I have been a sketchy yoga practitioner for some time now.
I discovered Ashtanga yoga several years ago. Lucky for me, one of the two Mysore dedicated yoga shalas in Toronto is located a nice walk from my home. I remember climbing the stairs tentatively. It felt so weird. Like I was underage buying booze as I was looking at the items on the shelves. I bought the Yoga Mala book, a mat and the Kino Primary Series DVD and skipped home not knowing that the medicine comes before the spoon of sugar.
The warmth (physical and personal) at the centre is what makes my practice progress more than anything I could do at home. The Ashtanga Yoga Centre of Toronto was really the door opening to healing in a way I never imagined. I saw Kino MacGregor there for the first time give a talk about meditation.
Ashtanga is not a casual kind of yoga. It’s the disciplined 6 day-a-week type. (Saturdays and moon days and “ladies holiday” off). What is scarier than the true ashtangi early morning rise, is the opening up that your soul experiences when your practice seems to be finally “working”.
In my case, it unleashed a lot of emotional stuff I had no clue was in me. Unpretty and difficult, I persisted. In between the episodic soreness of starting the sun salutations and the deepening into the primary postures, I caught glimmers of awareness and bliss that not much else has afforded me. Maybe gazing into my children’s eyes on the best of days and seeing heaven there falls into that category.
Or maybe I see heaven in their eyes on the best of days because the yoga practice influence has grounded me enough to be aware when I am in that moment.
For many of years I had the desire for a 6 day practice, but not ready to attain it. I’d have good weeks and many patchy weeks. I found it frustrating, got stuck on postures, and quit took long breaks several times. I must be a slow learner because the start and stop was punishing for me.
Flexibility (for me) is the easy part. It’s the strength bit that is my weakness. I build muscle quickly, I also lose it easily when I stop practice. So the graceful vinyasa still eludes me because my practice is still not regular enough.
I am so excited to develop the muscle strength for the gravity defying jumping back and through which visually, (for me) makes this yoga so mesmerizing.
The hardest part of my home-centred practice is really unrolling the mat. Ignoring the laundry, the tidying up, the dust bunnies being displaced as I unroll it. It’s bullshit hard.
It was all kind of parallel to reading A New Earth. I started and stopped reading it many times. I knew I needed to read it but it didn’t happen until I was ready. The seed was always planted , like a small stone in my the shoe of my soul. I knew it was budding, even though the soil was not very fertile and I forgot to water it.
The hardest part of reading it was figuring out what I was if all the temporary and material things about me were stripped away. It was around that time I stumbled into Ashtanga yoga and they kind of went hand in hand.
It’s been a winding road. Today, it feel less uphill. For that I am truly lucky.
I wanted to share my blissing out today because I am so grateful for all the things that came together for me to get here.
Namaste.
Idas
