Tonight the moon is only 1 percent full. It's just a sliver of a moon in the sky. Tomorrow at 4:27am EST we will have a new moon. This will mark the beginning of the Indian Year which is celebrated tonight as Deepavali. It is always curious to me how this celebration is about lighting lamps and candles just before the moon turns completely dark.

Today the Indian New Year, Deepavali, is celebrated. It is a celebration of lights. The triumph of Light over darkness. It is a good reminder of one of the greatest endeavors that a human can take: upholding the Light within. Specially during the times we are living it is a very important thing to do, not just for ourselves but for our surroundings and the whole world.

We have been exploring three of the five powers attributed to supreme Consciousness which are powers that each one of us have although in a more limited form. We started with icchā which is the "precognitive creative urge towards self expression"(1). Then came jnanā which is the knowledge born out of the observation of the deep structures of reality.

In yoga practice one of the main patterns that I weave in everything we do in every class is a sense of pulsation. There is the inhalation and exhalation. There is the balancing of opposing movements and actions in every pose. There is the contraction and stretching of muscles. There is the change of locations we find ourselves in at different times; sometimes we are up sometimes we are down, sometimes on the right side other times on the left. There is the active part of the practice and there is śavāsana

There is a nice coolness in the air in New York City. I took out my winter clothes and wore a long coat this weekend. I always look forward to wearing sweaters and coats in the fall just like I look forward to shorts and t-shirts in the summer. Each year brings a different experience for the same four seasons and yet there is always the same pattern. We know this very well and do things accordingly.

 I'm continuing to learn more about icchā, Will as a power, as a virtue we all possess. When it comes to our virtues my teacher said that they need to be practiced. So we want to exercise our power of icchā, Will. This is not something we do once  but it is a constant practice applied to everything we do. The more we practice our icchā in this way the stronger it becomes in us.