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All Good Medicine Is Bitter

Thursday, November 19, 2020 (Part I), 
The above title is a line from an excellent film called, "The Curse of The Golden Flower".  The analogy made to a yoga practice is that the time spent on your mat, can balance and re-adjust your perspective on yourself, and the value/non-value you bring to the world.  Facing your own insignificance, and non-value, is a bitter and humbling medicine at times. 

Humility is a gift that can come from your practice, and your mat.  Humility, is a clarifying value, and clarifying mindset, to maintain.  If what many of us believe is true, and the planet, solar system, galaxy, interstellar cluster, quadrant, and known universe were created by a conscience, omnipotent, being,....what do my actions, that occur on my little planet, in my little solar system, in my little galaxy, in my little cluster and quadrant, mean to that being?  They mean nothing.  This goes double if there isn't a conscience, omnipotent being; then one is really insignificant and unimportant.

"Am I not grand?......the things I do....so grand and profound.....I am a gift" 

It's natural to feel some variation of the above.  If not grand and profound, then at least above-it-all and superior.  One is not superior, however.  The medicine that comes from the mat, keeps one remembering:

"I'm insignificant.....any good I do is meaningless....I'm a toad swimming in a mud pit (with other toads swimming in the mud pit), arguing about who's going to be King of this mud pit.......the Sun will expand into a Red Giant and consume the Earth in 2.5 Billion years....."

Once read, the above notions on humility, and insignificance can seem depressing.  However, rather than feel depressed at your insignificance, it's better to stay connected to it, and bring yourself back to the ground with it to, bowing to everyone, and keeping yourself small.

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