What Is Your Sangat - Don't Lose it (or yourself) When You Have a Baby

Disclaimer:
If you didn't lose the real you when you gave birth, then this post may not be for you.
If you didn't suffer from post natal depression then this post may not be for you.
If you came here purely to judge, then step away.
If you don't like me being honest, bye!

Okay, who's left?

I had another epiphany - I know, two in one week, it's getting a bit ridiculous.  Maybe I am on a journey of personal self-discovery.

After I wrote my turban post, I at first felt great, after all, the yoga me was meeting the New Mum Online me, but I popped out to get my nails done (I know, not very yogic, but I was on the radio last night).

While I was out I had my epiphany and I thought to myself one of the most dangerous things you can do when being a new mum is be lonely.

It starts off as lonely but when the PND takes root, it becomes an excuse to cut yourself off, exclude yourself, go within, and pretend to yourself that nobody would notice if you ran away.

When you are at the teetering edge of feeling (I don't want to use the word but it begins with a S), it is the most dangerous thing ever to get yourself in a position where you are so solitary that really nobody would notice if you ran away.

With all my family being in Ireland, and the Yoga Teaching coming to a stop at 37 weeks pregnant (after teaching for 6 solid years), it meant I had no sangat. My yoga community was no longer - for me anyway (apart from on Facebook).

And while I was out getting my nails done yesterday afternoon, THAT was the word that popped into my head: sangat.

But you also lose your work connections, your colleagues, when you go on maternity leave.

So, what helped.  Well, last Summer I started going to church every Sunday.  I had been a lapsed Catholic but wanted to get Aaron baptised.  I ended up joining the choir.  I love it.  They all know me.  When I miss a week they worry.  When I come back they ask "where've you been".  When you are a New Mum, who is in danger of isolating herself, you need this.

But, with my sweeping comment about the church yesterday, you'd never know that I go every Sunday.  You'd never know that I LOVE it.  You'd never know that it was one of my many PND cures.  You'd never know that church, and the community I find there truly feeds my soul.

When they make eye contact, I feel like I really am on this Earth after all.  I am a mum but someone still knows who I am.

This is necessary.

But I delved into the old me when I wrote yesterday's post, and the old me knows that Church and Priests are from the Piscean age, and Spirituality is from the Aquarian age.  The former is about doctrine and obedience and the latter is about experience.  I prefer the latter, but the former has a place too.

It really does.

I take for granted that you know the difference between the Piscean and Aquarian Age (I learned it all as part of my Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training), but a great snap shot of the differences are listed on the bright red table here: http://catalystyogi.com/resources/what-is-the-aquarian-age/

Energetically we are no longer built (or hard-wired) to say yes sir, no sir, to the Priest.  In the Aquarian age we are more quizzical and have to personally experience in order to believe.

But I believe, dare I say, that the Church still has a place, or certainly the sense of community (and sangat)  that resides within its walls does.

What do you think?

If you have PND, please don't be alone.

Anyway as well as having my epiphany while I was out, I came back to a comment on my post, that linked to a follow up post, and although Lorraine outwardly doesn't criticise me, she celebrates the church and religion in defense of the fact that I flippantly knocked it yesterday.

I hope this post goes some way towards apologising for that, and showing that I too am a fan of the church, but it will have to move with the times, as we all will.  This is 2012 after all, and there are huge energetic shake-ups occurring and karma to be cleared.

Liska x