Thoughts on Peace

This was contributed by Lisa Boyle:

Thoughts on Peace

Among my first thoughts when I read the word “peace” on the slip of paper which I picked at random out of the basket at the Joint the other week was of a stunning photograph that appeared in the New York Times Magazine (I think) a few years ago. In the photo, a woman sat in the heart of Times Square at rush hour, meditating. Despite everything going on around her, all the traffic, people, lights and noise, she appeared immune to the buzz around her, the epitome of peace. This exquisite example of one able to shut out the world and enter a different one within suggests that peace is a state of mind, like a lovely place to which you can go without moving, that can be accessed anywhere at any time.

A second thought was of a story we used to listen to in the car when my children were younger. The tale, whose specific details I will misremember, told of a poor farmer and his wife who hired a wise old man to help quiet their noisy household of crying children and howling dogs. The family did not have much money, but they were so desperate, they scrounged and collected a small sum to pay the wise man if he was successful in helping them. One by one, the wise man brought the farmer’s animals from the barn into the house, adding to the noise and chaos rather than reducing it. Then, just when the noise became unbearable, he lead the animals back to the barn, again one by one, and gradually returned the house to the state in which he had found it, crying children, howling dogs in tact. Even though there was no difference from where they started, the farmer and his wife thanked the wise man profusely and happily paid him the sum of money. They had unwittingly found peace as they learned to experience the same world differently.

Yoga combines these two pathways to peace. Focusing on the rhythms and sounds of breath immediately transports the mind to a still place. Often before the body moves into the day’s first asana, a brief centering has already quieted the constant hum of thoughts, pleasant (a greeting from a friend, the wag of a tail), mundane (a grocery list, an errand to run), and stressful (a pile of bills to pay, an argument from the night before with a loved one), that can so easily crowd one’s mind. Further rhythms - chants of om or a series of sun salutations - sustain the stillness. Then, the focus and exertion of a strong physical practice fills the heart with desire and the mind with a willingness to experience the extraordinary in movement that is familiar and knowable.

Coming to practice at the Joint is a literal crossing over a threshold of peace (om shanti). But the peace found there is also a learned state of mind, a practiced one, which is available throughout the day, on or off the mat and inside or outside any set of four walls. It is both nourishing and necessary; it can be as simple as recognizing the peace of a beautiful day or as deliberate as invoking a calming mantra when your heart is breaking. This is the peace that yoga brings to me.