If at first it sucks terribly, it might be worth trying again.
My first experience with yoga was as a young person in high school.
I was beginning to seek physical fitness and joined a small gym in my community. Yoga was on the roster of classes, and always being a flexible kid, I figured it would be a good fit. I mentioned wanting to try it to a friend and her mother who were also members of the gym. Her mother’s eyes grew wide and she said, “Oh no. You can’t do that. It’s not Christian. It’s worshiping another religion.” And so, being a “good Christian girl” I refused my intuitive desires to try a new form of exercise.
Sometimes I wonder where I would be had I picked up the practice back then when it first called me.
It would be many years before I finally realized what I was told that day by a well-meaning soul was an absolute falsity, a deep misconception around yoga and the type of principles it encourages.
Yoga is a philosophy. It has never been a religion.
Though yes, some posture may be named, in Hindi, after certain deities, there is no more an aspect of worship involved in a split pose, which does have such a name, as a forward fold, which doesn’t.
The philosophy of yoga is broken down into eight parts, or limbs as they’re often called. What you experience in a traditional class, postures, are but one aspect of eight.
That is to say, seven other parts of yoga are equally as important as the acrobatics of what we consider yoga to currently be in the mainstream.
The purpose of yoga is union; to unify the mind, body and spirit, to bring each aspect of the human experience, both ordinary and divine into alignment.
Yoga, in its truest form, is about coming back to a deep sense of oneself.
And so, this leads into a much broader conversation of what is yoga.
Can running be yoga? Can laughing be yoga? Can crafting and creating be yoga? From my perspective, certainly so.
There are some activities that are far more yoga than an asana class at a local studio.
And this is because yoga is really much more about the attitude, mindset and intention that you bring to an activity.
Each time I release the false need for something, like achievement, I am practicing yoga. Each time I choose to take a deep breath before lashing out at someone who pushes my buttons, I am practicing yoga. And each time I step to my mat and make it about the perfect posture, I am not practicing yoga.
See, it’s not about what we do, it’s about how we do it.
When I was in my junior year of college, I took yoga for the first time. But I didn’t just walk into a class. Per my usual style of operating, I jumped all the way in and took a full semester of yoga.
And I absolutely hated it.
In the past I’ve said, “he just wasn’t my teacher.” And though in this tradition we often talk about “our teachers,” as those who guide us down the path of knowledge with whom we resonate, it’s become clear to me that if he weren’t my teacher, he wouldn’t have been my teacher. He would have never crossed my path. So if I’ve felt so misplace in him crossing my path in the past, but I understand he is indeed been placed here to teach me something, what did my first teacher teach me?
I believe it is this: no matter how powerful your knowledge is, if it’s not relatable to the student, it does not matter what you share.
My teacher was so deep into yoga that this statements and practices were incredibly unrelatable to me. It became a class I disliked.
...Ok fine, I dreaded getting out of bed at 6 AM for this class.
And ultimately I shut down to the possibility of having yoga as any part of my life for a long time, even when years later, I was called to it by name.
It’s interesting to understand now what impact a teacher has on a student loving a subject, or absolutely rejecting it.
But, as fate has it, I would not be able to resist the practice for long.
In 2012 I started at a new gym. My muscles were the sorest they had ever been. To help, I started taking the yoga classes offered by the gym for recovery. Like so many, I came to yoga for the physical benefits. I remember my teacher saying “come to the studio, come to the studio.”
He knew. He was my messenger.
Yet, I still resisted.
Until one day I didn’t.
I walked into a yoga class. I stood on the mat. As we prepared to set an intention for our practice, my newest teacher said “think of all the people that have made it possible for you to stand here today.”
My head exploded. My heart exploded.
Nowhere in my life was I being told to be grateful for what I had.
And I had so much to be grateful for.
My mother.
My father.
My immigrant grandparents.
Our founding fathers.
And so began my love affair with yoga.
I had to find out more about this practice that was way beyond what it seemed.
And so I did.
Love,
Nat