What is Your Heart’s Deepest Desire?

In celebration of the beginning of a new year, I am exploring the three yogic principles of Iccha (“will” or “desire”), Jnana (“knowledge”), and Kriya (“action”). John Friend, founder of Anusara yoga, teaches that these three principles correspond to the three A’s of Anusara: Attitude, Alignment, and Action. To help us to apply these three principles to ourselves and our lives, we can ask three questions:

• What is your heart’s deepest desire?
• How can you use knowledge (or what do you need to know) to help you align your body, both physically and energetically, with your true nature and your heart’s deepest longing?
• What are you willing to do (what actions are you willing to take in your life) to get what you want?

Though the first question — what is your heart’s deepest desire? — rolls off the tongue easily, it is a question that we can spend our whole lives contemplating. And the answer frequently changes as our lives and selves unfold and we enter different phases. What we most desire in our early twenties is usually not the same as what we desire in our mid-thirties, which is usually not the same as what we desire in our late fifties, and so on. And shifts in our desires are not limited to aging, but also happen with significant life events such as graduations, marriage, divorce, birth, death, illness, career changes, evolutions of self, and more. So the point is not to discover a finite answer but to check in regularly with our bodies and selves: what is my heart’s deepest longing at this point in time? Checking in with our deepest longing is important. There are many things that we desire, but some of them are more fleeting and superficial than others and some of them are closer to our true nature than others. It is the deeper, more essential longings that we are trying to uncover with this question.

When we start to get some clarity about what this deepest longing is, or even get a glimpse into what it might be, we can begin to explore how to align with it. In Anusara, we talk about the optimal blueprint for our physical bodies. Though each body is unique, there are universal principles that help us to align our bodies in ways that provide for optimal health and free flow of energy. Life experiences and habits pull most of us out of this optimal blueprint (for example, hours at the computer or driving pull our shoulder blades off of our back, overdevelop and contract our Trapezius muscles, and weaken our Rhomboids — resulting in a rounded, hunched over upper back). Yoga can help us to realign our physical bodies and repattern our muscles. As we do so, we simultaneously realign our energetic bodies. (I.e. moving our shoulder blades onto our back and practicing backbends invigorates the body, turns the body out to face the world, and can counter feelings of depression or unworthiness.) It is also a helpful practice to ask ourselves, in what ways are my daily habits, my relationships, my work, etc. in alignment with my heart’s deepest longing? In what ways are they not? What do I need to do to come into greater alignment with myself?

And then we come to the principle of action. The Kriya of a yoga pose or the choices we make in our lives is the expression or an offering of our heart’s deepest longing. It is the manifestation of what we are willing to do to get what we want. So as you look at the year ahead, what are you willing to do to manifest your deepest desires? What do you need to say “yes” to and what do you need to say “no” to in order to make it possible for the seeds of your intentions for the new year to take root and grow? Manifesting desires is not so simple as just wishing. Our yoga teaches that we need to take action as well. Perhaps, like me, you will commit to doing at least twelve Urdhva Dhanurasanas each week in 2010 to support you in building the strength and confidence to open your heart more deeply. Or perhaps you will commit to meditating at least ten minutes every day to help you become more focused and mindful or your actions. Whatever action or actions you choose to commit to, make sure that they are in service of your heart’s deepest longing and that your actions help to bring you into alignment with your true nature.

Happy New Year! May it be filled with joy, abundance, and many unfoldings and insights.