The Power of the Right Action in the Present Moment

I hope you all had a great week. It was a busy one for me. Sometimes when things are hectic and we lose the ability to pause we can find ourselves reacting rather than mindfully acting. When I notice this happening within myself I repeat my mantra; the words I try to live by most of all. It is a description of the third principle of karma stated by the sage Vasistha. 

“There is no power on earth greater than the right action in the present moment.” 

Really what this message reminds us is that it is within our power to act from a place of integrity. That was the practice this week both on the mat and off.

Doing the “right” thing is often difficult and this week we explored what “working from integrity” means in the body as it is a powerful place to practice. I reminded students that when we fully commit to a pose instead of “going through the motions” the practice becomes more challenging but more fulfilling at the same time. There is a balance of strength and flexibility that allows us to engage/strengthen and protect/lengthen at the same time.

We used Reverse Warrior as one example. Often we think of it as a transition pose but when we hold and engage by activating the core and bending into the front knee while grounding through the back leg we find that it can be quite challenging. That is integrity.   

This is true off the mat as well. We know when we act from a clear understanding of what is truly right (integrity) that even if it is more challenging in the moment, we will have less fear and less regret which equals less SUFFERING!

I shared this story with my students this week to demonstrate the ripple effect of acting from a place of integrity. Not only do we benefit personally in our bodies and minds when we take that right action in the present moment but others benefit from our choices as well. 

There was a study published several years ago that was done at a psychiatric hospital in Illinois. This was before electronic toll booths were common. This psychiatric hospital was located directly off of an interstate and to get to the hospital you had to exit onto a toll road that had an unmanned toll booth. Drivers were expected to throw the money into the slot as they drove through the toll booth. One of the graduate students that was interning at the hospital decided to conduct a study. He put a camera on the toll booth and he kept a list of names of therapists that paid the toll and those that did not. After some time he looked at the data and discovered that there was a direct correlation between who paid the toll and how well their  patients were doing. The patients of the therapists that paid the toll had more successful treatment outcomes. 

This reminds us of the power of our mindful decision making; not only for ourselves but for the people we connect with in this world. “There is no power on earth greater than the right action in the present moment” and practicing is the only way to harness that power. It is why I created the KLARITY Mindsette Mindfulness program.