When I Stopped Fighting with Yoga and Surrendered
If my vivacious, spirited energy is Yin, then Yoga is Yang. I fought against it for so long, mainly because it didn’t come to me as easy as dance, Tabata, or even mud races. Yoga was too slow and calm for me. I couldn’t concentrate; let’s be real, some of those poses are ridiculously difficult. I equated the benefits of exercise with sweat, soreness, heavy breathing, and rapid movement. However, on the occasion that I did take a class, the experience was the same. My mind wondered the first 15 minutes. What am I going to eat after this? Do I need to stop at the grocery store, or can it wait until tomorrow? Then when the intensity kicked in, the conversation changed to, This is hard as (insert curse word)! Look at her all flexible, ugh. I’m bad at this. But I’ll get better if I do it more consistently. Man, this ain’t for me. As we got to end of the class, my mind would stop wandering, I’d be fully present. When it was over, I felt grateful, relaxed, and accomplished — every time.
Then the pandemic hit. Being forced to stay in the house with a nine-year-old while carrying the weight of the world, while simultaneously trying to protect him from it all called for desperate measures. Wine and sitcom reruns only temporarily quelled my growing anxiety. Rediscovering a joy for cooking (and eating) provided some comfort but was causing steady weight gain. My body needed to move; my mind needed to pause. I turned to my old frenemy, Yoga. I told myself I would commit to twenty minutes once a week. The first two months, my experience was just like it had always been. Then gradually, my experience changed, and so did I.
Aside from helping me to become more mindful on and off the mat, Yoga also taught me to surrender. An unsuccessful hernia repair surgery left me with no attached or working abdominal core, something you’re told to “engage” often in Yoga. For me, this meant that there are some poses I physically shouldn’t do so as not to cause more damage and some that, when I attempted a fell over like a Pillsbury dough girl. It made me feel weak, defeated, frustrated, angry. In one of those moments, I heard, Do what you can when you can, then let it go. It was just that simple, but I had made it complicated. I was missing the point of Yoga, which is to connect the mind, body, and soul, not ridicule and fight it. So, I learned to surrender. To accept and praise my body for what it could do.
Once I released the negative attachments I had to Yoga, my practice improved. It would be small things, like being able to go deeper in on stretch, hold a pose longer, not feel my triceps on fire when doing downward facing dog for the 10th time. As my practice improved, so did my body. I started to notice toning and tightening when I held certain poses. It made me feel powerful like I could do anything. It reminded me that we can improve and potentially master anything and grow during the process with practice and patience.
My weekly sessions evolved into several 15 min sessions throughout the week, after a workout or in the morning. I still do an entire session twice a week. I started to crave the peace that sun salutations gave me. Yoga and I are not besties, but we’re friends. While I’m still very much a novice, Yoga has guided me to be more present in everyday life, to go with the flow, to just be easy. I learned to become more patient and compassionate towards myself. More importantly, I realized that I opened myself up to more by not shutting out possibilities and rising to the challenge. Namaste.
