Time: The Sequel

There's a lot of directions to pull yesterday's post.  One point I'd like to clarify is this idea that time could be, perhaps should be, a right.  I mentioned that Eva provoked this contemplation of time & the amount we, historically & culturally, devote to work.  I linked to Take Back Your Time, an organization devoted to Labor Struggles prioritizing issues around over-time, full-time work, & benefits.

Given that I practice a ton of yoga & teach, I often consider these issues "yogic-ally."  I'm not entirely sure what that is.  Here's some broad brush strokes: larger theories governing yoga invite the practitioner to liberate themselves first.  There's attention to your own health & well-being & cultivating it as a spiritual act.  Ultimately, I think true practitioners are urged towards addressing the same needs in the larger world.  However, it's pretty easy to stay in a stage of self-care.

My prior orientation was activist struggle, of which I'm still involved.  As an activist, we usually take a larger glance at collective challenge & solution.  This issue of time is a labor issue, but it also impacts each of us on individual, & perhaps spiritual levels.  I try to stay rooted in both approaches.  For one, taking individual agency over some of these issues can provide inspiration to others.  It is also a way to potentially live our larger political goals.  However, the activist orientation continually reasserts that we don't all have the same access nor choice, which is why larger campaigns challenging labor laws can often be crucial.  If we can individually disengage from the rat race, fantastic.  Knowing many of us can't, we collectively move towards removing those institutional impediments.

I brought up these two vantage points in conversation with a dear friend.  We were swapping stories about activist campaigns that are important to both of us, as well as some activism we see within the yoga community.  She said, "I think it's a matter of intention.  You can be opposed to Fracking because it lowers the value of your home or you can oppose it out of principle."  As the conversation unfolded, we both began to consider how the latter approach usually wound these beliefs deeply within the individual & compelled them to take this cause into the larger world.

The issue of time-- how we value it, create it, cede it-- is the same.  It's entirely possible to make this an individual quest or it's possible to consider how the more deeply seeded intentions of yoga ask each practitioner to include the well-being of all others in their own practice.  One of my favorite yoga mantras is "Lokah Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu"-- "May all beings be happy & free.  May my thoughts, words, & actions contribute to the happiness of all."

This is my political premise.  This is my yoga.