Automated breakfast making scenes are amongst my favorites in movies. There’s a great one in Pee Wee’s Big Adventure where he lights a candle, it burns through a piece of string to drop an anvil, which cracks an egg. I love the little details, like his bunny slippers sniffing out a carrot, and how he jumps onto a fireman’s pole in his pajamas. By the time he hits the ground on the floor below, he’s wearing his daytime clothes. He’s so joyful to just wake up and start the day!
Click here to take my free yoga class on this subject.
The vinyasa flow style of yoga is all about getting into that state of unconscious flow where everything just moves, and you detach slightly from your mind, to find a state of meditative bliss and connection, hopefully, with a bigger reality. I think of the Beatles song, that life goes on within you and without you. Or of Pee-Wee Herman. Or that French guy walking the tightrope between the towers of the World Trade Center.
Our hand shape, or mudra, this week, is “abhaya mudra”, which, ironically, is as simple as an open palm, held up to the right of one’s shoulder. You imagine the things that scare you, looking straight into the center of your open palm, and it turns your fears into flow.
Simple courage is anything but simple.
I’ll see you on the mat.
Love from,
Matt
P.S. Here’s that scene from Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. Family Guy spoofed the same breakfast machine, ending, somewhat hilariously, with Peter getting shot and wailing, “what is the point of these machines if they just shoot you?” Not very yoga-ish, I know. But also, quite funny. So, perhaps it’s yoga-ish after all?
P.P.S. It’s This Week’s Vegetarian Recipe!
Yoga is based on nonviolence, or “ahimsa”, in Sanskrit, which means no killing animals. So. Fava beans (we call them “broad beans” in England) are in season, and I’m always amazed by how strong a flavor they pack for such a modest little package. Nigel Slater’s Kitchen Diaries has a super recipe for pasta with ricotta, fava beans, and mint, which the Guardian reproduced for your benefit. Marcella Hazan’s Classics of Italian Cooking also has a lovely recipe for spinach soup with risotto rice which you can check out at Google Books.
