Who Are You When You Are Simply Being?

For a year and a half now, part of my morning routine has included asking myself these questions:

• Who am I when I am simply being?

• Where am I when I am simply being?

• How am I when I am simply being?

• Do I need or want for anything when I am simply being?

• What’s happening to time when I am simply being?

I didn’t make these questions up. They came from Richard Miller, who offered them as part of a teaching I attended celebrating the life and work of yoga teacher T.K.S Desikachar. I very much admire Richard Miller’s work in yoga nidra and, when I make time for naps, often fall asleep to his dulcet tones.

I have taken these questions with me into the incessant beep beep of tuk-tuks in India, into the stillness of humid Cambodia mornings, into the sound of fish jumping and frogs croaking and mosquitos buzzing in my ear canals of summer camp, to my writing cabin, to a yurt in wintertime, to hotels for work, to the hospital, and back again to my yoga mat in the mornings.

Most mornings, I don’t even try to answer these questions. I just ask them before my mind leaps towards its to-do lists, its taking stock of relationships, its listening to the mice in the walls. I try to keep breathing while I ask them. And somehow in the asking, I’ve had glimpses of being part of the world in the biggest sense, of being inside a small slice of vast geologic time, of knowing that one day my bones just might amount to a fossil imprint on a sea bed or a limestone outcrop.

Often in these early hours, I’m ok with that, and, in fact, it comforts me. It’s the rest of the day that’s the problem.

As I wrote a few weeks ago, I have a tendency toward measurement, of making sure I Add Up in the world. Fear drives me through endless mazes of doing and achieving and self-recrimination for all the not doing and not achieving on endless repeat (sound familiar?) because what my heart would like me to realize, but what I would like to ignore, is that I have to sit with the truths of these deep fears I hold:

• Am I afraid of who I am when I am simply being?

• When I come to the end of my life, will I know I have not loved?

• When I come to the end of my life, will I know I have chosen to ignore the gift life is?

• When I come to the end of my life, will anyone want to hold my hand?

• Do I actually, truly have the capacity and the desire to change so I come to the end of my live in love?

Like many of my questions, I don’t as yet have answers though I do wonder if holding them gently rather than running so hard and fast away from them would allow for more softness in the experience and response.

Trying to hold the questions softly as we arrive in the darkest night of the year seems like a good idea. One of the things I appreciate about the Christian calendar is that the days before Christmas are actually meant to be ones of quiet contemplation. When we attended a beautiful, soulful church in Ottawa, I loved the Christmas Eve service, where each person held a taper candle in their hands, which, one-by-one, the person beside us lit.

Oh, friends. Can we put down all of our trappings for a few moments and sit with the questions? Can we let the night be silent? Can we take the light offered to us and in turn offer it the person beside us?

Are You Lonely?

Even when I was young, in my mid-twenties and not knowing anything yet, I felt awe in the presence of “older” women.

When I was 27, I had the great good fortune (I knew it was good, but didn’t know how good it was because I hadn’t had children and didn’t know how sacred the time and space to write was or what a giftl it was to have someone cook all my meals and make my bed every day), to spend five weeks at the Banff Centre for the Arts. Five whole weeks to write! To have not one, not two, but three poetry mentors to take my writing seriously, to help me learn craft, to offer a sense of spaciousness in the work! To hike! To swim! To spend these weeks in the company of other poets!

And even though I didn’t know anything then, I knew somehow that these other poets, particularly the four or five “older” women who were part of the studio program, had something that I, as yet, did not. They were up for adventure (one was writing about her time spent in the Arctic), they were unapologetic in their seeking, they were open to improving and learning new things, and they seemed entirely at home in themselves. They just were. I knew, somehow, that that’s who I wanted to be when I grew up.

Almost two decades later, now that I am nearing 43, I no longer think of these women as “old.” They were between 35-65 and had just entered or had been dwelling for a while in this space of being age calls us into. Given that I’ve recently been treated by a dentist and a resident surgeon both of whom looked to be 13, I can also now see that our perceptions of “old” do in fact shift with our own age!.

Its About How to Be

And rather than rail against my own advancing years, I’ve actually found them liberating. I think a lot of us do. Years have a way of bringing experience and learning. When we hit forty, suddenly we no longer gasping for air under the sea of young children, or the shoulds we’ve been expecting out of our careers, our social status, the perfection of our houses. We begin to recognize our own patterns and deficits, and we can see all of our messy stories as narratives that have shaped us into who we are—the good and the ugly. We begin to see things and ourselves as they are.

Sometimes (ok, oftentimes for me), we don’t like what we see. But now we might have more capacity to grope out into the darkness and see what we can find there. Often, we find other people who have dwelt in the darkness and can help us us draw maps to walk out of it.

As one of my yoga student/teachers said to me, when we hit 40, or 50, or 60, “it’s no longer about what to be, but how to be.” Yes.

Other Humans Can Equal Bridges Across Chasms

In learning how to be, we need real, physical, embodied people to help us. I’m so filled with thanks for the therapist I’ve found and for the existential check-ins we have, for counsellors in times past, for my own yoga teacher and for the teachings of yoga, for my teachers that join me in yoga each week. I’m especially grateful for these humans and their presence because I spend most of my work day in the digital space.

And although I have been known to rail on about the perils of the digital world (did you know there is such a thing as email apnea?), it can also be a profoundly educational and healing tool. I absorb so much teaching from podcasts about the nature of being, daily poems read into my ears from Tracey K. Smith,, weekly meditations by Susan Piver… the list goes on (and on). This richness is something that wasn’t available to us even 10-15 years ago.

These voices feel like bridges strung across chasms. They make me feel like I’m a part of what’s good in humanity. They make me feel like parts of me are not the monsters or aliens I thought they were. These voices have made me feel less alone.

This is the crux: together these voices and the real, physical presence of people in my life have made me less lonely. In doing so, they’ve allowed me to feel the heavy weight of protective armour I’ve spent many years dressing up in to get through each day.

Extra Armour Not Required

Don’t get me wrong; in many ways, I quite like my armour. It requires no change or work from me. It’s weight keeps me comfortably pulled down. Many days I’d like to order more of it through the convenience and non-human interaction of Amazon.

With the convenience of one click!

But doing so won’t let me get any closer to learning how to be. To come into myself the way those women poets had. Why? Because we need, as I heard on a podcast the other day, a soft underbelly in order to change and grow.

Showing a soft underbelly often feels vulnerable—I’ve been feeling that over the last few weeks as I’ve been writing and sharing these thoughts. Yet all of the people for whom I am most grateful have shown me their own soft underbellies. They’ve said yes, this hurts. Yes, there is darkness. Yes, I too have faults and insecurities and maybe life hasn’t turned out how I thought. Yes, there is also abundance. Yes, we’ll find a path together.

In the last few years, my husband has found himself in a leadership position at work, and last week he attended workshop on physician wellness. The presenter, bless them, said that one of the best questions you can ask someone is are you lonely?

It’s true—if I ask you are you lonely, I am opening a door between your heart and mine. I am cutting through the surface question of how are you doing? and its conditioned response of “I’m fine.” I’m letting you know that you don’t need to give me a pat response, that I actually really care, and that you can answer yes. I’m letting you know that we are both human. That I, too, know what loneliness is. That my underbelly is soft. That I might not be able to fix anything, but that I am listening and holding your hand in the dark as we both learn how to be.

Are You Hungry?

This weekend, I am full of gratitude to be at the little cabin on a farm that I have been coming to twice a year for the last three years in order to write. This time, I’m also here to rest after my world turned upside down in the last four weeks (it’s so hard to believe it’s almost been four weeks!).

The days are full of the crunch of frost on frozen fields, the wind through stripped trees, flights of ravens and blue jays, the hum of the refrigerator, the woodstove clicking in heat. I’ve slept for long chunks of time. I’ve nourished and felt pleasure in the nourishing of my body with good food and tea and water.

But for the first time since I’ve been coming here, there’s been a new sound—cats sharpening their paws on the post beam near the back door and mewling to get in.

We are decidedly hungry!

When I pulled up in my car on Friday night, four cats came crawling out from under the front porch to greet me. They looked well fed, but cold. I sent the owner of the cabin a message asking if she would like me to keep them outside or if there was food I could give them or if she would prefer I do neither. She replied that she’d seen someone throw a pregnant cat from a moving car on the road. She’d made a nest for the cat in the garage and regularly fills up a food dish. The cat has since had three kittens, and whenever I step out the door to get firewood or go for a walk or to breathe some fresh winter air, the cats are there, hovering and pleading to get in. If they see me in the kitchen, they prowl around the windows. As I write, I can see them scampering after mice and leaves in the wind.

My heart, of course, wants to let them in. It is -15 out today, with snow coming. But they are feral and the owner rightly does not want them in her home. So, I say hello, then shoo them away. It doesn’t feel good or right.

This is How I Can Help

All of this has led to thoughts about offering — warmth, food, touch — heightened by things I’ve already been chewing on. Yesterday, I sent out a short essay on my TinyLetter space about how asking people how are we doing? falls short of what’s truly needed in human interaction. One of my very dear and wise yoga students/ teachers replied that an alternate, better question is “are you hungry?” (What would I do without my fellow seekers?)

My soup would not look this fancy. Just saying.

It’s such a simple question, yet somehow it gets right down into the belly of being a human. It allows for a simple response: yes or no. If the person is physically hungry, we can prepare them a meal, grilled cheese, say or soup or chocolate brownies. While I tend to fall into a thinking trap where food is something to be controlled, food, when offered this way, is love. It demands nothing. It says here. Rest. Eat. This is why people bring food when catastrophe strikes (for which I am so thankful). They are saying I love you. They are saying this is how I can help.

And maybe, if you ask the question, the person will respond with a need that runs deeper. Maybe if they say yes, they are speaking to the river running through them that they can’t find their footing in, that they can’t name, that they can’t manage to swim through to the bank, to grab hold of a rock or a tree root or overhanging branch.

This can be a grim place to be and a grim place to witness, especially when we can’t ourselves pull our friend out of that river. But maybe we can try to sit beside them in their suffering.

We’ll Probably Fail A Thousand Times

This sounds all well and good, I know. It’s hard. It requires us to climb out of our own cold rivers, which I myself am really and truly not very good at. It requires us to set aside our agenda for that moment in time, to put aside the things we must be doing (work, vacuuming, changing the litter). It asks us to make time. It asks us to climb over the barriers we build and society builds around us. And we’ll probably fail a thousand times before we get that one time right.

As I was packing to come here, my nine-year-old son came home from a long day rehearsing the school musical on a PA day. He and his sister started to fight. She said some unkind words, he kicked her. I yelled and sent them both to their rooms. I could hear him sobbing through the ceiling. I don’t have time for this, I thought. What is his problem?

Then I heard him fall off his bed, and the sobs escalated. I marched upstairs still in a pique, threw open his door and said, What is going on? Why on earth are you crying?

And my sobbing child on the floor said, I don’t know.

And something in that response made me grab hold of a branch in my own river, climb out to the bank, and see the little boy drowning in something he couldn’t understand. Many times in the past, I’ve chosen not to see, but somehow, in that moment, I chose to be there. I asked if he needed a hug. He climbed into my lap and we rocked in a chair for a few minutes.

Are you hungry? I asked.

Yes, he said.

When Things Fall Apart

A Watch Cannot Measure How Far the Heart Can Fall

I’ve had an Apple watch strapped to my wrist for the better part of a year. I wanted it for many reasons: it measured my steps, how many active calories I burned, how many hours I stood or exercised, my heart rate, my speed when running or biking, and I could even wear it while swimming laps in the pool. If I got my lap count wrong (say 50 laps, when I had only done 48), well then, I could correct that “error “right away. In short, I liked (ok, still like) how it measured my efforts over the course of each and every day. If I didn’t close my “Move” ring one day, then I knew I darn well better do it the next day (one of my yoga students asked me this week “who sets these rules?” and I answered, only half-jokingly, “well, God does!”)

I don’t think I’ve always measured things. When I was a young child, I spent long days wandering rolling pastures without thinking too much about time or how far I’d walked. Did I begin to measure when I was a teenager at an evangelical Bible camp (did my soul measure up?), or when I rowed competitively (did I weigh too much?), or when I was in university (if I failed to get As, would the universe rain down its acid of inevitable and irrevocable failure?)? In short, what could I punish myself for? (Here are some podcast pearls of wisdom on doing a lot of these things out of self-punishment.)

This is my watch at 4 pm today. Given I’m at a writing retreat, I did not put it on today, which, I’ll admit it, discombobulates me.

What Will I Have Left?

Part of this penchant for accounting likely has to do with a personality trait of mine, which, according to Gretchen Rueben’s Four Tendencies Framework , is the Upholder. This means that if I say I’m going to run 10 kilometres, I must run 10 kilometres and not 9.98.

But it also runs a little deeper. If I track my food precisely, I can control my weight and how people see me. If I make this many dollars, I will feel secure. If the dishwasher is loaded and unloaded in exactly the right way, the house will not fall down into a pile of broken bricks and splintered floor boards around me. It is funny and ridiculous, and I can sometimes roll my eyes at it, but really, it is because I am deeply, terribly afraid of losing control and whatever the consequences of this loss might be.

And I have been deeply, terribly afraid of what the loss of all this tracking and doing might leave me with.

Things Actually Fall Apart, and I’m Too Busy On My Phone to Realize It

Well, of course, despite all this calculating and worrying and holding things so, so tight, when disaster was actually striking, when things were actually falling apart, I wouldn’t/couldn’t even recognise it. From my hospital bed, I was too busy on my phone trying to control who would look after my editing students, trying to find subs for my yoga classes, letting my co-volunteer at the school’s breakfast club know that I would not make it in that week. I was updating Facebook and finishing reading a novel.

What a manageable mini-lark this all was! In other words, I was in absolute denial that I actually had no control over my body at this point and that to live without a major organ exploding, I had to cede all of that control into the hands of very well-trained professionals in a space-ship like room full of sterile equipment, who would put me to sleep and remove said organ without me even feeling it (praise be).

The Best Damn Recoverer

At that point, I thought I would be fine. I was proud of how fit and healthy I was, which made the risk of complication lower and the ease of recovery, I thought, higher. I would, in fact, be the best damn recoverer known to humankind. Indeed, I came home from the hospital at 9:30 am, seven hours after surgery, and by 10 am, I was clearing up email (because who needs to rest or sit with anything?)

Ah, hubris. In fact a day after surgery, I woke up to pain, which escalated in the night. It came in waves that felt like they were sending shrapnel through my stomach and pelvic floor. It went on and on and on, so intense I couldn’t pee, or stand, or do anything but cry. I spent a much more horrible day in the emergency room. There was no texting or reading or coping, just being in pain in a seething room of others also in pain (though I did listen to Jon Kabat Zinn’s Body Scan Meditation over and over again, which I think helped just as much as the pain drugs, and more for my state of mind). Then I went home and spent several more days not able to walk or lie down or sit or sleep without those pain waves.

In that time frame, the unknowing was almost worse than the pain. What was causing it? Would it last forever? Was I crazy? Who was I if I was not working, moving, answering texts and emails and checking Facebook?

In that time, I realized I had to shut it all down. The computer. The phone. The “I am strong and tough” persona. I could not truly, deeply rest with the digital space calling me. I had to tell people “I am not ok” and rely on their true goodness. I had to ask for help (note: had to. Why can’t we just allow ourselves and other people the giving and receiving of help?). I had to lie on the couch and watch the light of winter blanket the back yard and the chickadees go on in the face of it. I had to sit with the Big. I. Don’t. Know. And I hated it.

The Best Damn Recoverer (Reprise)

In the end, after a few more days, a CT confirmed nothing was internally wrong, and that the pain turned out to be from damage to muscles and nerves, who were quite insulted by the whole scenario (no one tells you a very high percentage of post-operative patients experience nerve pain).

A ha! I thought. I know how to work with this; I am a yoga teacher who has taken courses on how the mind works with pain! I have played for my students Richard Miller’s Yoga Nidra on pain recording! I will be up and running (literally) in no time! I should be ok — it’s just muscle and nerve pain, and the surgeon doesn’t know why this has happened, so it’s not real pain! I should be able to return to my pre-surgical life in the prescribed 4-6 weeks. This experience should not be happening to me, so I’m going to ignore it and do all the things anyway!

Well, it turns out my body has its own timeline. True, I’ve had some good days, and even a week where it felt like my muscles were healing, and in response I pushed it, but didn’t even know I was pushing it until hours after. Then, yesterday, I turned the wrong way or something (I don’t even know what I did), and my Friendly Insulted Psoas started spasming in a new place, in the upper half and around my back, waking me up in the night, sometimes taking my breath away, sometimes hurting to actually breathe.

Have I learned a Wise Lesson in all of this? I wish I could say I truly understood in the depths of my being Pema Chodron-like truths about the ground always shifting beneath us and that certainty is not in fact certainty. Pre-surgery, I really thought I knew this stuff, talked about it in my yoga classes, thought I was chill with the overall concept of shifting ground.

But it turns out I don’t really know this stuff. I fight this stuff. My mind throws tantrums into the universal void that keeps hitting me back with an asteroid named Slow. The. Fuck. Down.

A List Without Answers

What do I know? What can I share? I don’t have final answers, only this list, only these things I am working through and don’t have a pat ending for, a list I would be happy to have you add to:

• Things fall apart.

• Sometimes we will be in the void without answers and without knowing if we will make it out.

• As one of my wonderful yoga students said, sometimes all we can do, and the best thing to do is name it: “This is suffering.”

• In order to rest, we must Shut It All Down. We must shut down the measuring and the doing, even if everything in our minds and cultures tells us we can’t possibly. We must dwell in stillness even if it scares us because if we don’t, the universe will make that choice for us, and it will not be pretty or comfortable or “safe.”

• The only person who can make me rest is me. The only person who can make you rest is you. But we can bring each other cups of tea and muffins and allow for that rest even if it goddamn kills us.

• We must reach out in the dark for other people. Other people will open their arms.

• We must learn these lessons again and again and again.

PS

My Ongoing Time of Trial has dragged my writing life back into the picture, even if I am kicking and screaming at it (Fuck you, creativity!!) For that, I am happy, and hoping to write more regularly here. Also, I probably won’t always use so many expletives. Maybe.

Voices in the Wilderness

Last post, I wrote a little bit about happiness and how one of my favourite podcasts helped me know more about myself and, as a result, come to accept myself a little bit more. 

This week, I got to thinking how podcasts (and good radio) carry such potential to help us be happy in our daily lives, come to know ourselves, help us feel we are not alone, and learn about others and the world around us. When I was on the cusp of adulthood in my early twenties, I remember listening to the CBC show Ideas while driving home in the dark and feeling somehow ethereal and somehow part of a shared and cozy humanity--that there were others out there listening to the voices in the wilderness, too.

Light years later, I've discovered podcasts, and while I try not to multi-task too much, I love listening to them while working in the yard or especially while grocery shopping because it makes me feel so much more human and alive than proceeding through the endless assembly line of consumption. 

My favourite podcast is called On Being, where host/interviewer Krista Tippet interviews anyone from quantum physicists to poets to activists to musicians on what it is to be, to question, to wonder, and to truly talk to each other on this earth. 

A few days ago, I listened to Invisibilia, a show about the invisible forces that make up our daily life. This season, they are focusing on "concepts," the first being a radical retake on how emotions are made. 

And on my must-listen-to list is the Metta Hour, with meditation guru Sharon Salzberg. 

What do you listen to? What podcasts inspire you? Why?

It's OK to be Happy

Happiness is one of those words that seems to be everywhere in our lexicon today. People study it, many books are being written about it, and in fact, one of my favourite podcasts is Happier with Gretchen Rubin. 

I like the podcast because while it does have it's more philosophical moments, it also offers practical tools to move towards happiness. Through the podcast, I also had an Aha! moment in terms of my personality type (I'm an Upholder). For a long while, I could see only the negatives of this personality type (I can be fairly rigid, for example), but it also helped me realize I can know my tendencies and work with them instead of just feeling bad about myself. (Take the quiz here).

This is the key: somehow along the way, I had started a cycle of thinking that said that because I was this way or that way, or because of this or that, or because I had or did not have this or that, or because, because, because, I didn't deserve to be happy. This went on to the extent that I felt guilt over who I was and where I lived in the world and the privileges I have most moments of every waking day. 

Guilt, of course, didn't serve anyone else and didn't serve me. Change -- whether directed at yourself or at contributing somehow in the world -- doesn't work very well if it comes from a place of guilt, which is a state that draws energy towards the self instead of extending it outwards. 

Better, say the Buddhists, to direct love toward the self and extend it outward in an ever-widening circle after that. So, for the past 6 months, I've been doing a Loving Kindness meditation every morning (here's a guided example). 

Today marks the inauguration of Laundry Line season, which also makes me happy.

Has it made me happier? Yes, but not in any grand way. I think the McHappy Quest we all seem to be pushed toward these days is a bit of a myth. I'm not floating around in a state of equanimity and joy all day. Not all parts of my life are singing in a harmonious chorus (though I would like them to be!). But it has, like all practices, helped me to extend little moments of love towards myself, towards those I love, and towards those I don't like very much at all. I think this has made generosity easier for me -- I genuinely want to do things that help others in small ways, which doesn't come from a guilty feeling.

It has helped, in little ways, for me to see bits of beauty every day. Even if I forget them 10 minutes later, even if when the kids get home, I get grouchy and annoyed, at least I've known a bit of gratitude, which I'm hoping gradually builds into more equanimity.

Every single person deserves these little moments. Everyone -- even you, even me. 

You Have Permission to Nap

Last week, I encountered a lovely piece of writing on the perils of always needing to be productive, to be doing something -- and of course I read it while sneaking in a Facebook session, while feeling guilty about being on Facebook, while doing something mundane, like trying to sweep (again) the floor. 

The story brought me into a chair, and I've been thinking about it ever since. It brought to my awareness how much I am always--almost every waking minute--trying to prove the worthiness of my existence by achieving: a clean floor, a new poem, a new book, another yoga class. I've felt it particularly since I stopped working full-time because I feel an acute need to justify my existence because I am not making a full-time wage anymore. I've internalized that making money, or keeping a clean house, or being a master family manager, is what generates my worth even though I would say to anyone else that they are worthy for simply being here and being them. So why is it so hard to offer rest and compassion to the self? 

 Of course, there's a laundry list of reasons for everyone, and we don't need to make ourselves busier by listing them. Instead, step out. Breathe. Go lie down on some grass in the sun.

Last week, I tried to do a few of these things. One day, I took a nap in the hammock even though I still had 4 yards of dirt to haul. And I listened to this fabulous yoga nidra--which is deep yoga rest--practice by Richard Miller, too. Yes, it's 35 minutes long, and yes, you are worth taking that 35 minutes out of a schedule to listen. 

Walking Out the Mind

Walking is one of -- and probably the most important -- of my daily practices. It's a quiet and often overlooked practice that doesn't need any fancy equipment beyond a comfortable pair of shoes. 

There is something about the rhythm that is cerebellar, that gets me out of my mind and into my body and the surrounding world. I can feel wind, sun, rain, or snow on my face. I can hear what birds have returned. I can smell water on rock. I can hear, as poet Robert Bringhurst puts it, the thinking of things.

I usually leave right after the school bus whisks the children away. Often getting them out the door leaves me feeling fairly fractured and anxious, which leads me to circling through my usual mental loops over how the day will go, what I will fail to do, what disaster will occur, etc.

But give me ten minutes on the lakeside path I frequent, and I'm already feeling less fraught. Like most things that make us a bit easier, it's not magic, but it sure is a simple medicine. 

Portsmouth Harbour Breakwater

Yoga is Not About the Pants

Or about how "flexible" you are.

Or about six pack abs.

Or about the person next to you doing a headstand while flossing their perfectly straight, perfectly white teeth. 

It is not about being "good" at yoga, or being "fit," or being attractive/skinny/bendy enough to be allowed in a yoga studio, though it seems most yoga magazines and yoga stores if not explicitly, than implicitly through their use of photos and ads, create these rules. 

We have enough places/magazines/brands telling us to feel bad about ourselves 

Yoga doesn't have to be one of them. 

In fact, my favourite explanation of what yoga is comes from T.K.S. Desikchar, in The Heart of Yoga. Yoga, he writes, can be defined as "attaining what was previously unattainable." He goes on to say, the starting point for this thought is that there is something that we are today unable to do; when we find the means for bringing that desire into action, that step is yoga."

That step could be finding a way into a pose that's comfortable and steady for us or learning to examine our own reactions to a given situation. But, Desikachar writes, "the practice of yoga only requires us to act and to be attentive to our actions. Each of us is required to pay careful attention to the direction we are taking so that we know where we are going and how we are going to get there; this careful observation will enable us to discover something new."

In this explanation, there's no room for should be. There is only room for what-is, for coming to the self and the world with alertness, curiousity and attentiveness. And it's those little acts of attentiveness that add up to a life. 

And for that, pants are optional. 

mazaletel: courtesy of Flickr.

You Don't Need a Serious Yoga Face

When I was in my early twenties, my friend and I went to a particular yoga studio for the first time. This was serious yoga. Everyone wore serious, solemn expressions while unrolling their mats, lining up their water bottles, and sitting in expectation of the instructor's arrival.

When the instructor arrived, she too was very serious. Instructions were given firmly, without the trace of a a smile. They were carried out equally firmly by everyone with Serious Yoga Faces, except my friend and I. We were trying to keep our novice giggles in, an effort that collapsed into laughter when he accidentally whacked my chin with his long arm. 

The instructor looked at us pointedly and barked "No laughing!" 

Duly chastened, we fell into silence, but we also never went back to that yoga studio again. 

Seriousness Can Make You Brittle

There are likely very serious reasons you might want to practice yoga. You might want to gain more health or more relief from stress, and of course these are some clear benefits of yoga. 

But if you can't hold a tree pose without being a bit or a bunch wobbly, will chastising yourself while squeezing every muscle you have to the point you think your head might pop off really help you become a graceful and balanced tree?

When we reach for or try for something so hard it almost hurts, what we are actually doing is creating more strain, both physically and mentally. We become rigid instead of supple. We miss out on the opportunity to say "Oh, silly me, there goes my balance again," then to try again without worrying if we will fall (we might!) 

With a lightened heart, maybe we will never get a "perfect" tree or live the "perfect life," but we will have the opportunity to experiment with what works or what doesn't for us, to experience moments of fun, to connect with the person who's face we've just hit by accident. 

Find the Joy

Whether it's in your own home practice or at a studio, ask yourself if joy lives there. It will be impossible--sheer drudgery--for you to keep coming back to the mat or to any practice if there isn't just the tiniest spark of joy somewhere.  

To Create Daily Yoga Practice You Don't Even Need a Mat

Creating a daily practice of anything can feel like climbing a mountain uphill both ways in a thunderstorm on an empty stomach. Likely, your days already feel too crowded for one long breath, let alone adding an extra 10 or 15 minutes for contorting yourself into a pretzel on an overpriced sticky mat by your dying fern in the corner of your living room at some ungodly hour, which is the only time you can possibly squeeze in. Who would want to do this? It sounds and feels like a punishment. Like a should instead of a relief. 

Start with a Vision

If you are thinking you should practice yoga, you'll always feel like you are pushing and pulling your kicking and screaming self into something you really don't want to do. Yuck.

It might be more helpful to start with a vision of what you want your life to feel like versus what it feels like right now. We're not talking about picturing doing a wheel pose ten hours a day on a warm Tahitian beach or on a mountain peak in your perfectly moulded yoga pants. We might be talking about "I want to find an approach to back pain that works," or "I want to feel connected to myself and others," or "I want to know what I'm feeling," or "I just want ten minutes to unwind everyday." When you think of your vision, what does it feel like in your body? Does it feel soft? Lighter? Note what this feels like, and let this feeling be your motivator and guide. If a step you take doesn't make you feel your are moving towards your vision, reconsider your approach. 

Make it Easy

To start a yoga practice, you don't even need to set aside an extra 10 minutes of your day if it feels too overwhelming. You don't even need a mat. Why not take a different approach -- instead of cramming more in, why not find a way to make what you are already doing to feel softer and easier? 

Here are a few simple ways you can think about beginning to add yoga into your life (but you only have to pick one, you don't have to do all the yoga all right now):

• Do you eat? Fantastic! Try turning off your phone, putting down your book or newspaper, and muting the podcast. Eat slowly. Savour the texture and taste of each bite. Breathe in and out between bites. Finish each breath. Try eating this way once a day for a week or two and make a note of any differences this practice makes in your life.
• Do you breathe? Fantastic! Can you practice feeling your breathe as it expands into your side and back ribs every time you get in a car? Or set a timer on your phone to buzz every hour. Use that reminder to take 10 breaths into your back and side ribs. Practice this for a week or two and make a note of any differences this practice makes in your life. 
• Do you stand or sit? Great! If you find yourself making dinner with fifty toddlers clinging to your legs, or trying to get through a work Skype call without hyperventilating, root down through your feet. Imagine them as tree roots anchoring you down. Then breathe up all the nutrients the tree roots are gathering. Soften through the front and back of your neck, and breathe into your side and back ribs. Breathe like this for 10 or so breaths. Try to do this at least once a day. Make a note of any changes after a week or two.
• Do you like to rest? You're in the right place. At any point in the day, especially just before bed, find a pillow and a wall. Slide your hips right to the wall, slide the pillow under your hips, and swing your legs up the wall. Let your arms open a bit away from your body, turn your palms up, and breathe. Place a rolled up blanket under your neck if it feels strained. 

Worry Not

Chances are you won't feel some mystical or magical transformation now (or maybe ever). That's ok. Just keep finding those little moments every day to breathe into and through. Pay attention to how this feels in your body. That's all you have to do for now.

Let Me Know

If you experiment with any of the suggestions above, let me know how you fare either in the comments or via email.

Until next week,

Brenda