Last summer, Marnie and I spent a day volunteering at the Twin Cities Pride Festival. We worked the booth for the Minnesota Unitarian Universalist Social Justice Alliance (MUUSJA), and we had our own special UU-flavored offering: “Glitter Blessing!”
Some people walked right on by, pretending not to see or hear us (honestly, that probably would have been me). Others cautiously asked what we meant by “glitter blessing.” A few brave souls walked up, pointed to their cheek, shoulder, or another place on their body where we dabbed some glitter gel and offered them a blessing.
At first I was just trying to get the pattern down as if I was at a booth at a technical conference and we were handing out free USB drives. I wanted to “do a good job” and say the blessings correctly. But I quickly realized that glitter blessings weren’t just a cute gimmick, especially when people started breaking down in tears as we read a little blessing about how they matter, or stated the fact that they are loved unconditionally. It was heart-opening to watch those folks walk away looking lit up from the inside.
It’s Pride month, and Twin Cities Pride will be back this weekend, June 27 and 28 at Loring Park. My experiences at Pride reminded me of the part of yoga that we often leave out.
The Support We Tend to Skip
Swami Kripalu encouraged three supports for yoga practice. Sadhana is your steady personal practice, the time on the mat and the discipline to attain self-knowledge. Sangha is community, the people you practice alongside. Seva is selfless service born from practice, doing something for others and asking nothing back.
Most yogis I know give themselves fully to sadhana, such as attention to the flow of the breath, the shape of postures, and the early morning rituals. Some find their sangha and treasure it. Seva gets the least attention of the three, but it might be the one that changes you most, and Pride weekend could be a great place to practice.
The practice of seva is powerful because the kind of happiness you make by helping someone tends to stay with you longer than the kind you receive.
Find Your Own Dharma
A festival booth isn’t the only way in, and it might not be yours. In 2004, for example, I organized an AIDS benefit concert to raise money for my local AIDS service organization. That was my seva at the time, shaped by what I knew how to do.
You might have your own. Maybe you make sure your workplace protects equal rights for everyone on the team. Or perhaps you host an event to raise money for an LGBTQ+ organization, or you encourage comprehensive sex education like Our Whole Lives (OWL). The point isn’t to copy what worked for me. Rather, it’s to find your own dharma, your own way of acting in line with what matters to you.
Putting It Down
Pride is about being seen. Showing up as who you are, out loud, surrounded by people who are glad you exist. In a time when LGBTQ+ people are feeling their identities questioned, that visibility is as important as ever.
In Light on Life, B.K.S. Iyengar writes about what happens in savasana, the resting pose at the end of practice:
Savasana uses techniques of relaxation to cut the threads. The result of this is not, as in meditation, freedom, but loss of identity. I do not say loss of false identity because in the world in which we function, these identities are real. Yet taking the long view, they are unreal. Even the fact of being male or female is an identity that can be put down.
Read that next to Pride and it might sound like a contradiction. It isn’t. Iyengar says plainly that in the world we live in, these identities are real. They’re worth celebrating. They’re worth protecting. And then, for a few breaths at the end of practice, even a gender identity can be set down for a while. A Buddhist might call that a taste of not-self: not a denial of who you are, just a rest from the work of holding it.
Pride affirms while savasana releases. You don’t have to choose between them. You can spend Saturday being fully, loudly yourself, and Sunday evening lying on the floor letting all of it go for ten minutes.
It’s not too late to volunteer this weekend, either through Twin Cities Pride or MUUSJA. If the booth life calls to you, the festival can use the hands.
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