yoga diary - day eleven

It was hard again this morning and my first thought was, "oh no, not another angry yoga day."

Why isn't this getting easier? It was hard to get to the mat but I got there. Once there, I expected to be rewarded for my efforts with some good feelings, maybe some more graceful stretching but the first moves of my practice were harder than they have ever been.

It was hard to get my knees anywhere near the floor when I sat down, honestly, I don't think they would have been lower than my hips if I'd been sitting with my butt on a chair, much less a pillow or a rolled up towel. Then the first bends and stretches? No way, the backs of my thighs were resistant to the point of pain. It was harder than doing this on the very first day.

I still don't know why that is but what I did about it was to decide, fine, if it's going to be this hard, I'll take breaks, I'll make it easy, I'll cheat but I won't stop.

Red tide is immanent, it's natural for me to be impatient and angry about everything. This is the point where Kali energy peaks and destroying things, especially things that will shatter, is an attractive thought.

So I gave myself that permission and carried on.

About halfway through this difficult practice I started noticing the instructor's breathing was not perfect, she would say four more breaths and then actually instruct two or she'd say "deep inhale" then wait for solid 30 seconds, (and breathe the whole time) and then finally "exhale slowly." Not possible, I would have passed out.

She sometimes gave instructions twice. "Take one more deep breath and then lower your leg to the floor, now one more deep breath and lower that leg to the floor" speaking of the same leg.

Then I realized I wasn't reacting the way I expected. Instead of being annoyed and frustrated I was thinking to myself, "see? nobody gets it all right all the time." It's ok for things to go wrong.

I wasn't in the usual rut.

Suddenly I started thinking about life and love and how it all starts perfectly in ease and comfort and how we resent effort and resist it all the time and really? who wouldn't effort is pain, it's hard, it's sweat. Then I started thinking - what's the opposite of sweat and effort? It's ease and comfort and stillness, ultimately it's sleep. But sleep can be disturbed so I suppose ultimately it's death - which is like before birth, which is perfect and contained and still and (for the most part) solitary.

Which one do I want?

I was thinking I was at some sort of breakthrough point and becoming very wise when we reached Savasana (corpse pose) the last pose of the practice, lying there still and as "dead" as possible I heard the instructor say, "this is your most important pose."

Right.

It's not all about stillness or avoiding that and it's not about all about effort and extending myself, it's about finding where I am for the day and making the most of it. In love, it's about effort sometimes and repose at others, in life - same thing.

So on what is likely to be the last day of my physical practice for the month, I am back to where I started. Stretching for balance, looking for answers, trying to get somewhere with all of this.

It's not a line, it's a labyrinth.