Parvati Magazine February 2014 - Sobriety | Seite 8

YOGA YOGA TRUE SOBRIETY From this perspective, true sobriety exists only when we are not “under the influence” of the world around us. True sobriety lives through the eyes of an individual who can remain untouched by life’s stresses, traumas, and struggles. We are all born with a sense of purity, untouched, unharmed. We all breathe, move, cry, laugh, crawl, walk… If we are lucky enough, we are loved, we hear hands clapping when we succeed, we get treats for learning new tasks, we are held without having to ask. This is the beauty of childhood, or so we would hope. As time passes, we are often faced with a rude awakening. We learn that we can’t always have our way, that we can’t please everyone, that we won’t always have people clap their hands and cheer us on for all that we do. Life as we knew it had changed. It is not surprising that so What would the world look like if we could walk through it with the sobriety of a newborn child? W hat is Sobriety? There is one definition that many of us are all too familiar with: The abstinence from alcohol, drugs and any mood-altering substances. Thus, the term “sobriety” is often thought of as the opposite of being “under the influence” of some form of mood and mind-altering substance. Wikipedia offers another definition of “sobriety”, as “the natural state of a human being given at birth”. many of us learn very quickly that there are coping strategies, albeit very unhealthy coping strategies for the longterm. Nonetheless, the focus is on getting through now. We learn that there are so many ways to escape our reality, be it through the traditional substances like alcohol, drugs and painkillers, or through dissociation, anger outbursts, sex, food, etc. We feel damaged, as we can never return to the natural state of purity we were once born with. We feel saddened by the harsh nature of the world. We feel p