What it Takes to Fill Your Tank

Greetings Yogis and Yoginis,

This week in class we are considering what it takes to “fill your tank.”

Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of trouble, attempts what is above its strength. . . . It is therefore able to undertake all things, and it completes many things, and warrants them to take effect, where one who does not love would faint and lie down.
-Thomas a Kempis

Without a tank full of gas, no car can drive very far. The mind, too, needs a full tank of vitality to draw on for patience, resilience, and creativity. Filling that tank every morning is one of the most practical purposes of meditation. The test of your meditation is: How long can you be patient with those around you? In the beginning, you should aim to make it at least to noon acting like the proverbial angel.

Most of us, however, even if we start with a full tank, have little control over the thousand and one little pinpricks that drain vitality as we go along: worry, vacillation, irritation, daydreaming. By lunchtime the indicator may be hovering around empty.

Then it is that you have to be acutely vigilant. The tank is nearly empty, but by sheer effort and deft defensive driving, and using the mantram, you manage to coast through to the end of the day without any serious accidents.

The more effort you make, the more endurance you gain. The next day you may find the tank itself a little larger; you start the next day with a greater capacity for love and patience than before.

Words to Live By: Inspiration for Every Day – Eknath Easwaran

Note: A mantram is a powerful spiritual formula which, when repeated silently in the mind, has the capacity to transform consciousness. Learn more at http://www.easwaran.org/.

The homework is to learn what it takes “fill your tank.” Work to notice when your “tank” is becoming low and recognize when it is time to nurture yourself. When you find yourself loosing your patience do whatever works for you to find patience, love and compassion.

Blessings,

paul cheek
Rushing Water Yoga
The BKS Iyengar Yoga School of Southwest Washington
417 NE Birch St., Camas, WA 98607
360.834.5994

www.rushingwateryoga.com
info@rushingwateryoga.com

Serving Yoga to Camas, Washougal, and Vancouver Washington since 2003