In September of 2014 I spent a very enjoyable week in the Oxfordshire countryside at Charney Manor, a 13th-century manor house situated in the picturesque village of Charney Bassett. The Manor is a very peaceful and tranquil place with beautiful landscaped gardens. People often come from across the country to stay at the manor for reflection and relaxation. The reason for my visit was to attend a week-long Yoga Nidra training course with James Reeves and the iRest community who have been inspired by the work and teachings of Richard Miller, an American yoga teacher and Clinical Psychologist. Yoga Nidra (an ancient meditative practice dating back to 2500 B.C.E.) renamed ‘Integrative Restoration’ or ‘iRest’ for short, has been a particularly effective healing practice for military veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan suffering with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Since returning from my time at Charney Manor I have spent the last few years exploring Yoga Nidra in more depth in my own practice, with students on retreat, in workshops, and on a one to one basis. I have often been struck by the simple, yet profound effect the practice can have on people. One of the aspects of the practice which has inspired me the most is that it is not seen as a self-improvement plan. Often, with practices such as yoga or meditation we can take them up with an agenda to improve ourselves in some way, which although at times helpful, can also reinforce a deeply held view of an inherent lack of essential goodness.
In the practice of Yoga Nidra we are invited to explore directly through our senses the six koshas (a Sanskrit term meaning sheaths or bodies). In the vijnanamaya kosha we are invited to explore opposite beliefs. For instance, I may believe that if I do or attain something, then I will be better than who I was. The practice invites us to explore the opposite, which would be ‘I’m perfect as I am, and there is nothing I need to do or attain that will make me any better than I am’.
In the Buddhist Dzogchen teachings we are offered a view that we all have Buddha Nature or essential goodness, a potentiality that lives within us all but is often hidden to us by ignorance and confusion. We live in a culture of validation through performance and achievement. The dominant view in our culture is to work hard, transcend yourself, develop yourself and get the most out of life.
On a relative level it can be helpful to develop skills to be in the world, but how often do we get validation of ourselves, just for being us? The Buddhist teacher James Low says “Everything you do is icing on the cake, but the cake without icing is fine, the cake is good”. Any skills we have are useful but they are conditional, transient and should be held very lightly. This may be a challenging idea to hear, but something I feel every one of us really needs to hear. Maybe as we make our way through the world we could just allow ourselves to accept our essential goodness and trust that we are okay and fine, just as we are.
“You don’t have to justify your existence by being useful. You yourself are the justification for your existence. You haven’t come into existence after all these millions of years of evolution just to sit down in front of a typewriter, or to keep accounts. You are the justification of that whole process. You are an end in yourself. All that you can really be said to be here for is to develop into some higher form of human life…So don’t be ashamed of sitting around and doing nothing. Glory in it. Do things spontaneously, out of a state of inner satisfaction and achievement. It is a virtue to be ornamental as well as useful”.
From ‘Wisdom Beyond Words’ by Sangharakshita, Buddhist teacher.
Image Kristiana Pinne