Artful Hands
Mudra Series: Inspired Heart Offering
Mixed Media Size: 19” x 19 3/8” x 9”
Significant hand gestures, called Mudras, are present to varying degrees in most spiritual traditions. The actions of one’s hands, reflects the heart’s status: aggressive when in fear; healing when compassionate, and retracted when feeling isolated. With many shapes and shades in between.
Mudras that arise from the eastern Buddhist and Yogic traditions, are intended to shift energetic patterns through the meridian channels that originate at points in the hands. Like the art of Reflexology, the hands (and feet) are maps of our bodies; whereas reflexology deals more with the physical body, mudras align the subtle (=emotional) body. Several of these are familiar, whether we use them consciously (prayer position as in the ‘Namaste’ greeting, & meditation mudras) or unconsciously (thumbs up, the peace sign…). They are in our ancestral knowing.
When we engage our hands in gestures/mudras that express noble qualities, we promote the divine potential within. With the influx of Yoga into the contemporary mainstream, I’ve been delighted to share my heartfelt appreciation of how hands can heal, integrate and perpetuate wisdom so easily. When upset, we can choose to transform the strong emotions in a healthy way, by engaging an appropriate mudra, intention, and breathing. This practice helps us integrate the wisdom and discard the toxic byproducts of any challenging situation.
Another important hand gesture is the offering of a flower. In my personal life, I’ve consciously grown positive heart qualities, to help me negotiate some pretty challenging situations.
When I traversed separation and divorce from a 20+ year relationship, I tempered my ego’s reactions of blame, judgment, resentment, and anger into compassion through some extensive guided meditations on Forgiveness and Compassion. I would, in my mind’s eye, offer to the person of my grievances (my ‘wusband’, myself…), a flower, smiling from my heart as I did so. Over time, this transformed my potent negative emotional reactions to create a peaceful heart.
Offering Compassion is the art piece that illuminates the feel and gesture that:
Transforms Wounds
To Blessings
Manifesting Expansion
of Heart’s Desire for
Joy, Beauty & Love
As a yoga teacher, I theme each class around a Mudra – the focus into the powerful emotional body, assists the practitioner to heal, ground, integrate and align to noble qualities such as: Joy, Equanimity, Loving Kindness, Patience. Invoking such high vibration energy, allows us to negotiate challenging emotional terrain more easily.
When you are angry, frustrated, fearful, try this: bring your hands together into prayer position (Anjali Mudra) at your heart level. Feel the energetic shift within; Breathe and feel into the quality of compassion; allow your heart to transition from contraction to expansion. It may take some time, but with practice, you grow a softer heart and recondition reactive patterns from low to high vibration responses.
This is what I hope to inspire in both my creative art expressions and in teaching yoga; I remind myself and hopefully, inspire others to heal and engage from a loving space.