you want to learn through others?


It was Bob Marley who said … "What one man thinks is great, but only a fool leans upon his own understanding.”


The most important thing my students is to direct your zeal, to be eager for, the exploration that the studentship of yoga brings and the forthcoming liberation because without doubt, call it what you will … this psycho-spiritual practice is a liberator.  


It is a form of self-study that is not just a study of our internal habits, patterns judgments, thoughts, belief systems, moral codes, but also demands that we study things that inspire us so we grow and change in these bodies in this lifetime.




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