Nature taking it back.

Ciudad vieja, en Panama

Misty Morning Raven

An old raven speaking the wisdom in the guttural way that they do. Location: Berkeley Hills

Hindi and the Harmonium

La Hoja de Palma

Strelitzia reginae

                  

Will work for the elation of others...

YOGA PRIVATES

Do you feel like your practice has plateaued, and are you looking to advance? Are you lost in your yoga classes and looking for clarity? Do you have nagging aches and pains from your practice that you just can't move on from? Do you want to know how to develop a sustainable home practice and have the support to make it happen?

Are you seeking a mentor to support you in your journey towards manifesting your teaching capabilities?

I am now available for for both periodic and ongoing private yoga instruction and yogic mentoring. Let's take it higher together!

Location: SF Bay Club or your personal practice space.
Length: 1 or 1.5 hours.
To reserve a session call 415-612-0190, or email matthew.champoux@gmail.com

~Headstand~

Radiant Morning

Flowers, Water, Tree.

Home Tree

-BE THE TREE-

The Architecture of the Universe and Avatar

The Heart is considered to be the architecture of the universe; the great weaving that binds all of creation (and anything seemingly empty of the qualities associated with creation) together. The Heart is furthermore, and rather obviously, found at the core of all beings, and at this Great Center(according to the tenets of Advaita Vedanta) we find the seat of the Atman, or our true self--it is a commonality that binds us to each other. This is the principle highlighted in the brilliant film, Avatar, which I hope that everybody sees at least once. This film crystallizes very brilliantly the true nature (and value) of the world that we live in with its emphases on the Great Goddess Eywa and the intimacy of connection felt by the Na'vi to their home, to each other, and nature. Through realization of the True Self we pierce the knot of ignorance that keeps us from the heart splitting the reality and beauty of the universe. We realize that we are Brahman , or the totality of the universe. Our ignorance, avidya or lack of knowledge, is due to the fact that our conditioned mind extrapolates ourselves to be essentially separate from things and things from us). Through awaking to the nature of Atman we liberate the subtle energy of the body which flows naturally, like water down a deep and rocky gorge, into the honeyed center of all things and through diving into the great ocean of the Heart with a one-pointed focus, the apparent "thingness" that we ascribe to the processes of continuum around us (and which are us!) breaks down to reveal the dependent arising of all phenomenon. Through the disintegration of the rigidity that binds our mind to subjects as if they were perminant and essential we come to view the vastness of creation like a beautiful weaving, a tantra, of gossamer brilliance that is empty, luminous, dreamlike, and the very fabric to enlightenment. We are connected and always participating in this flow that binds. Every moment we are connected the heartbeats of all beings; even to the hummingbird sipping nectar from a shimmering red flower that rejoices as it spills its heart out into the world high above the buzzing, heavy aliveness of the rainforest. We are One. This is the lesson of the great wisdom traditions of the world and what will give the film Avatar its lasting value.

Currents of Awareness

Deep inside all of us is a place where we naturally become aware of our being, of the life force coursing through our veins. By simply allowing the presence to bubble up, much in the same way that lava churns its way progressively upwards from the depths (from the heart of the earth to eventually erupt), we find a vast well of comfort--a comfort that one might find swimming during a warm summer's night in a dark lake with the heavens illuminated by the radiance of the Milky Way. There are creation myths among certain indigenous amazonian peoples related to the Milky Way but they call it the River of Milk; it was from this River of Milk that people came from the creator riding upon the back of a great and powerful serpent. In Sanskrit, the Milky Way is known as the Akasha Ganga, or the great sacred river of space (the macrocosmic continuum of the holy Ganges River on Earth). Space, in addition to being an outer state is felt when we release through the soft palate.



Milk, of course, is deeply symbolic and has meanings ranging from our connection to the Mother Goddess, to our human mothers, nourishment, safety, abundance, and even to gratitude and jouissance. So in many respects, our practice of yoga is about finding a way back to a primordial, mythical state by observing the breath, conducting ourselves with dignity and respect for all sentient beings, and practicing alignment with wisdom and faith. This practice is about finding ourselves at home once again as a part of the expansive cosmos and free from the fear that is born from disconnection.



Through a continuous layering of the alignment principles associated with yogasana, seated or standing postures, we grow naturally more aware of how the energy of universe flows through our system in the form of gravity, fluidity, earth, air, fire, water, space, and light. This is not something that we are making up, rather these are the felt qualities linked to the process and unfolding of wisdom and freedom in the mind and body; of liberating the dormant serpent energy at the base of the spine. We are developing layered patterns of experience that wake up the body and unblock the rivers of energy in our system, and as these rivers become unblocked a great and natural joy begins to fill the networks of interrelationships that form the body-mind consciousness. As these currents of energy begin to open we then begin our journey back down the River of Milk; riding upon the great serpent energy that constitutes the substratum of the universe. In the words of Mason Jennings, "how deep is that river?" Join me and we will find out together.

Compassion for All

May the capacity of our hearts to support and nurture each other, and every other life form on this planet, continue to grow.

Be Like a Mountain

In the Dzogchen teachings it is said that your View and your posture should be like a mountain.

Your View is the summation of your whole understanding and insight into the nature of mind, which you bring to your meditation. So your View translates into and inspires your posture, expressing the core of your being in the way you sit.

Sit, then, as if you were a mountain, with all its unshakable, steadfast majesty. A mountain is completely relaxed and at ease with itself, however strong the winds that batter it, however thick the dark clouds that swirl around its peak.

Sitting like a mountain, let your mind rise and fly and soar.

The posture we take when we meditate signifies that we are linking absolute and relative, sky and ground, heaven and earth, like two wings of a bird, integrating the skylike deathless nature of mind and the ground of our transient, mortal nature.

-SOGYAL RINPOCHE



-photo taken by Herbert Wong

The Vehicle of Air

When you bother a leaf katydid (seen below)!

This is an example of both extreme crypsis and batesian mimicry.

After being disturbed, the katydid presents its back and under-wings that have clearly evolved a pattern to represent a great and glaring set of colorful eyes, which, it has been theorized, evolved as a means to frighten off color sensitive predatory birds (Batesian Mimicry). I am truly awestruck contemplating the dynamic processes that joined together to result in this refined and elegant being, which, lest we forget, is still under the influences of its environment and still a dynamic droplet in the river of evolution. This is a brilliant example of the innate intelligence present within the substratum of the energy of life.

Some Amazon Pics

Breath, Desire, and How To Open The Heart

As we breathe is it possible for us to die with every breath? Can we allow there to be a release that cascades throughout our physiological system that ensues with the termination of each breath? Can we breath in such a way that our eyes become like a crystalline still pools of water? Can we, even as we are stuck in traffic, waiting in line, or when our kids are screaming their heads off continue to breathe in this way?

Strangely, by watching the unfolding currents of the breath and the continuous flowering of sensations that accompany each cycle we are slowly able to disentangle the fixity of our labels for things and the things as they are themselves--the fixity of our labels of how things are or we think they ought to be slowly dissolves. As thought structures begin to dissolve we can, if we are attentive with soft eyes, open ears and a vacuous palate, develop a relationship with the oceanic force that connects all things and is the energy of desire that drives and directs our lives.

This force, says Lama Yeshe, is the wellspring of energy that we must draw upon and direct towards awakening, or enlightenment. Otherwise, this energy will inevitably orient itself towards the unquenchable desires the are limited to the world of NAMA and RUPA, or NAME and FORM. Yoga of course is that ultimately satiating experience that comes from embracing the totality of our world in all of its forms, names, their interconnections, and the sparkling hollowness that lies at their core. Yoga is not limited to the shells of things and the names that we give them. From brushing our teeth, to surfing The Web, to calling our friends, to driving to work and sharing moments with loved ones, this energy of desire is pulling us ever forward like a great and surging tidal wave. In fact, it is this perpetuity of desire that enables us to become fountainheads of positive change in the world around us and to become beacons to light for those who have lost their way in the dark. And through the cultivation this energy and working tirelessly for the sake of others, we find what is means to live with a truly open heart.

Ornate Hawk-Eagle

The Shape of the Universe

One physicists idea of the great meta-structure of the universe, and perhaps also the structure our our energetic hearts.

A reminder for all who dwell in the urban jungle

(courtesy National Geographic)

Serpent Power-Shakti

Unknown species of asian pit-viper (perhaps a Wragler's Pit-Viper)
(courtesy of National Geographic)

May the People of Tibet once again live free.

A Prayer Composed by
His Holines Tenzin Gyatso The Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet

Honoring and Invoking the Great Compassion
of the Three Jewels; the Buddha, the Teachings,
and the Spiritual Community

O Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and disciples
of the past, present, and future:
Having remarkable qualities
Immeasurably vast as the ocean,
Who regard all helpless sentient beings
as your only child;
Please consider the truth of my anguished pleas.

Buddha's full teachings dispel the pain of worldly
existence and self-oriented peace;
May they flourish, spreading prosperity and happiness through-
out this spacious world.
O holders of the Dharma: scholars
and realized practitioners;
May your ten fold virtuous practice prevail.

Humble sentient beings, tormented
by sufferings without cease,
Completely suppressed by seemingly endless
and terribly intense, negative deeds,
May all their fears from unbearable war, famine,
and disease be pacified,

To freely breathe an ocean of happiness and well-being.
And particularly the pious people
of the Land of Snows who, through various means,
Are mercilessly destroyed by barbaric hordes
on the side of darkness,
Kindly let the power of your compassion arise,
To quickly stem the flow of blood and tears.

Those unrelentingly cruel ones, objects of compassion,
Maddened by delusion's evils,
wantonly destroy themselves and others;
May they achieve the eye of wisdom,
knowing what must be done and undone,
And abide in the glory of friendship and love.

May this heartfelt wish of total freedom for all Tibet,
Which has been awaited for a long time,
be spontaneously fulfilled;
Please grant soon the good fortune to enjoy
The happy celebration of spiritual with temporal rule.

O protector Chenrezig, compassionately care for
Those who have undergone myriad hardships,
Completely sacrificing their most cherished lives,
bodies, and wealth,
For the sake of the teachings, practitioners,
people, and nation.

Thus, the protector Chenrezig made vast prayers
Before the Buddhas and Bodhisativas
To fully embrace the Land of Snows;
May the good results of these prayers now quickly appear.
By the profound interdependence of emptiness
and relative forms,

Together with the force of great compassion
in the Three Jewels and their Words of Truth,
And through the power
of the infallible law of actions and their fruits,
May this truthful prayer be unhindered
and quickly fulfilled.
-----------------------
This prayer, Words of Truth, was composed by His Holiness Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet, on 29 September 1960 at his temporary headquarters in the Swarg Ashram at Dharamsala, Kangra District, Himachal State, India. This prayer for restoring peace, the Buddhist teachings, and the culture and self-determina-tion of the Tibetan people in their homeland was written after repeated requests by Tibetan government officials along with the unanimous consensus of the monastic and lay communities.

Full Moon sychronicity

My dear friends, I would like to share with you a bit of synchronous joy that I encountered the other evening just preceding the full moon. Rather spontaneously, I developed one of those bed-time hankerings for Rumi. I think that sometimes reading a few poems can be as riveting and satiating as reading an entire book. The first poem that I opened up to was titled

"Quietness"

Inside this new love, die.
Your way begins on the other side.
Become the sky.
Take an axe to the prison wall.
Escape.
Walk out like someone suddenly born into color.
Do it now.
You are covered with thick cloud.
Slide out the side. Die, and be quiet.
Quietness is the surest sign
that you have died.

Your old life was frantic running
from silence.

The speechless full moon
comes out now.

-(translated by Coleman Barks).

The surest sign to me that the yoga is working is when that moon can be felt illuminating the sparkling inner walls of an opened, released, and soft-palated cranium hovering there in the spacious inner sanctum of "akash" or the "space that dwells" in the pallet during khechari mudra. It is as if the moon were a dangling droplet of nectar that condensed there as a result of pure, beautiful release. Finding this poem just reminded me of the odd, joyous brilliance that makes up the binding weave of our existence. Full moon inside and out.

New Class Time!

I am thrilled to announce that I am teaching a new alignment-based vinyasa class at the Bay Club every Sunday at 9am.

Consider the value of ecosystem patterns of thought and awareness

Forthcoming...

All endings are really just beginnings.

New Classes

I am continuously astounded by the variability of each yoga class that I teach in terms of the energy that it contains. Each class begins with a negotiation process between the teacher and the student, a negotiation of our egos and space. Are the students listening? Are they listening and not paying attention? Are they listening and paying attention, but my instructions are not making sense?! What are the areas of the poses that need more articulation and highlighting, or what are the general physiological trends of the student body? And of course, am I talking too much? Whatever the answers to these questions, I find that the most valuable seeds of the practice that can be transmitted in a class are those that emphasize the feeling-tone of a process within which we involve our imaginations to create a feeling-image within the pose that recalibrates our sense of ordinary reality. In his book entitled, The Heart of the World: a Journey to Tibet's Lost Paradise, Ian Baker describes the value of imagination from the Tibetan Buddhist perspective: "...imagination does not so much transform as reveal what is already present, the mind's inherent creativity realizing it's essential unity with all phenomena and events." So, in the context of our yoga poses, there are infinite forms of feeling that can be imagined and meditated upon that range from lotus,' swords of light, serpent hoods, tidal waves--mostly nature oriented images, since a study of our body's form cannot be extract from our evolutionary and environmental past--to mythical and transcendental visualization that bring us to the brink of the quantum field and the realms of the gods. Interestingly, while I find myself negotiating the waters of teaching a yoga class with a properly tuned level that will be valuable for the students, or focusing on the pragmatics, I enjoy it most (and think that the students are equally) when we can dissolve/relax our existences (or roles) as subjects and objects, our roles as students and a teacher, and simply relish in the soup of the present experience, that is the effulgent, radiantly unfolding lotus of the present moment that binds all of us inexorably upon a single golden thread.

Why Yoga and the Value of Transcending Opposites

Through the practices of yoga we are cultivating a synergism of process in directional movement. When dialectically opposed patterns are joined together, they merge to create a more potent, higher state of being that has within it higher levels of potential energy, light, freedom, and grace. If the patterns were left to their own divisive tendencies, we encounter less of the just mentioned qualities and miss the opportunities of a dynamic equilibrium. Also, in the dissolution of opposites we find a heightened source of power, joy, vitality, through which the ecosystemic processes of the breath-mind-body system can be fully tapped and enlivened. In yoga we are planting seeds, the bijam, of the various yoga postures in the the soil of our lives, into the fecund ground of the mindful heart, where their encapsulating psycho-physiological effects take root, accumulate, and join together as a radiant, towering forest. As the postures age and begin to accumulate, all you have to do is let go of your efforts and allow the exfoliation, the flowering of the process, to unfold within the present moment. The general tendency to this experience equates to the process underlying the word "bliss."

For example, by spreading the roots of the feet in Head Balance, through expressive and articulate legs, our intention echoes the feeling-tone, the bhavana, of a lotus blossoming and unfolding its heart towards the heavens, with roots that draw their energy from deep within our hearts. The applications of this process, of course, extends well beyond our personal lives.

Arachnid Physicists

Long before Einstein was theorizing about the time-space continuum, a spider in the Amazon was weaving it!



She dwells within a little leaf tent, which dangles innocently from the bottom of her web, as if it had fallen there by chance, carried by a moist breeze.