True Happiness
The New Moon in Taurus can offer permission to get in touch with simple physical pleasures and to embrace the natural world. And what a time to do it, as spring is upon us here in the northern hemisphere. Spend time outdoors, savor being with others, and in general, move slowly. Explore your basic needs concerning home, connection, and your own body, and what is necessary for you to feel a sense of security.
When it comes to being at home, wherever and whatever that is, look at your surroundings? Do you have too much? Too little? Does anything need replacing? If it’s overwhelming to do that, first step outside, breathe the fresh air, and feel the grass with your hands or feet. Now, go back inside. What have you seen and discovered in nature that inspires how you organize your space and what you keep?
Take an honest look at the people you have in your life. With the utmost care and compassion, determine if you are fulfilled by these connections. Do they leave you feeling replenished and excited for life, or do they drain you? Perhaps it’s not the people themselves, but your opinion and thoughts on them. Maybe it’s up to you to change your patterned way of thinking about others? And yet, space can open up in choosing to not let everyone have access to you.
Yoga shows us that we have layers in our body called the koshas or sheaths, traditionally startinging outward and going in. The koshas are as follows: annamaya kosha or the physical/food body, pranamaya kosha or the vital/breath body, manomaya kosha or the mental/emotional body, vijnanamaya kosha or the intuition body, and anandamaya kosha or bliss body. Do you feel at home in your own body? This appears to be a simple question that might make sense to start with as you think of who you are, but we need the outside world to show us that there is one inside, too.
How do all these factors contribute to you, overall? Your environment, the people you’re with, and at the core of it all, your body. Are your needs being met in these areas? Are you happy, or is there hesitation?
In his book, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself, Michael Singer speaks on choosing happiness no matter what, and how each of us can decide to do this. Things will happen to challenge our inner peace but that’s part of the process. He says, “The highest spiritual path is life itself.”
Ultimately you choose how you respond to all moments, especially challenging ones, and there you have it, everyday becomes a spiritual experience as soon as we see life the way it is.
References: Cafe Astrology, Yoga and the Koshas - the layers of being, & The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself by Michael A. Singer
