I don’t know why I picked up that particular yoga video. Maybe it was the woman smiling peacefully in meditation on the cover, or the
bold letters proclaiming it was definitely for “any body” (not to be confused
with “anybody”). Probably it was the only workout video in the $5 bin and I’d
had enough of myself: I was fat and I couldn’t touch my toes, two facts that
had only become more factual as time went by.
But after one attempt, I was in love: Yoga was pretty.
It wasn’t like all the sweaty, gross exercise I had tried in
the past. There were so many lovely names for the poses that I couldn’t do:
Lotus, which involves tying your legs in a knot; Half Moon, which involves
standing precariously on one leg; Birds of Paradise, which involves tying your
limbs in a knot while standing precariously on one leg. All of these and more
were demonstrated by a serene instructor, near a beautiful beach
setting. “Go at your own pace,” the instructor said in her charming foreign
accent. “Don’t push your body too hard.”
“Right,” I said, “Not pushing,” but in my heart I knew: If I
could master yoga, then I would have arrived. I didn’t
know where I was arriving, only that I wanted to be in that place – that
pretty, serene place – so very badly.
I wasn’t naturally talented at it. Halfway through the 45
minute video, I would sit in the floor, head cocked like a confused terrier’s,
watching as the instructor flowed through ever more complicated poses as the
most basic poses eluded me. I couldn’t get my forehead to the ground in Child’s
pose. I couldn’t hold myself up in Down Dog. I couldn’t stand up straight in
Mountain pose. “When you are tired or out of breath, just return to these poses
until you find your center,” the lithe video-instructor told me.
“Where do I go if those are the poses knocking me off
center?” I wondered.
I tried everything. My Amazon wishlist was covered in yoga
videos. I was getting a new one every month and couldn’t do half of them. I
listened to yoga podcasts, went to yoga classes, read yoga blogs, always
seeking more of that beauty and serenity in my everyday life.
“Just pick one pose,” a friend suggested, “just one pose to
do during every yoga workout until you get it right.”
I settled on Tree pose because I liked the name, never
considering that it was yet another pose that involved standing precariously on
one leg. I persevered. Trees are calm. Trees are spiritual. Trees are solid and
sturdy.
I fell down.
Repeatedly.
I inwardly referred to my efforts to do Tree pose as
“Toppling Tree pose,” until I learned that Toppling Tree was the name of an
actual and altogether different pose that I also was unable to do.
I fell down some more.
I picked a different pose to work on.
After months, I still couldn’t tie my limbs in knots. “Bring
your arm behind your back, under your thigh, and clasp your hands together,
coming into a bind,” an audio podcast said.
I twisted my arm behind my back and strained toward my
thigh, coming nowhere near under it, and not even to the same zip code as my
other hand.
“What if my body just isn’t built that way, no matter how
hard I try?” I lamented to my husband, who was playing video games nearby.
“It just takes time,” he said.
I sighed as the podcast directed me to attempt the same move
with the other arm. “They won’t let me on the colony ship to Mars because I’m
not supple enough!” I said.
Matt only shrugged. That’s when I knew he wasn’t really
listening.
And then one day when the instructor in one of those videos
said, “Now hold the pose for five breaths,” I said, “Screw it. I’m tired,” and
I did Down Dog instead.
“Wait a minute…” I thought. “I can’t do Down Dog. This is
one of my least favorite poses…”
Only it wasn’t. I couldn’t remember the last time I had
dreaded hearing the words, “Raise yourself up into Downward Facing Dog.” What I
remembered was the instructor from that very first video saying, “When you are
tired or out of breath, just return to these poses until you find your center.”
Tossing yoga DVDs around the living room, I searched for
that video, long neglected amid all the new ones from Amazon and the audio
podcasts. That day, I did the entire 45 minute workout for the first time.
Somewhere along the way, the things I couldn’t do became doable.
So I kept right on doing them.
I never did find that pretty, serene place. Life isn’t like
the yoga videos. There are things I still can’t do, both in yoga and in everything else. There will always be days
when I’m off balance, when the most I can do is the least I’m capable of doing.
Those days are okay.
I know now, in a way I couldn’t know before, that you keep
doing the things you can’t do until you can.
I also know, unequivocally, that I can touch my toes.
Nice to know I'm not the only one who feels like this!
ReplyDeleteSomeday I'll write a post about running, but there will be cursing in that one.
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