Pain Free?

While I was on the west coast, I visited a  Hot yoga class where the teacher encouraged us -- "some day you will be pain free."

"Really?" I thought "is that our goal?"

I remembered back to an Ashtanga class years ago when our teacher remarked that "injury has a certain inevitability to it."  I consider an Anusara class where our teacher talked about honoring our whole self, the broken as well as the healthy. What different philosophies these remarks reflect.

My great goal in yoga is not an absense of pain, though I do generally feel better than before I started to practice. I fantasize about practicing until I'm 80 (pincha mayurasana at 80 - that's my goal) and know that things break and wear out as we age. I've experienced plenty of that already.

I guess my sense of the goal of yoga is to be  interested in whatever happens, and to breathe and stay present with the experience in each moment, whatever may come.

Old Friends

Recently I spent almost two weeks couch surfing with friends and relatives. It was awesome. Some days it was easy to pull out my travel mat, change into yoga clothes and practice. I even made it to a couple of local studio classes as we moved from town to town. The weekend that we rented a house with a group of old, dear friends, however, it became clear that no time was going to organically emerge when the group energy would quiet down so I could pull out my mat. Finally as the band finished the morning-long process of hooking up all the electronica, I decided I could hear them as well form my bedroom as I could from anywhere, and so I closed my door with the intention of practicing. I was not convinced, at this point, that I would have the will power for a full hour of asana practice. It was too hard to be away from my friends. I was wearing kind of stretchy jeans, so I figured I'd just do a few simple poses and go back to the party.

After a few forward folds and cat-cow, still something was not right. How would I know that I had practiced? What is the difference between really practicing and just stretching a little? I figured I should roll out my mat and change into yoga pants. I began as I always do with Sun Salutations (I like the "c" salutations to start). I had been away from home for 9 days and hadn't slept properly since we left, so I knew this was not the moment for my most vigorous flow. I began slowly, really focusing on my breath and sinking into each pose. Now I felt like I was practicing. Sun salutations are like an old friend -- how many times had I done this sequence over the past 10 years? Too many to count. Entering this familiar flow did what any practice is designed to do, to root us and bring us back to ourselves even in confusing transitional moments.

The message became even more powerful as the improvisations in the living room just outside my door turned into an old familiar song- one I had been hearing my friends play since long before my yoga practice began. The song was an old friend, one I had heard so many days listening to them rehearse, so many nights hearing them perform. How many ordinary and extraordinary occasions had this song been with us? And of course the voices were my friends' voices -- old, old friends. Friends who had been with me for my whole adult life, who had been with me as I found my calling, who had been with me on the Playa, who had been with me as I got ready to become a parent.

And here I am, alone in my cell, Sun Salutations leading to standing poses and backbends as they inevitably must. Surrounded by the sounds of old friends. The old familiar songs, the old familiar travel mat flaking off in bits on my hands and feet, the layers of meaning and memory in asana and music. 3000 miles away from home, still I was at home. This is what it means to practice.

Breaking it Down

Recently my teacher got very excited about about transitioning from a  side crane to Eka Pada Koundiyanasana II. Now each of these are poses I can ordinarlly achieve, but moving from one to the other? I was mostly transitioning from side crane to a disheveled pile on the floor. As I looked up from my disheveled pile, I watched one of my classmates who was also new to this sequence place her legs with great care and determination. She was going to make it into that pose with just sheer focus of attention.

Finally one day we had a small class and I asked for a variation to help me get ahold of the sequence.  Our teacher put a blanket on the floor by his head, then set his head on the floor in side crane, and from there switched legs and extended into Eka Pada Koundinyasana. I tried this variation without a lot of hope but with great determination. I realized that with my head resting on the floor, I had the time to carefully move the top leg to my upper arm, and make sure it was secure before removing the lower leg. Finally I had a way into the sequence. 

I grew up in a family of classical musicians, so I had been taught from a young age that when you confront something difficult, you slow it down and break it down into smaller and smaller pieces until it is no longer difficult. I went to sleep at night hearing my dad break down musical phrases into small chunks, repeating them over and over until they lulled me to sleep. (My dad has amazing precision when her performs; it sound effortless.) When you confront a difficult pose the concept is the same -- break the pose or sequence down into smaller more manageable chunks; add a block, add a blanket, adapt, adjust until the challenge is the right size for you at that point in your practice. The muscles will learn something and remember the experience even if it was achieved with a brick or a partner.

So recently I was playing poker with a fried who could make a bridge out of the playing cards after shuffling them.  "I can do this" I thought "I just need to break it down and pay careful attention." I asked her to explain her technique, and watched carefully how she held her hands. All my life I had thought "I'll never be able to do that. Some people can do it, and some people can't." Today I thought "this is like any new asana, I just need to break it down and practice." Yet another gift of yoga... and all those hours spent in a practice room as a child. Who would have thought.

On the Road

Lovely class at Twist Yoga this morning while visiting my dad. It was a lovely flow with an ayurvedic focus on the fall transition. They did a great  job making an out of town guest feel welcome and grounded. Sure miss my buddies at Sunrise though.

Why I Need Arm Balances

For years arm balances have been a guilty pleasure. I mean, there are no goals in yoga right? So why does it feel so triumphant to balance on your elbows? There is a feeling I get when I glide into Eka Pada Koundinyasana for example, that just changes my whole day. Until recently I thought it was some unseemly show of ego. But Saturday as we began the familiar sequence that leads to Eka Pada Koundinyasana II a kind of fierce determination came over me. I thought "that's it! Arm balances allow us to be fierce!"

By day I am a Unitarian Universalist minister, and the mother to a young boy. I constantly cultivate in myself patience and gentleness. Whenever any bit of fierceness or determination emerges in my kitchen or at a committee meeting I shake my head at myself inwardly. Patience. Active listening. Kindness. Letting go of outcomes.

But on the mat, this fierceness is okay.  In fact, our teacher has been encouraging us to move from Ashtavakrasana to crow and back. And each time I fall on my rear laughing I look over at that woman in the front row who is starting to get the hang of it, I see that fierceness in her. She is not giving up on that leg, quavering determinately in mid air,  until it is safely onto the other shoulder. 


Remember when we were little kids turning cartwheels in the backyard, or diving into the pool? "Look at me Mom! I did it!"  How often do we, as adults, get to experience that glee? This Saturday morning, as I rested in child's pose after an arm balance series I realized that perhaps I don't need to feel guilty when I focus my mind and will, and soar for a moment, balanced with legs outstretched. As long as I can continue to laugh and be patient when I fall on my face and try again.

Playing Around

Once I got over my incredulity that I too could kick up into handstand at the wall, I hit what has probably been an 8 year plateau in the pose. My attitude towards handstand since that time has pretty much been as a strength builder.  Whenever the teacher requests a handstand, I dutifully comply, but when other folks in my class start walking across the room on their hands, I tell myself that Adho Mukha Vrksasana is "not really my pose." For the last couple of year's I've been working on using a bunny hop to get up instead of the one legged approach.  It's much harder for me, somehow, so I keep plugging away at it. I'm able to hop my hips over my head only about 1 out of 3 times, so it keeps me humble.

Then a couple of weeks ago in class we practiced a partner pose going into handstand from kind of a double-dog position, with a third classmate spotting the handstander from behind.  I questioned the pedagogical usefulness of this, but just as I was musing critically our teacher said "I think it's good just to play around in handstand, you know?"

So the next time I was in the lake with my son and his friends, I thought maybe I should do some handstands in the water like I used to do when I was a little girl. I assure you I was the only adult in the lake doing handstands.  I felt a little foolish, but it's just as fun now as it was when I was eight.

Then yesterday in class, I hopped up into a perfectly balanced handstand before I even knew what had hit me.  Some muscle memory of fearlessly shooting my legs up through the water had stayed with me. I needed that lesson- that sometimes more progress is made by just playing around than by all the dutiful hard work in the world.