Saucha / Cleanliness ~ by Cynthia Land, LMT, RYT

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How many of you are going through your closets deciding what shirts bring you joy?  The Marie Kondo plan of simplifying is not a new one.  The yogic concept of saucha or cleanliness has been around for millennia and feeds into this idea of austerity.  If you understand the 8 limbs of yoga, much of it is about eliminating suffering. Within the first limb of yoga is the concept of saucha.  Here we find removing clutter also helps clear the mind which in turn helps reduce suffering. 

I need only glance at the mess on my desk to know that it brings me anxiety/suffering.  Where to start is always the issue. I’m tempted to throw everything in a burn barrel and start over. No, that’s not the answer but the solution often seems overwhelming. This has happened to many of us. We have become overwhelmed. We’ve accumulated so many things, whether they be papers, books, cars, shoes or problems that we don’t know where to start. Thank goodness for others who have come up with processes that work. 

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If you’ve ever watched any of the cooking shows, you’ll notice that chefs clean as they go, wiping spills and washing knives right after use. Much of life SHOULD go this way and yet the socks somehow can’t quite hit the hamper. Note that putting the socks IN the hamper takes a millisecond and creates a cleaner space in your room. Are you willing to give two shits for some happiness? Translate this into the dining room after a meal when instead of leaving dishes on the table you instantly put them in the dishwasher, or when you come into your home you leave your shoes by the door and put your keys in a pretty dish where you can easily and quickly locate them the next morning.  

Another process I’ve found useful is the 15 minute rule. “I’ll only do this for 15 minutes.” (Pinterest task list) Completely cleaning off my desk or cleaning my house is instantly overwhelming. But if I can tell myself, I'll just clean for 15 minutes then the task seems manageable. I use this method with a lot of things in my life. Even writing. I like it because I can see an endpoint and I don't feel as though it has to be perfect, I just have to get started. Getting started several days in a row, gets things done. Also, I don't limit myself to 15 minutes. If I want to longer, then I give myself permission to do as much as I like.  

One of the other yogic practices related to saucha is kriya or cleansing techniques. There are a litany of these and I won't go into all of them here. You can see and try a few by referring back to my blog from January. Suffice to say the yogis found living in the corporeal world a little trying. They're were constantly finding things about the body to clean. They cleaned their diet by often being vegan or fasting.  They did intense water cleanses of the digestive, respiratory and excretory systems. Some of these were done around the change of the seasons. All of this was done in an effort to remove any impurities that might hamper their ability to reach enlightenment. Today we learn from these techniques but we don't have to adhere to them.  

When it comes to removing clutter, we might also want to turn the spotlight on our relationships.  How are the people in our lives supporting us?  Do they bring us joy or suffering?  If they are bringing suffering, are we willing distance ourselves from them?  Some feel compelled to keep certain people in their lives because they are family or we've known them since childhood.  But if these people are toxic and preventing from us growing and succeeding it might be time to let them go.  I stopped talking with my dad for about a year when his PTSD got to a point where I could barely have a conversation with him without it turning into a full blown argument.  My parent's home was no longer safe for me.  We both went into counseling in separate ways but were eventually able to come back together and are now closer than ever.  

This spring I tell myself I will take everything out of my clothing closet and keep only what brings me joy, 15 minutes at a time. 

A Healthy Approach to Writer's Block by Marj Ivancic

The empty page awaits, a vast and terrifying blank landscape. And the longer it remains without script, the more intimidating it becomes. Sometimes, it’s writer’s block preventing us from tattooing that white wall. Other times, it’s that scene. You know the one. The chapter you’ve been dreading since the moment you realized your beloved story couldn’t live without it. 

Dammed up by apathy, indecision, or revulsion—it doesn’t matter—the words aren’t making an appearance anytime soon.


What to do?
I read a blog post in which the author plucked advice for such a conundrum from fifteen published writers. After getting over my initial dismay that three of them opened their quotes with some variation of the dreaded “try and…” grammatical error, I did glean some valuable guidance: write something else; find where the story drifted off course; get over the fact that the first draft will suck. But I was disappointed that not one of them touched on—dare I say it—exercise.

Wait! Don’t run away yet! Hear me out.

Pick up any health-related magazine or journal—heck, Google it—and you’ll find an article touting how physical activity helps prevent Alzheimer's, manages diabetes, and lowers risk of heart disease. But it’s the benefits to the brain that makes putting the body in motion so important to writers.

We’ve all joked about the grey mush between our ears, but did you know there’s white matter in there too? And it’s responsible for getting information from one grey iceberg floating in the cerebrum to another. According to the PsychologyToday.com article “Why Is Physical Activity So Good for Your Brain?,” physical activity strengthens those communications highways, resulting in faster cognitive processing. Considering language and communication are two of the primary functions managed by the cerebrum, white matter plays a major role in powering a part of the brain writers rely on to get their story from thought to page.

Want a little proof?
The Stanford News website published an article about a 2014 study that showed walking improves both creative thinking and inspiration.   At its core, the experiment compared walking to sitting, but its scope spanned a variety of those states: walking outside, walking on a treadmill, walking on a treadmill facing a blank wall (Ugh!), being pushed in a wheel chair outside, sitting outside, sitting inside, to name a few. 

While in these conditions, the 176 participants completed four creativity tests. One focused on their ability to construct “complex analogies” in response to a simple prompt. The more deeply associated to the root of the prompt the response was, the better. The other three tests centered around the ability to devise creative uses for common objects, also known as “divergent thinking.”  The results of all these tests showed that the walking segment scored highest.

Did you hear that? I’ll say it again—the movers out thought the sitters. 

When you’re standing (or sitting, as it were) in the writer’s block desert, sweating and thirsty, wouldn’t you love to get a little inspiration, to be able to devise a cunning plot twist, or craft a few lines of thought-provoking prose? 

A wee bit of moving around doesn’t sound so bad now, does it?
The benefits of exercise don’t stop there.
Physical activity aids not only our minds but our souls as well. Take a complaint of depression or anxiety to any doctor and one of their first questions will be about your exercise regimen. The chemicals produced by a good sweat are as potent as fairy dust for fending off those I’m-a-terrible-writer blues. 

The Mayo Clinic listed the following benefits of regular exercise: 
• Gain confidence
• Take your mind off worries 
• Get more social interaction
• Cope in a healthy way

I don’t think anyone is saying exercise will turn you into a grinning idiot who never has a bad day. But if you put a little effort into getting out of your chair, you’ll be better equipped to stand up to those whispers of negativity. You may even find yourself able to recognize the toxic in your life, both people and situations, and find the strength to cut free of them.

So, the next time you’re feeling bullied by that empty page, let your body be your muse—and walk away. Literally.
 ________________________

  1. Christopher Bergland, “Why Is Physical Activity So Good for Your Brain?,” The Athlete’s Way.  https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-athletes-way/201409/why-is-physical-activity-so-good-your-brain  

  2. May Wong, “Stanford study finds walking improves creativity,” Stanford News, Stanford University Communications, http://news.stanford.edu/2014/04/24/walking-vs-sitting-042414/ (access 17 August 2016).

  3. Mayo Clinic Staff, “Depression and anxiety: Exercise eases symptoms,” Mayo Clinic, http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/depression/in-depth/depression-and-exercise/art-20046495 (access 17August2016).

Photos courtesy of free downloads at Pexels.com and the MS.org sites.