Yoga’s Probiotic for Mental/Emotional Indigestion

Lately, I have been having digestion problems. My physical digestion is fine. Everything is moving through and leaving my body in proper order, especially with my vegetarian summer diet of our garden lettuce, spinach, peas, beans, kale, zucchini, and beets.

No, that’s not the indigestion that is bothering me. It is my mental and emotional indigestion that is making me feel nauseous, bloated, constipated to the extent that I am feeling useless and not filled with my usual zest. All of the pain in the news today—the pain of the mothers and fathers and children at the U.S. southern border, the pain of workers who will be laid off because of the international trade wars with China, Europe and Canada, the uprooting of all the Syrians making them refugees and our U.S. refusal to help but a few of them, the anxiety of some of my immigrant friends from Central America and Haiti and other countries who used to have protective status in the U.S. after horrible disasters and persecutions in their former countries and are now worried about possible deportation, the pain of some of my yoga students suffering from relationship disruptions or the traumatic mental confusion of some of my other yoga students. All this emotional ingestion without the proper processing makes me suffer from bloated sadness.

I became deeply aware of the constipating effect of all this unprocessed emotion when I golfed yesterday. My golf game deteriorated to losing balls to the water and woods of Whispering Springs Golf Course and to finding the bunkers after beautiful drives and iron shots. I couldn’t handle even this minor frustration and irritation.

I couldn’t take any more emotional disturbance without shutting down. I felt constipated emotionally. I didn’t feel like doing anything more. I just wanted to be depressed. I even fell asleep while watching my nightly PBS News Hour. I just couldn’t take any more input. Even my meditation lacked peacefulness.

Then I remembered that yoga has a solution for this emotional (and physical) indigestion. It is called agni sara, which means “the essence of fire.”

So, this morning I spent more time doing agni sara before I sat in meditation. I stoked the fire of my body and became aware of all the emotional trash in my mind. I burned away for the time being much of the undigested emotional garbage. It worked! I could probably stop listening to the news and stop worrying about my students and the pain of all the refugees and children in the world, but I don’t want to isolate myself from my social reality.

So, I plan to increase my agni sara more and more each day. I plan to activate the fire of my divinity within and stay connected with the light within me. I also want to share this amazing practice with any of you willing to learn it. I have seen that some of you may have emotional indigestion as well.

Just let me know by calling the Center (920-921-9404) so that I can schedule either a private time or a class to help you experience this marvelous process of digesting not only our food, but also our emotions. Just call the Center and let the receptionist know that you are interested in learning this practice in a practical step-by-step way.

Namaste’