Setting an intention, creating space

Setting an intention, creating space

It is Tuesday, so we had our weekly meeting at 6:30 am.
It was pretty cold this morning like I always do.
I was actually thinking to bike down here, but boyfriend insisted that he want to give me a ride.
It was nice of him, and I appreciated the intention.

Then, I realized my body is not as ready as usual because I skipped the cardio moment that I usually do.
My body was not as warn and my muscles were still sleeping.

In Atlas Studio, it is very important to set an intention before we start.
My general intention is “appreciating what I have” which include my life, my body, my disposition, my family, my boyfriend, my teacher, my classmates, and the most importantly my deceased husband.

Then, I set some specific intention for improvements in my yoga performance.
I have tender quad (front thigh) and weak shoulders.

I also prescribe my clients some intention.
If my client have low back issue due to sitting their chair for too much, I will ask them to have specific intention to decompress their low back when they stretch. If a client has uneven muscle development due to work or sport, I will ask them to have special intention to the other side of the body to develop to match with the dominant side when they work out.

I believe the result follow your intention.

Intention is extremely important in Buddhism as well.
I learn Classical Chinese with Confucius theories from my Taiqi teacher.
When no-righteous thoughts appear in your mind, and if you did not notice that it was not righteous thought, it will become intention. The intention will eventually become manifested in to motivation.

If the intention is wrong, even though appear-to-be right thing to do can cause an unexpected result.
For example, I witnessed someone did something that she should not have done. I thought I should report that to my manager. The right intention could be making the work environment right and fair for everyone. However. My intention, even the slight of intention I had was that manager would think “huh, the girl is not the first I thought she was when we hired her. Yuumi seems like to be kick ass on whatever she does. I may give her more credit on her achievement.” The result was horrible. And I actually did not realize my true intention which was masked by thin superficial justice that I thought I had till I hurt someone’s feeling. The lesson was that intention does count.

How to face your inner intention?

One way is creating the space and silence so your little inner voice will reach your mind.

The significance of silence for music, poetry, and other art forms is evident.

”Poetry comes out of silence and yearns for silence”, Picard writes, or as Rainer Maria Rilke states, ”Works of art are of an infinite solitude”. Great paintings and works of architecture also arise from and create silence. A powerful architectural experience eliminates noise and turns our consciousness to ourselves, into our existential experience and sense of being. The church interiors of Alvar Aalto and Juha Leiviskä, for instance, are cast in a benevolent silence. The innate silence of an experience of profound architecture arises from the manner in which it focuses our attention on our own existential experience–I am listening to my own existence.

The language of architecture is the drama of tranquility. Great buildings are silence turned into matter. They are petrified silence, and every building has its characteristic silence, and great buildings are museums of silence. Perhaps the idea of turning life back to the unpretentious appropriateness and silent prestige that we admire in the peasant’s sphere of life, or in the most refined creations of Modernity, proves to be mere nostalgia, but man has never mourned for a homecoming more than today. And man has never yearned for silence as the focus of one’s very being more than we do in our era of surreal and hysterical consumption and noise.

By Juhani Pallasmaa, who is Professor of Architecture at the Helsinki University of Technology and is William A. Bernoudy Architect in Residence at the American Academy in Rome.

Well, my house is nothing special, no profound architecture per se. However, what I can do to creat silence at home is not too complicated. I just need to turn off the damn TV, and start picking after my stuff. Huh. My mother will be proud of me of she witness that. However, creating space is equally powerful as creating silent moment on yoga mat.

Today, I will clean my bed room.

Oh, I am so booked today.

May be tomorrow.

Oh, I have six appointments tomorrow. I will be tired.

May be in the weekend.

Oh, I have yoga teacher Training.

Hmmmmmmm………
Actually creating space is harder than I thought. ……….

南無阿弥陀仏