Creating Community

My neighbor around the corner decorates her front porch for every holiday or happy event in her life. Her eye for color and sense of humor are obvious in this year’s Halloween decoration. It features a couple of smiling straw-filled scarecrows dressed in bright fall hues. With their droopy arms entwined around each other, they are literally joined at the hip and seem to be inviting all who walk by to join in their fun. I was delighted to meet this neighbor about a year ago and find we had a lot in common, including laughing at the same insane things happening in the world. It felt good to connect with someone on a more than casual basis in a city that is changing every day and a neighborhood that keeps relocation companies busy moving them into and out of their homes. Thank goodness for the community we have at Sacred Space Yoga in Frisco! The Sanskrit word for the community experienced by those coming together to practice yoga is “kula.” Yogapedia expands the definition to say this community created in yoga “is considered sacred because it is a group of people who come together freely, with intention and a shared sense of purpose.” In addition, kula can be translated to mean “community of the heart,” implying that our Sacred Space members have shared values and look forward to connecting with each other. The Sanskrit word for yoga is “yuj,” meaning union, connection, and relationship. Yoga is often described as the union of the mind, body, and spirit. The miraculous human body we all inhabit is a perfect example of the community within it; the body’s systems are interdependent; the human body works optimally when all systems are communicating and connecting with one another. However, we are more than our body; we are also mind and spirit, both of which influence the body. It takes mere seconds for a whiff of a hot pizza pie from the oven to stimulate the brain, begin salivation in the mouth, and alert the stomach of good things to come. The same is true of a touching event such as hearing a young grandchild sing “Happy Birthday” to a grandmother - the heart is warmed and tears flow even as a smile lights up the grandmother’s face. We all have so much in common with each other. The Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky said “We sometimes encounter people, even perfect strangers, who begin to interest us at first sight, somehow suddenly, all at once, before a word has been spoken.” Let’s continue to reach out to others in our yoga community, our neighborhoods, our city, our nation. Every new person who walks into the shala (place of yoga) at Sacred Space Yoga in Frisco gives us all the opportunity to welcome them to the family and be blessed by their presence.

*We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among these fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects. ~ Herman Melville