05 Dec Yin and Yang Balance
Drawing from philosopher Ken Wilber’s concepts about the contrasting importance of both mother love & father love, I see the Yin (chandra-based) practices as developing our inner mother love & the Yang (surya-based) practices as fostering healthy father love.
Mother love is connected with beingness; father love is aligned with evolution. Mother love lets us value ourselves & others just as we are whereas father love knows there’s always more to learn & room for change. Mother love promotes willing acceptance while father love develops inspiration toward improvement.
A skillfull yoga practice allows both sides of our nature to be inhabited: the receptive, allowing side (yin) & the dynamic, engaging qualities (yang).
Ultimately we need both in healthy doses to grow into sane & functional adults who are able to experience authentic intimacy w/ ourselves & others. When we have divorced these essential attributes, it’s like hopping around on 1 foot-we are easily thrown off balance by the slightest challenge.
The shadow side of imbalanced mother love or yin excess expresses itself in behavior as a collapse of motivation, chronic complacency, feelings of victimization or apathetic disconnect. On the other hand, an overabundance of father love encourages restless dissatisfaction & judgmental perfectionism which pave the road toward intolerant fanaticism.
Wherever there’s an absence of the feminine yin principle, we see the body-& by extension, the earth-treated as an object, tender emotions denied & all fragile & vulnerable sides of life aggressively undermined. Yin w/o yang causes ineptitude, whereas yang w/o yin can range from cold insensitivity to outright abuse.
Since many of our daily activities are improvement based & yang oriented, our yoga & meditation practices in Aquanimous Yoga have a strong yin element for us to heal this culturally ingrained imbalance.
Our Yin Restore classes are held every Wednesday 7pm, Saturday 10am & Sunday 12nn at the Makati Shangri-La, Manila.
Kindly book a class a day ahead to join class. Please take note of our 24-hr booking/cancellation etiquette & 5-min grace period.
See you on the mat ?
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