Have you ever listened to NPR's ongoing "This I Believe" series?
The premise is simple: people are invited to write a brief essay on something they believe. That's it. It started back in the 1950's, disappeared and was resurrected recently. I checked the CD collection of essays out of the library to listen to this week. It was remarkable and started me thinking: what do I believe?
Here's my response: I believe in giving up toast.
I gave up toast on September 1, 2006. That was the last day I made myself toast. Two pieces of whole-grain fresh bread with real butter and strawberry preserves. I ate the toast for breakfast while I enjoyed a mug of English Breakfast tea with milk and sugar. It was a Friday and the last weekend of the summer. As I ate breakfast, I realized that it was time to give up toast.
On that day, I didn't feel at home in my body. I practice and teach yoga and a sense of ease in my body is important. I didn't have a goal weight in mind, I just knew that I needed to move more, to eat less and find companions for the journey.
The first step was, in many ways, the most essential. I savored the toast and tea, feeling gratitude for every bite. When I was finished, I rinsed the plate and cup and breathed a sigh of relief. No more toast. It was the most important symbolic step I could take.
Why toast? I love toast. When I feel overwhelmed by life, I could always count on the comfort of toast and tea. Good, whole grain bread, real butter, real preserves or jam along with tea made in a pot and poured into a cup with warmed milk and sugar restored me. Toast and tea nourished me.
Sometimes the small gestures are the most important. I didn't give up all wheat products or all carbohydrates. I simply let go of the one that meant the most to me.
For me, opening to Grace meant giving up toast. Authentic change is Grace. Perhaps Grace is, in many ways, a combination of will-power AND surrender.
In the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali writes tapas svadhyaya ishvara pranidhana kriya yoga. Tapas (discipline) svadhyaya (self-study) ishvara pranidhana (surrender to God)....these are the actions (kriya) of yoga (union).
Giving up toast, something I love (discipline), witnessing my response to the little letting go I feel when I fix myself a cup a tea (self-study), walking away from the toaster (surrender to God). Do I miss it? Occasionally. But when I feel that longing, I breathe and dive deep, like fish dive when a storm causes great waves. I feel what I'm actually feeling underneath the desire for toast. And what am I feeling? It could be anything: a momentary irritation, a splinter of grief or a drop of sadness. This small practice welcomes the presence of Grace into my life as I am in that moment and leads to the possibility of union, of being at home in my body....being at ease with life.
What is your "toast"? What small, essential thing can you release to make room for Grace?
Eat less, move more and give up the toast.
