The Cockroach

You know one of the rules of being a yogi is non-harming other creatures of God..Ahimsa.. whether it be through something you say or something you do to cause harm to others..It makes you really think about what you say and the actions you do that involve not only people but animals and bugs as well...There are some guide lines I believe..Mosquito's carry disease so I think it is ok to repel them in any way possible...I think it is ok to kill a mosquito because if you don't it will feed on you and in doing so can cause you potential harm and the potential harm of other creatures and humans..moths or beatles..not so much..Birds and cows and dogs and even fish I think you should not harm....Please just bare with me here I'm going somewhere...You see I'm a little confused about one of Gods creatures on the chain of life..I'm not talking about politicians either..I said God's creatures..hahaha..I'm talking about the cockroach...It is harmless enough...It does carry disease but it doesn't bite (if it does don't tell me either way) and most of the time here in India there will only be one or maybe two that you see crawling in a corner or coming up through a drain pipe..I think the uneasy feeling you get from the Indian cockroach is that they are usually as big as a small bird..In fact to mention it I think they fly as well...So what do you do abou these creatures.


I was in led practice yesterday and I ended up in the bathroom because it is less crowded and it's like your very own little studio in there..You can still hear Sharath and he walks in every so often and gives you a little grin..I was surrounded with great energy from my fellow yogi's Tom and Andrew and David (from NC) and a strangely Baron Baptiste look alike...so it was a perfect place to be...I got through the point in my series where I stop and continued to watch the beautiful people around me practice until closing..I am so lucky here because Tom and Andrew are all the way through primary and it is a gift to see them practice the postures that are after the point where I stop..Not to mention David has a breath like music..it is so full of intense devotion and rythem..So beautiful..As we began back bends I began my finishing sequence and my giddiness continued...than... right before Utpluthi...I saw it...It was huge... It was black... It was at least 4 inches long ...It was very confident in a creepy way...It was the cockroach..at this point there was no drishti..no focus except for trying not to scream like a little school girl in a building with 150 people deep in breath and the most famous Yoga teacher in the world on the other side of the wall just 10 feet away from me..all I could do was breathe...I wanted to grab the fan cord next to me and smack the life out of the cocky(pun intended) guy..but I just sat there with my eyes on the enormous fellow and breathed...and he kept crawling right toward me..and than.. Shavasana...I'm mean seriously...come the fuck on...so I closed my eyes but on the inside I was freaking out...than it happened...I opened my eyes and Shavasana was over...I shot up and looked around and there was no cockroach anywhere in sight..I looked to the left and to the right and I saw nothing..It was gone...I did see a pile of clothes on the floor just above my head and guessed it had found a home in there but you know that's not my journey...hahaha...I got up rolled up my mat and walked out of the shala...When I got home I told Susie about my little adventure...She was also unsure about the sentence of whether we should exterminate a cockroach or not...So I have decided...as long as it is in another persons space I will respect the creepy fellow...but if it is in my space...It has to leave...maybe I won't kill it but I will remove it with gloves, a paper cup, a face mask, and if I can talk someone into it... their hands... I will attempt(loose words here) to stray from violence towards the creepy roach..but you know...I'm not being honest here..I'm probably going to bash his head in with a flipflop or spray the little fucker with some bug spray...If I start to lose sleep over this I'll figure something else out...

Nite nite..