donutszenmom.com

Global webconference this morning, meaning up even earlier than usual (4 AM) to get set up and the call started by 4:45. Yawn. We go through ’til 6:30, so no Mysore practice. I’m going to type up a few notes now, and then do practice here. I don’t mind the home practice. I can go easy and baby the new tattoo. It’s small, just one word on the back of my neck: santosha. My favorite niyama. LOL! I wonder if it’s tacky to have a favorite niyama. Hey, maybe that should be the sort of thing one uses as a pickup line: So, what’s your favorite niyama?

I’m feeling a little tired this week. I need to just work it through, of course. I’m assuming that this is just normal exercise science: the principle of progressive resistance results in increased strength and endurance. Alrighty, then.

Last night, my sister wanted to take my parents out for dinner for their upcoming anniversary. So The Cop, My Gift and I met up with them over on my parents’ side of town. My sister’s girlfriend suddenly said, “Karen, I need some yoga advice.”

“Okay,” I said hesitantly.

“I have a yoga tape that I use. How long am I supposed to stay in each position? Am I supposed to get into the positions fast, or slow?”

“Um, what do they do on the tape?”

She didn’t want to talk about what they do on the tape. She wanted me to say how long to stay in yoga poses and whether to get into the poses quickly or slowly.

“Well, it’s different for everyone, really. Try it a few times and see how it feels. See what your body tells you.”

“I can’t do it if I don’t know what to do, and I can’t feel what it feels like if I don’t know what it’s supposed to feel like!”

“If you just try it a few times, you’ll start to find out…”

“How can I find the answer when I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing?!”

I kind of shifted my attention a bit, as The Cop and My Gift were both starting tentative alternate conversations to try to get me out of the jam they could see that I was in. My sister’s girlfriend started telling my sister about how she couldn’t know what to do until someone told her what to do, etc. She was very unhappy and frustrated with my answer. I’m not good in situations like this, because I don’t know how to respond when someone is intent upon getting something I can’t give them. When things like this happen, I need to start acting like the dog, who looks at me with great compassion when she doesn’t understand what it is that I want of her: I will make big dog eyes and turn my head to the side, indicating that I WISH I could make the human happy, but, being a dog, I have my limitations.

I suppose I could have just said, “Five breaths, and get into the poses as fast as you can.” In the end, perhaps that is the same as, “well, yoga is really a self-exploration,” or even the same as big dog eyes.