Tara Sullivan

Last weekend, I spoke at my second funeral this summer. In March, one of the pillars of my life abruptly became terminally ill. A second followed in May. The kind of news that everyone dreads, with terrifying keywords: metastatic, huge, inoperable, no treatment. They both passed away this summer, in June and August respectively.

Spiritual practice does not eliminate suffering.

Yoga practice does not turn life into a vortex of nothing but love and light.

If you are struggling, it doesn’t mean you aren’t doing it right.

The modern, western yoga world can give the impression that if you’re not happy and smiling, wealthy and in love, you didn’t understand the assignment. Let’s not forget that the Buddha’s most essential teaching is that life is suffering. We will all lose everyone and everything that we love.

When I saw Anja Kuehnel, my friend, colleague, and director at Three Boons Yoga Berlin just before my best friend’s funeral, she said, “Aren’t you glad you have the teachings?” Damn right I am.

I don’t pretend to have all the answers, but I know that decades of yoga practice and study have made me strong and resilient. I know that whatever I am experiencing, whether grief or bliss, as long as I have this body the feelings will change. If I want to have deep, honest connections with others, I must be willing to be with them both in celebration and in mourning.

Yoga is a practice, something I do regardless of how it feels, or how I feel. Some days and seasons of life I feel uplifted, light, joyful, and others I struggle, the body changes, life brings challenges, and even pain. Breathing through all of it with equanimity, as the witness of what it means to have a human life, this is the practice. With consistent tending, the practice bears fruit and I get to experience what Sri Brahmananda Sarswati calls “I-AM”. I am not this body, I am not this mind, but I AM. This does not eliminate my feelings of grief and sadness, but exists underneath it, so that I have a firm footing on which to reflect, mourn, and cry without losing sight of the continuing flow of life.

The most common refrain in times of loss is, “I wish I had….” I wish I had told her how much I loved her, I wish we had spent more time together. Hospice staff will tell you that at end of life, people primarily regret not what they did, but what they didn’t do. The advice is always the same: don’t wait to live your life, the practice is now.