The art of Dristi and calling in a greater focus to our lives

On the mat, in our yoga practice, we experience and know dristi to be our gaze, where we are looking and focussing our attention.

It’s a key element towards allowing our practice to be filled with awareness, to drop out of our mind and into our body, and without it, our practice is merely scattered thought in movement.

There is something magical when we move from here. We conduct movement from a space of deeper energy, tuned into a flowing source of creation. Time doesn’t stop, but we are unconcerned with its passing; we are filled with prana and brought to the focus of expansion and contraction of breath entering and exiting the lungs, bringing life into our body.

Our practice naturally always starts with the physical effort of asana. Butt over time, with effort and practice, we deepen our understanding of these more subtle elements of how to use the breath to create heat to open and release the afflictions in our mind and body, tune our focus, and bring stillness into our being.

Our practice becomes a mirror towards how we are experiencing both our inner and outer worlds as well as a pathway towards cultivating awareness, grace, humility and love.

We can think of our dristi not just as where we are looking but also where we are directing our energy and attention off the mat, how we are experiencing and perceiving things, as well as where we are placing our energy.

Try not to think of it as a skill to be obtained and optimised but rather an art to be explored and expressed.

Practising and honing our dristi on the mat calls us both into questioning and exploring how we are bringing forth awareness into our everyday tasks, efforts and interactions. We are experiencing and learning how to bring forth mindfulness into how we are living, as well as being able to catch ourselves when our focus and energy become misaligned.

We then equally see how this weaves into other elements of our practice, such as pursuing our dharma and practising brahmacharya, ahimsa, Satya, dharana, and dhyana.

As we learn to bring it back in, we can then find ourselves able to live with the right action towards our duties. We are moving through life embodied with our values and purpose and so, in turn, serve our deeper self and a higher calling.

Dristi is not simply just the gaze to the middle finger in a warrior two, but it is also the greater focus of how we are living and moving through life.

Miles

P.S. If you’re in London this weekend or in a time zone that is somewhat relatable to London, my regular Saturday class at Indaba will be a two-hour masterclass as part of the 20-CET I am running there this weekend. If you want to join the class (in-person or online) or even jump on board the TT, you can sign up here.

P.P.S. Did this newsletter leave you feeling inspired? Tell a friend to subscribe.