The Seeker: A Journey Toward Wholeness
By Colette Crawford

Y oga has been a part of my life for over 30 years. I remember watching my mother sitting on the living room floor folding her torso over her outstretched legs to rest her head on her knees. She looked like she was sleeping. When I attempted this forward bend in the first class my mother took me to, I struggled to reach my toes and yelped at the burning pain in my hamstrings. How did she do it so effortlessly? The yoga teacher seemed to hear my thoughts. "Look at your mother," she bellowed in a thick eastern European accent. "She can touch her toes much better than you, and you are so young!" I was 17 but that didn't seem to help me. With a fierce determination, I pushed harder to reach my toes only to be overpowered again by my tight hamstrings. Eventually my teenage defiance toward the teacher's mockery won me over and I stopped going to class. But this didn't stop my inquiry into yoga, meditation and spirituality. I continued to seek.

Years have passed since this time. My hamstrings have changed. They are more flexible. The hatha yoga postures have helped my body stay healthy and especially to heal from a severe back injury.

Yet, the practice of this physical yoga took me only so far. After seven years of marriage I was divorced with two small children. Eight years later I married again. In hindsight I saw that the same issues I struggled with before resurfaced in my second marriage. What I thought was different was really the same. I didn't know how to have a relationship.

I am not alone. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, 50 percent of American marriages end in divorce and remarriages come in higher at 60 percent. Years of traditional psychotherapy didn't help me save my first or second marriage. I was almost a statistic of the latter until the day I met the teacher who would show me the inner mapping of my mind. Little did my husband and I know to what depths we would dive to dismantle our egos as we sat on the couch together looking at Dr. Gary Sall.

A doctor of clinical psychology and a meditator for over 35 years, Gary was perched barefoot on a stool peering at us like a pelican searching for food deep under the ocean's cap. Nothing passed his keen eye. Regardless of the case we tried to build against each other, after 45 minutes Gary skillfully told us that we knew nothing about love. We wanted only to be loved and get our needs met. This felt like a slap in the face, but the seeker within each of us was hooked. What does it mean to truly love? And so began our journey of self-scrutiny, requiring incredible courage and commitment.

It has been seven years since that day. During this time I have learned more yoga from Gary than in the 30 years I have been practicing asana (postures) and he never left his stool!

How was this possible?

In that first meeting I was met in my wholeness. Gary saw me! He was like a mirror reflecting what was in front of it. From this place I could see the fragmentation of my spirit. The only way I could hold this vision was to continually examine myself in my most significant relationship-with my husband. Our practice was to put every moment under the microscope-each word, action and thought.

If he wanted to go wrestle with the guys and I wanted him to stay home with the kids, we explored our motives. Was I being clingy and controlling? Was he being childish and irresponsible? It was grueling to look at ourselves so meticulously and not always pretty. Many times in the beginning we would explode and slip into old patterns, but usually one of us at a time. The one who saw clearly would hold his ground while the other was being irrational. I remember Gary saying, "Why bother with regression therapy? In an irrational state we are already regressed." The clarity of one partner was like the beacon of light in the fog. Over time we let our guard down, becoming more vulnerable with each other.

Through our self-study we became conscious of how our thought processes from early conditioning imprisoned us. When we are caught in our pain from the past, we can't really see each other. Most of the time we don't even feel that pain. Defense is the reaction. Old hurts and anger fuel the fire that conceals the real moment, which keeps us from seeing ourselves, and each other. The great Jewish philosopher, Martin Buber wrote, "The inmost growth of the self does not take place, as people suppose today, through our relationship to ourselves, but through being made present by the other and knowing that we are made present by him." In the seeing of ourselves, and each other, we confirm our presence, meeting each other spontaneously in our wholeness and uniqueness. In this meeting we are healing. And this allows us to have a genuine relationship. This has spilled over into all aspects of our life, work and relationships with others. And this is a work in progress.

This is the essence of yoga.

Yoga is now in the mainstream. There are all kinds of classes from power yoga to gentle stretches that focus on breath awareness. It is true that we need to begin with the body. After all, we are in it. But often that is where the work stops.

How is your yoga practice helping your life? Are you able to have a relationship that is loving, honest and supportive of your growth as well as your partner's? Do you genuinely meet yourself and others?

The practice of yoga was created to lead one internally to the Self, to one's natural state of wholeness through the banishment of the ego. I can't think of a better way to do this than in relationship, especially a committed intimate relationship. It is easier to make small talk with the clerk behind the counter than it is to be present with your beloved.

Ancient sages to modern-day ones teach that to attain freedom and experience peace and happiness we must study and develop control of our mind. The mind is very cunning and deceptive. We must observe it as if we are watching a large poisonous snake. When you observe the mind in this way, you learn what is real and what is illusion.

Yoga is a science which can help us get in touch with the health of our body, mind and spirit. Yet, it is more than practicing postures and breath control, meditation or chanting, or philosophizing about yogic texts. With a commitment to self-study yoga, is a journey that leads us back to our wholeness. It is a means to our awakening from illusion.

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01/03