Yesterday I wrote about the benefits to your body of performing the stances. Today I would like to consider the potential effects on the mind of this practice.

Doing the stances is a form of meditation and the basic purpose of meditation is to calm the “monkey mind” as the Buddhists put it. Buddhists use the term monkey because this particular tradition originates and is widely practised in places where monkeys are a familiar sight. In the Stav tradition we might better use the term “Squirrel mind” and reference Ratatosk  who runs up and down the Yggdrasil tree carrying malicious messages between the eagle which lives at the top and Nidhogg, the dragon who lives at the base.

The Ygdrasill tree can be seen as representing the self with the Eagle as the higher self and the dragon as the most primitive aspects of ourselves. Neither aspect is better than the other, to be complete we have to accept ourselves as both beast and angel. The higher and lower, or however you want to describe them, aspects of ourselves are both essential aspects of our whole selves. Each aspect has its own kind of innate wisdom which we would do well to learn to listen to. The problem is our conscious, everyday mind which seems to forget how to listen to either what our body has to tell us about our fundamental needs or our conscience which can guide us to our higher purpose. For some perverse reason our squirrel mind just wants to set one off against the other and sabotage our chances of either happiness or fulfilment.

So, when performing the stances we are looking to focus, calm and open the mind. We are not looking to receive some great insight or wisdom, that may come, but only in its own time. What matters is that we clear away chatter and distraction, learning how to ignore the incessant chatter of the squirrel.

How to do this? The galdre stances have the advantage of bringing sound into practice and this certainly helps block out the chatter of the squirrel mind. I would recommend doing galdre stances once or twice a week for this reason as well as the way it will enhanced your breathing. When doing silent stances in the trel or konge versions you can try disciplining the mind to be clear and if you have a gift for meditation, if there is such a thing, you should be able to clear your mind as you do the stances. I personally don't find this easy and my inner squirrel is large, energetic and of the high decibel variety. So, rather than fight him I recite the rune poems to myself as I do them, one half as I breath in, the other as I breath out. It works for me and it is a good way of learning the rune poems and making sure you don't forget them.

I can't promise that doing the stances will change your life over night but it does bring an awareness that we can take control over our own body and decide, at least for a few minutes what thoughts occupy our minds. This is actually a pretty big step towards genuine freedom.

Tomorrow I will consider how the runes might talk to you through the practice of the stances.

Regards,

Graham

www.iceandfire.org.uk