Spanda

I was recently studying the concept of Spanda with my Ayurvedic coach. She described it as an energetic vibration that expands and contracts in a pulsing motion. We discussed how this pulsing energy guides so many aspects of our lives, including eating, wake/sleep, energy levels, and moods. Ayurvedic medicine believes that there is a natural wave of lightness and depth, joy and sadness, fullness and hunger, feeling energized and tired. This eb and flow is normal and should be honored rather than fought. Ayurveda believes that we need to listen to and understand this pulsing expansion and contraction, moving with it rather than against it. We need to allow equal amounts of sleep and wakefulness, emptiness and fullness, and balance energy given outward to other with energy given to self.

As we were describing this natural and normal eb and flow I could not help but reflect on how hard I fight it. I worry about feeling hungry, despite always having food at my disposal, I worry when I feel sadness, even though I know my depressions will lift, and I especially worry when I am feeling joy, waiting for the other shoe to drop. I worry about any given state being permanent, even though all of my experiences have taught me that there is no permanence.

I worry because I was raised in a culture that fights to maintain a stasis. We fight for good enough, not too happy and defiantly never too sad. We work to eliminate struggle with more and more efficient ways to acquire food, fitness, fun, and friendship, with pre-made meals, “20 minute workouts”, and social media connections. We work hard to avoid struggle and pain, but at the same time forbid ourselves from feeling too much joy. Our desire to maintain a static experience has deprived us of depth. Depth of pain, Depth of joy, Depth of love, Depth of fear. In an effort to not feel too much, we end up not feeling enough. When we begin to feel too much we have created a toolbox of ways to smooth the rough edges and numb. Food, drink, screens, exercise, etc. Yet the more we work to avoid the eb and wave of our natural spanda the more we work to create contrived joy and pain. We acquire stuff, plan vacations, and imagine that changing our workplace will get us that feeling that we are chasing. We endlessly dissect the horrors of the world with our friends, from afar, allowing a titrated amount of pain to course through our bodies. When the feeling comes, and it is too much, we numb it and then desire it even more.

So I am working to tolerate all of the peaks and valleys and know that I have the capacity to hold them all. Allowing hunger will make my supper taste so much better, knowing the depth of sadness will make my joy so much sweeter, and being locked away from the world will make being in it so much fuller.