My Yoga
by Kay Taylor
When I started doing yoga, I had a love/bored relationship with it. Not love/hate, but more like the yoga practice of clock gazing. It's 11:35. Seems like it should be noon already. The spinal twist is now facing in the other direction.
It's now 11:37. What time does this class end? Noon or 12:15. Maybe I could just go to the bathroom for awhile...
For years I'd go to one, 60-minute class per week. But then life got busy. I moved. The teacher moved. I'd stop for a while and then I'd feel inspired to start again. I did feel more relaxed after class and I imagined it was good for me to stretch my muscles. But the clock would tick ever so very slowly.
I'm mildly embarrassed to say that I didn't really enjoy or explore yoga seriously for the first forty years I was doing it. Yet during most of those years I had a strong practice of meditation, spiritual studies, endless psychotherapy and a inner compass of integrity and compassion.
I just didn't know that what I was doing was actually yoga.
I first read the Yoga Sutras as a trainee in the Stellarflow teacher training. It's like playing baseball for a few decades and never knowing the rules. The Yoga Sutras were the first written summation of yoga principles, written by the sage Patañjali approximately 2400 years ago. I love that the Sutras go on and on about the details of simply living a conscious life before physical yoga is even mentioned, and mentioned ever so briefly, I might add. This assures us absolutely anyone can 'do' yoga. We are all capable of learning to be honest (Satya), or cultivating cleanliness (Saucha), even if our handstand isn't quite happening yet.
Our yoga practice is meant to be nourishing and illuminative. In the 'Heart of Yoga' by T.K.V. Desikachar (this book is available at Innerstellar and is really a must-read), we are counseled to develop alertness and relaxation. This means we develop a pose that is vibrant and alert yet without tension, and our relaxation is without dullness or heaviness. We cultivate strength and ease at the same time.
It has taken me these past few years to fully understand and embody this simple core principle. It's so easy to strive and force oneself to try to keep up with what we think the teacher is demanding of us, or to slack off-to slide out of the pose when the teacher is looking in the other direction, like a rebellious child. I know that no matter what asana is offered in a class, I CAN find my breath and listen to my body. I ask myself 'what part of this can I do?' and through this subtle questioning and awareness, a discovery unfolds. This is my practice - cultivating strength and ease at the same time. I am learning how to move out of struggle and focus on what is possible, sliding into the spaciousness that feels right for my body, knowing that it's different every day.
I've also come to understand the true nature of yoga is all of life. Yoga is not just twisting around on a mat, but is every single breath, every single thought, every single choice. In the petrie dish of strength and ease, yoga is no longer boring for me. There's no need to look at the clock, because truly I am always in a yogaclass. I am practicing and honing my ability to meet life, to be alert and strong in body and mind, while cultivating a joyful and open heart.
This is my yoga.
originally featured in our June 2016 newsletter
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Photo credit for the red shirt photo: Gavin Drummond