Okay, I'm back and fully alive again. Or nearly fully alive. Migraines tend to suck the life out of me for
at least a day. Add to that the fact
that I haven't been to yoga in about a month...for the first half of the day,
I'm pretty sure every muscle hurt, included the ones involved only in blinking. Luckily, it's all largely worked out as the
day has gone on. I even ran out and
danced in the rain a little bit. You
just have to do that every now and then, you know? You just have to let yourself feel the rain
and let remind it you that you're alive.
But anyway...hot yoga.
Whoever this Bikram dude was, he was insane. I mean seriously, who thinks of stuff like
this? "Not only are we going to
attempt to contort our bodies into postures that just don't make any logical
sense," thought he, "but we're going to do each ridiculous exercise
TWICE, over a span of 90 minutes, and we're going to do it IN THE
HEAT!" It's not just a little bit
of heat. A lot of heat. Ridiculous heat. It must be like 175 degrees. Or 105, according to Wikipedia. I wasn't too far off.
The class itself? Is
torture. You think you're going to
die. Or slip off your mat and slide across the
floor and into the mirror on the amount of sweat that is rolling off of you and
everyone around you. Yes, everybody has
a mat, and yes, everybody has a towel, and yes, the floor is some type of super
absorbent soak-up-the-sweat yoga floor, but there is just so much sweat. It comes out of places
where you don't even
have pores. You will sweat just laying
on the floor and not moving. But no,
just laying still isn't good enough. You
have to do things like stand on one leg, with one leg up in the air behind you,
hold that leg up with one hand, and stretch the other arm in front of you, so
you look like a bow and arrow. As much
as you want to, you don't get to just stretch it and then put your leg
down. Nope, you've got to hold it while
the yoga instructor rambles on and on about how much good you're doing for some
random part of your body, and how all you have to do is breathe. I'll have to do some research as to whether there are stats on
the murder rate of yoga teachers. I think it's a good thing that yogi wannabes are generally a peaceful people.
 |
| This is not me. I do not look like this. Yet. Or, perhaps, ever. |
Yoga, of course, is about you and no one else. It's not about the gorgeous woman with the
Ganesha tattoo who drips sweat like it's her job, but doesn't look
fazed in the least. It's not about the
60 year old man with leathery skin who looks like he could hold the one legged
postures for days. It's certainly not
about the woman with the unruly braid in her pink sports bra who accidentally
fell out of a posture, dropping her foot BEHIND her head, and so did a casual
back flip as she started again. And you
know, it's a good thing it's not about them, because what I've found is that
the regulars don't tend to be very friendly.
Given, I'm not very friendly after I've sweat out all the fluid in my
body and my muscles are shaking when I'm sitting still...but still. They're the opposite of friendly. And if you try to be friendly, they WILL shut
you down.
For example, one poor girl tried to be friendly after class
with someone who was clearly a regular.
"It was hot in there today," Friendly Girl said as they stood,
waiting for the shower. The Regular
looked at her, wearily, and said nothing.
"I thought it was hotter than normal. Maybe it was just more humid. I wanted to stick my head out the
window. I wasn't sure I was going to
make it. Do you think it was more
humid?" Friendly Girl asked.
The Regular, with absolutely no expression, finally responded
with "I think it was the normal temperature. I did notice that my sweat was more watery
than usual, but I've really been trying to
increase my fluid intake, and I drank coconut water before class, so I think
it was more related to that than to the temperature." She then turned around, thus ending the
conversation.
 |
| Also not me. And yes, this does hurt your head. And it is hard to breathe. |
Friendly Girl looked hurt.
I wanted to jump in, but was so confused as to how sweat could possibly
be "more watery," I didn't dare say anything at all.
So why do I keep going back?
What is it about this torture that I enjoy?
I don't really know.
I like the challenge, I guess. I
like the repetition. I know it will be
the same every time I go. There's a
ritual to it that is strangely comforting.
The change and progress I see is measurable. Most of all, though, this class is the only
thing I have found that can actually make my mind be quiet for 90 minutes. For 90 whole minutes, I don't have to think about
anything. All I have to do is be in my
body. All I have to do is breathe. The only thing I have to do for 90 minutes is
survive it, one minute at a time. Yoga
class is the only thing I have found that forces me to inhabit my body so
fully. I start the class self-conscious. I don't want to look at myself in the
mirror. I scrutinize and analyze and
feel embarrassed...and by the end, that is gone. I am there, in my body, making it through 90
minutes of sweat and heat and stretch and twist, and it makes me feel
strong. It makes me feel
successful. For that little bit of time,
I get to feel completely comfortable in my skin, if only because I am too
exhausted to do anything else. I get to
be conscious in the way I inhabit my
body, even if only because I can feel every muscle, tendon, and bone. My body--THIS body --the one that I live in
and argue with and have such a complicated relationship with every day of my
life -- this body carried me through 90 minutes of intensity without any
analysis or thought or deliberation. It
makes me feel alive and capable. It
makes my body feel whole, and trustworthy, and --yes--even beautiful.
 |
| To be clear...this is also not me. |
In class yesterday, my teacher quoted Bikram as saying that "yoga
is the only subject in which the subject is not the object." Yoga is the subject, she clarified, but you
are the object. Your body is the
object. We do not go to yoga class to "do
yoga." We go to deepen and strengthen
our relationship with our bodies.
90 minutes of body-living is worth it. 90 minutes where my brain gets a break, and
the only thing it has to do is breathe --that's worth it. 90 minutes of intense focus on the present
moment, with no thoughts of the past or the future is worth it. Surviving yoga means embracing my body. Therein lies the biggest challenge.
No comments:
Post a Comment