Leaning into the Edge
Avoid challenge and have a boring life without growth.
Recklessly push your self into overwhelm and you get injured and regress.
Lean into the edge of challenge and you feel the exhilaration of growth and empowerment.
As we mindfully embrace challenge , we need to navigate between the hazard of striving on one hand and of avoidance on the other. We need to find the right amount of effort, the sweet spot.
One way of getting to know the sweet spot in the middle is through a gentle forward bend. This is a practice that I call “leaning into the Edge”. When we hang forward without pushing, there is a point where we naturally rest. That point is the edge. At that point we can feel some stretch at the back of our legs but it is not usually uncomfortable.
| Mindful Exercise Leaning into The Edge Whilst Doing A Standing Forward Bend Beginning by standing quietly and feeling the connection of the soles of the feet with the ground. Tuning into the breath. Allowing yourself to fold at the waist, letting the head and the arms hang naturally without trying to push any further. That is your edge. Paying close attention to how you tend to lift a little with the in breath and drop a little with the out breath. Noticing if there is a natural relaxation where the head and the arms naturally drop closer towards the floor. Noticing if there is a sense of the muscles being stretched in the buttocks, backs of thighs and calves.Noticing if this stretch provides a sense of challenge. Repeating this exercise once or twice daily for a few days, noticing how the edge’s location at both the beginning and the end of the exercise is different from one day to the next. Noticing if there is any tendency to try to push through the natural edge. If that is there, seeing if it is possible to let that striving go and just hang naturally. Alternatively, noticing if there is any tendency to back away from the edge so as to avoid the discomfort of the stretch in the backs of the legs. Again, seeing if it is possible to let that go and to open up with curiosity to the precise sensations associated with the discomfort With a little bit of effort, we could push through that edge if we wanted and go deeper into the forward bend. That extra effort is equivalent to the striving. If we just stay at that edge while attending to our breath coming and going, the stretch naturally extends effortlessly. Usually on the exhalation, gravity pulls us down a bit lower. As this happens if we feel more stretch in the backs of the legs which can then become uncomfortable. We are now effortlessly entering the challenge zone. We are now leaning into the edge. |
We can take this attitude from the mindful forward bend into any challenge we might have to face. We just have to define what our edge is and genty but persistently lean into it without forcing it.
For example you may want to be able to speak confidently in public but find yourself freezing when you try. You are automatically overwhelmed. so you need to step it back to find your edge. You need to look at what you can do that is similar that has an element of performance in front of others. Perhapsyou like teeling jokes to people one on one. Then you might find that your edge is telling a short joke to a group of friends and when that beomes easy your edge will have moved to something bigger like introducing a speaker to a room. With some reflection it is usually possible to find your edge with whatever challenge you are facing.
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