Yoga

Stretching my limbs, now

In a knot – focus on breath

While my cat looks, yawns

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Sometimes we get lucky – but only if we do something to make luck find us. Sometimes, that requires actually reading the newsletters we get.

Moving through unread e-mails, I stumbled upon my energy providers’ newsletter. I clicked, and saw a bright, pleasant e-mail with stories about digital pollution (in French; in Dutch), saving energy during winter, and two job openings. And, at the end, the contest.

I hesitated for a moment – the prize made me reflect. What if I win, I thought. And then I have to actually use this prize…

I still clicked.

And I won.

8 online yoga classes.

It took me a week to recover from that news. A week deciding which name I was going to send them in answer to their question, “who will be taking the classes?”.

I thought of my sister, but she already joined a yoga club. I thought of my friends, but I didn’t want to have to answer the obvious question of why I didn’t take it up myself. I even thought of my mom who has back problems and crappy internet, and of my boyfriend, who – yoga? Yoga? Ha. Ha. Ha.

So I told myself: “How bad can it be? I can always turn off the camera, right?”

And sent my name.

Then, they sent me emails with my account details, and info about the program.

And I waited again.

As if merely clicking on the link to check out their program would somehow expose me. They would all of a sudden see me and see right through me – a bit like a Hobbit peeking into the Palantir – and then I would no longer be able to escape.

The same joy-ku from above on a yellow background.

What was I so afraid of, I wondered? I had done yoga before. Years ago, as a student in Antwerp, taking the bike to follow my friend who had grown up in the city, through the streets at night, to a place I could never find on my own. A nondescript building. We parked out bikes, rang a bell, went up a flight of stairs and entered another world. A large room, windows covered, and the entire ceiling decorated with large pieces of colorful cloth, in browns, shades of red and orange. Pillows in warm colors of turmeric, red chili and cinnamon. Mats in soft colors. Small lights were scattered across the room, and incense was burning with smells I didn’t yet know how to name – nor do I today. Music played softly. Around us, people from all walks and phases of life got ready for the session, barely speaking. At one end of the room, the yoga teacher, looking as if he just got off a plane from India in the seventies, got ready and signaled the start of the session. There I stood, a young girl from out of town, with a practical and “act normal, that’s already crazy enough”-upbringing, in very boringly regular clothes. I happened to have wound up in a central spot, smack in the middle of the room, and I spent the next hour desperately pretending I was going to really understand what all this greeting of sun and moon and something with a dog meant. And how my body could also twist itself like that.

I never felt bad there. Anytime my friend went and invited me, I went.

But I never felt like it was something for me. Something I would seek out on my own.

Here, two decades later, I’m sitting in front of my pc. And I click the link, and register for what seems to be the lightest and easiest session, called Yin Yoga. “In a Yin Yoga class, the emphasis lies on slowing down, softness and mildness for yourself. Yin Yoga gives you the opportunity to explore your boundaries and is suitable for beginners and advanced yoga practitioners.” My translation is crappy, but that’s what it said in Dutch. Everything else looked much more demanding, I must admit. I imagined myself laying on the floor and could already see my biggest hurdle being having to fight off sleep. “I can do that.” , I figured.

So I did what I typically do: I signed up and committed myself before I could chicken out again.

This morning, at 10am, I was strangely looking forward to the session.

The kids at school, the boyfriend upstairs, I installed my fitness mat on the floor, got the pc in front of me, and logged in on zoom with the camera off. Until I realized I was the only one with the camera off, and took my first hurdle: I switched it back on.

With little introduction, we started.

Oh la la.

This is not cardio, that’s true, and it’s slowing down, for sure. But when the instructor spoke about how it’s about unblocking your body and making your joints more supple and mobile, she was not joking. My body let me know that, nope, no fight against falling asleep necessary here.

“Let your breath be your anchor point,” the instructor said.

My anchor point? It felt like my boey!

“Hold the position and feel it in your body”, she said.

I did. Really, I did. Holding the position was about all I could do.

“Feel your hamstrings lengthen.”

U-huh.

Then, I saw the cat. Napping in the soft chair right next to me on my mat on the floor, his eyes meeting mine, at my eye-height. So relaxed. He looked at me, then shifted his body, and for a moment, I think he copied me. And then yawned.

“One day,” I mumbled, “I will be as relaxed as you in this position.”

I got visions of myself smiling and walking in exuberant daylight, walking ever so lightly as if I were floating, and I felt at peace with my yoga and my stretching and my hamstrings who didn’t want to be lengthened.

I’m not doing these yoga classes to force nor punish my body.

I’m doing this because I love my body.