Yoga and the Art of Working with the Unknown, part 2

The sky above may be cloudy and grey, but spring keeps springing as leaves are awakening into an unknown future.

Here it is, April 30th and most of us are becoming loopy by being in lockdown. I read a quote from the Chopra Center, which said: Instead of rigidly clinging to the familiar, embrace the unknown.  This will spark your creativity. In a way, we’ve all been forced to work with the unknown by not clinging to the familiar and by embracing not knowing. And for sure, it has sparked a lot of creativity in all of us. 

For me, it’s shown up in being creative in things like cutting my own hair! Fortunately, I have 2 mirrors which I can place in front and in back of me – who knew one could do a relatively decent job of cutting one’s own hair!

It’s also been a time for me to re-up my cooking skills and make use of things that had been in my cupboards too long. I used some old almond butter to substitute for peanut butter in my Thai Massaman Curry dish, which turned out great!

Working with the unknown has also meant letting go of trying to get things right but rather just doing what we have to do, daily. The Hindu Teacher Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj said:

“You just do what needs to be done, leaving success and failure to the unknown. For everything is caused by innumerable factors, of which your personal endeavour is but one. Yet such is the magic of man's mind and heart that the most improbable happens when human will and love pull together.”

For sure, this whole pandemic situation will result in a lot of suffering. But also, for sure, it will also bring out qualities of faith, resilience, and action in the face of not knowing. And in a way – especially as yoga practitioners – we are called upon to act, doing what needs to be done, even if we don’t know what will result from our actions. 

Nisargadatta Maharaj’s statement also reminds us that we are all interconnected, which is what yoga teaches us. And somehow through each of our individual acts of kindness, generosity, and ingenuity at this time, we will somehow build upon each other’s actions and create in some ways a better future world. Will we learn that we need far less than we thought we did? For the sake of the planet, I do think and hope so.

In considering how to work with the unknown, we have the examples of numerous artists all around us. The prominent 20th Century choreographer, Agnes de Mille, said:

"Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what's next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little. The artist never entirely knows. We guess.
We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark.”

During this pandemic, the arts community has been one of the most greatly affected. With theaters and movie studios shuttered, jobs have been lost or put on hold. Yet artists constantly live and work with the unknown, and are constantly taking leaps into the dark. Artists tend to be very resilient types be as they’re used to be being battered around and still in the end finding a way through the challenges. But there is some comfort in knowing that it’s OK to guess at life, and maybe even that it’s OK to not know how. The human experience, I think, is best and most exhilaratingly lived when we step away from our controlling mind and step into the flow of life, allowing the path to reveal itself one step at a time. In this way, working with the unknown is not something to be feared, but rather to be welcomed. If this approach worked well for such a creative genius as Agnes de Mille, and resulted in amazing works of movement arts, the it’s good enough and welcome for me!

As the Japanese Zen Priest, Kosho Uchiyama, said: “When we let go of all our notions about things, everything becomes really true.” For sure, during this time of immense unknown we’ve been forced to let go of a lot of our notions about things. But hopefully, if there is any silver lining to all of this, it’s that we can see life in its rawest truth more clearly. 

May you do what needs to be done, …
May you leave your successes and failures to the unknown, …
May the improbable happen, …
May you let go of your notions about things, … 
May you take an artistic leap into the darkness, … 
For the benefit of all beings everywhere.

Aloha with Metta,
Paui Keoni Chun