by Heather Brown, RYT500
This year at CF Yogi, we have started the journey exploring the yamas and niyamas: the yogic principles that can help guide a person to understand themselves more deeply, and live harmoniously with the world around them. The philosophical aspects of yoga are always present in our physical practice, but we don’t always take the time to really explore them. Understanding these ideas can not only deepen your practice, but can deepen our life experience off the mat as well.
All that being said, March will be the month of Saucha. In the simplest terms, Saucha is defined as purity. However, it is a much more nuanced idea than that. I like to think of it as clearing the space for yourself so that life can flow more easily. Even small, repeated acts can have a cumulative effect. So, I thought we would break this huge concept down into more digestible chunks. Little things that you can experiment with in your own life just to get the idea. If you like what you experience on this small scale, feel free to dive in and explore this concept even more.
Let us start by breaking down this broad idea of purity into several sub-categories: Physical, Mental and Emotional/Energetic.
Physical Purity
This aspect of Saucha is the most obvious. It encompasses the acts of keeping your body clean, nourishing it with wholesome foods and caring for your personal environment. In today’s world of always keeping busy, this is not always the easiest thing to achieve. Just remember that it doesn’t need to be all or nothing. Give yourself permission to start small. Many of us already practice some form of Saucha, nowadays we tend to call it “self care”. Do you have some sort of bed time routine; wash your face, brush your teeth, brush your hair? These are all expressions of Saucha.
Here are a few other small ways to focus on the physical aspect of Soucha as part of your daily routine:
Hydrate consciously – drink a glass of water mindfully. Allow yourself to notice its clarity and the way it nourishes you as you are drinking it.
Wash face and teeth or shower – any of these rituals are a practice of Soucha.
Mini-declutter – take the time to neaten up at least a small area of your space. Your environment reflects your inner clarity. If you notice your environment getting messy, taking some time to make some changes can reflect back onto your inner self.
Mindful Intake – Pause before eating, drinking, or consuming media. Ask yourself how what you are about to consume is nourishing you.
Mental Purity
Here is where Saucha starts to get less tangible, moving from the physical to the mental side of things. Saucha here means noticing what thoughts you entertain, cultivating clarity and letting go of mental clutter. Once again, that is a broad sweeping generalization. In practice, this is a little more complicated to implement. So, I am going to use an example that everyone has experienced at some point in their lives as a basis for this reflection.
Imagine, you accidently slam your finger in a door and immediately become angry and think “that was dumb.”
The first step to making any change is recognizing the behavior that you want to change. In this example, there are actually two opportunities to practice Soucha. The first, is the moment that wave of emotion that flows over you when your finger is slammed in the door. The second, is the moment after when you respond with, “ that was dumb.”
How can you use the practice of Saucha to change the experience in this example? When the initial injury happens, practice a pause before reacting in anger. In this pause lives the sensation of the reaction, the pang of whatever the body wants to respond to, but then it passes. Noticing this space is the first step to changing how the body reacts in these situations. After that initial response, practice noticing what self-talk is present in the aftermath. In this example, “that was dumb.” was in response to the mistake. A judgment of ourselves having cause our own pain. A more supportive response might be “why did that happen?” or “what can I do to prevent that the next time?” You can acknowledge mistakes without shaming yourself. Every time you speak to yourself, you are reinforcing your own self worth. Take each of these moments as an opportunity to build yourself up.
To review, here are a few small ways to focus on the mental aspect of Soucha as part of your daily routine:
Notice – At first just take the time to notice your immediate reaction and self talk to things. It could be an emotion or a response that you just do and don’t really think about. Notice these moments and maybe write them down.
Pause – Once you notice when these moments are happening, you can start to find pause before reacting. Giving yourself a little more space to notice the sensation or feeling and respond with a little more intention.
Respond with intent – As you start including the pause, notice how your responses to whatever the situation is can be more supportive of yourself and your situation.
Emotional and Energetic Purity
This last category of Saucha is often the most challenging to identify and make changes to. Emotions carry with them a residue that follows us even after the emotional experience has passed. Saucha asks us to acknowledge and process these emotions rather than letting them build and fester.
Here are just two practices that I often use to process emotions and allow them to be release:
Journaling – I feel like this is a common one these days. Just getting those emotions out can be a huge release and can help to clear the mind. Taking this a step further, you can write what you want to clear on a piece of paper and then burn it. Sometimes adding an act like burning the thought can help the process of removing it from your mind
Trusted Social Interaction – Another common way to process emotions is having a conversation about the situation with a trusted friend. Just like in journaling, the retelling of the story helps us to process and reframe what happened.
Of course, there are many ways to process and release with energy without hurting yourself or others on the journey, what are some other ways that work for you?
Putting It All Together
So, what does it mean to integrate this idea of Saucha “purity” into our lives? All of the practices I have mentioned have one goal in mind, to help us clean out all the junk so that we can be present and clear in each moment. Letting go of what was or what might become and allowing ourselves to exist in this moment. It is a practice to be maintained, which means you will fall in and out of practice no matter how long you have been working to embody these ideas. As you practice your Saucha, don’t forget about Ahimsa, and continue to be kind to yourself on this journey.
Conclusion
Soucha can be defined as the practice of removing clutter from our lives, physically, mentally and emotionally. There are many small practices that can contribute to making a huge shift in our lives, but it is a practice. We must remember to be kind to ourselves as well as this practice ebbs and flows. As we continue down this road of the Yamas and Niyamas, you may notice that everything is connected. These ideas will continue to build and overlap as we progress. Here is your reminder to start small and be kind when bringing any of these philosophies into your personal practice.
Namaste.
CF Yogi’s March classes centered on Saucha (purity and clarity) are now available to registered participants in CF Yogi’s member portal. If you can’t join us live, recordings are available anytime in the Video Library!
