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Read MoreBut deep down inside we're coverin' up the pain. It's an old thing. It's a soul thing. But it's a real thing. ~ Who’s Gonna Help Brother Get Further, Elvis Costello
My back is better. The hurt is gone.
When I first started yoga, I feared for my back. I had sprained it years earlier, and sometimes it still gave me trouble. It wasn’t long before I realized that with every pose, there really wasn’t much that didn’t involve my back. So I was cautious, and it took a lot of encouragement and a lot of baby steps before I got brave enough to progress. I was grateful for the pace and the patience of a class that allowed for this.
Soon my core got stronger which strengthened my back. Not long after, there was a photographer in the studio, and I was given a photograph of myself in a handstand with my back reflected in the mirror.
Read MoreWe are stardust, we are golden. We are billion years old carbon. And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.
~ Woodstock, Crosby, Stills & Nash
I’ve been looking at the sky since I was a little girl.
I look up when I leave the house in the morning, and I look up when I arrive home in the evening. All throughout the day, all I have to do is look out the window. Our offices occupy the top floor of a building, so I get to work right in the sky!
Really, if it were possible to keep my eyes open, I’d watch the stars all night.
There is some kind of tie between yoga and the heavens. It’s taken me a while to figure this out, but for me there seems to be a connection between the practice and what’s going on up there. This seems to be what grounds me.
If I try to put this into words, I’d say the sky is limitless, and when I move on the mat, I feel limitless, too.
Read MoreYou know the nighttime, darling (night and day) is the right time (night and day) to be (night and day) with the one you love, now (night and day) … ~ (Nighttime Is) The Right Time, Ray Charles
Lay down. Take Savasana.
The practice had been hot and strenuous, and at its end the instructor turned off the lights and with these words put us in Savasana, the final resting pose.
I should know by now not to be surprised at the end. I’m aware by now what happens as we draw to a close, how we move from abdominal work to backbends, from folds to twists and, finally, to Savasana.
But on this night, as on so many others, I’m as surprised as ever. Before I know it, it’s over, and I’m startled to hear the instructions to take rest.
But I listen and lie back. I pull the bobby pins from my hair and dismantle my ponytail. I lay out my arms and my legs. I open my hands, palms up on the mat, and I splay out my feet.
You don’t have to do anything now, he said. Nothing else is happening. Nighttime is starting.
Read MoreKiss me on my eyelids, make bad things go away. Kiss me on my forehead, make everything okay. ~ Kissalude, Basement Jaxx
When I was little, I didn’t really have a forehead. I had a keppe instead.
Keppe is the Yiddish word for forehead. As a child, I was always kissed on the keppe, and I was tucked in at night with instructions to put my keppe in the pillow. If I was ever hurt, a kiss on the keppe would always make things better.
Of course, my children grew up with kisses on their keppes, too, and I’d tuck them in at night with a game, a kind of Goodnight Moon for the senses. I’d call out and point to the parts of their faces, starting with their noses, followed by a light tap on each. I’d say eye and other eye, and they’d turn their faces toward mine and close their lids for another tap; then, one cheek and next the other, then their ears, their mouths and chins. And finally, the keppe, and they’d let me put my hand on their brows and rock them goodnight on their pillows.
It was a game of acknowledgement, and they never tired of it. In a few moments with just these parts, we named and recognized all that was them.
Read MoreThis is for the ones who stand, for the ones who try again, for the ones who need a hand, for the ones who think they can.~ Comes and Goes (In Waves), Greg Laswell
My handstands had left the building.
My yoga schedule was off, and so was my usual inclination to go upside down.
My handstands were missing, and I didn’t know how to find them. And I wondered if rearranging the furniture hadn’t actually been the best idea. After all, the armoire against which I’d practice my handstands had left the building, too. Maybe that was the reason?
It was a Monday night, and I arrived at practice for the first time in a week. I set up my mat and told the instructor what had happened, that my handstands had disappeared. It was not the first time they’d gone missing, and it made me feel back at Square One.
When you ask who’s new tonight, I said, I may not raise my hand, but I’m the one who’s new again.
Read MoreWhat’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. ~Romeo & Juliet, William Shakespeare
I met a man named Adeoye.
I’d met him before. He works in a store I frequent when I arrive at yoga too early and need a place to go before class.
I didn’t know his name then. He is a beautiful man, with a beautiful voice and smile to match, who serves as the greeter for the store.
And he does a good job greeting. I even remember what he said the first time he greeted me. He paid me a compliment. He told me I looked fierce.
I smiled back and thanked him. It was early on a weekend morning, and I was feeling far from fierce. I was dressed in a hodgepodge outfit with my hair half done. I had blown out my bangs but left the rest to dry in every direction. Wearing barely any makeup, I had on my yoga gear and what I call my supersonic socks, the rugby socks my son had bought while backpacking abroad. Emblazoned with the words,
Read MoreLook for the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities. Forget about your worries and your strife. ~ The Bare Necessities, The Jungle Book
I usually get up and get dressed every morning, except for Saturdays. On Saturday mornings, I get up and get undressed.
This is the morning of my hot yoga practice, and it’s a bare one. The room is fairly bare. There’s a big Om on the wall, but that’s all. I am almost bare, my pants are cropped and so is my top. Even the instructor’s mat is bare. It lies empty while he teaches from all corners of the room.
It’s just too hot for any sort of cover. One step into the room, and the heat has already stripped away whatever I may have on. By the time I unroll my mat, I’ve no choice but to be there bare.
On this particular Saturday, it is overcast and quiet and, somehow, at just one day past Halloween, it is already a true November. There’s a chill in the air and the wind is blowing, baring the trees of their leaves that have only recently begun to change. At this early hour, downtown has yet to be dressed, too, and I easily find parking in the empty streets.
Read MoreA change is gonna come. I see it now. ~ A Change I Gonna Come, Seal.
At first, I fit yoga into my life. Now, I fit my life into yoga.
And once upon a time, I never even did yoga.
That time is hard to imagine now. What did I do before? I fill so much of my time with yoga that there’s hardly any room left in a day, and I wonder how I filled it before.
Change is challenging for me, and so taking up something like yoga, and doing it as frequently as I do, is something I would never have anticipated. I usually like to do the same thing I’ve always done, even if now I can’t remember what exactly that was.
Read MoreIt's said that yoga can open up a person. It did that for me, and out came 270 pages! My book is up on Amazon (available here)! It's a collection of my essays, edited into sections of 15 Healing Truths. I am very grateful to my teachers and my fellow yogis and my readers for helping to make this happen.
Read MorePut a little love in your heart. And the world will be a better place. ~ Put A Little Love In Your Heart, Dolly Parton
How long does it take to strengthen a heart?
I think that depends on what kind of shape it’s in and whether it is a strong one in the first place.
The heart is a powerful muscular organ that never rests. It beats continuously throughout a lifetime, and so it’s important to provide it with the necessary nourishment, especially if it’s a big one.
I’ve been trying to strengthen my heart.
It’s a long overdue effort, but apparently my strategy to date hasn’t been the most effective. I’ve basically preserved mine rather than fortified it, and it can’t get stronger without the proper nutrients.
Read MoreRock me on the water. Sister, will you soothe my fevered brow? Yeah, rock me on the water, then maybe I'll remember, maybe I'll remember how. ~ Rock Me On The Water, Jackson Browne
Tonight, I was in a yoga class that took place in what I can only describe as The Twilight Zone.
I call it The Twilight Zone because I literally had no sense of time during the practice. I was so incredibly immersed in the movements that the end snuck up on me, and I only knew it was that time because the instructor dimmed the lights.
We start the practice at the top of our mats, the usual place to start.
We press our feet down and lift our toes up, and we’re instructed to extend our arms up and around and back into place, alternating first one and then the other, until the room is like a pool of backstroking yogis.
And even though we are swimming, the instructor asks us, again, to root down into the earth, to press our feet as if we are instead on dry land, and to lift our toes and glide slowly as if we have many more miles to go.
Read MoreI'll say a little prayer for you. Forever, forever, you'll stay in my heart. ~ I'll Say A Prayer For You, Aretha Franklin
I have a buddha in a bubble!
My children surprised me with a snow globe that houses a golden Buddha, seated in a peaceful womb of gold and glittering with sparkles that alight on his shoulders, his head, his hands, his lap and his feet.
Every morning, I shake my buddha!
And I watch as my vanity lights illuminate the sparkles as they glisten and swirl in a dance to start the day.
At the closing of one of my very first yoga practices, I sat for the first time with my hands in prayer while the instructor said a few words.
He instructed us to exhale what we no longer needed and to inhale some goodness into its place. After the practice, I was so hypnotized, I would have followed any instruction, and this seemed easy enough. I was surprised how visual it was for me, and I exhaled what I imagined as the color gray, and I inhaled what I imagined as the color white.
Read MoreI just take one step closer to you. And even when I've fallen down, my heart says follow through. ~ One Step Closer, Michael Franti
Step to the top of your mats.
This is what the instructor says at the beginning of most every yoga class.
I hear this so much that it’s automatic to simply step to the top when I’m told. I can be finishing a conversation, coming up from a seat or coming down from a stretch. It doesn’t matter. Everything stops, my mind clears, and I step to the top.
But last week, I heard something else.
Step to the top of your mats, the instructor announced.
And when I did so, my mind, on its own accord, suddenly responded in silence, Reporting for duty!
I’ve never really had a thought surprise me. I usually know what I’m thinking about. But, that day, this response was as automatic as my step to the top. And even though no one could hear my mind speak out, everyone else reported for duty, too.
Read MoreHow can I possibly be inconspicuous when my flow is so ridiculous? ~ I’ll Be Around, Cee-lo Green
I was at an evening yoga class with a guest instructor who arrived with a great big welcome, his greeting warming the room, and his smile inviting many in return.
This is a Level Two class, he announced. So, what would you like to work on?
With each answer, he jokingly upped the ante, saying, Oh, hips? That’s a 3.23 class!. Inversions? That’s a 5.67 class! Backbends? That’s a 10.789 class!
He asked us what we wanted and got us laughing when we answered, promising us a high energy class and lifting us with that of his own before landing the room in a quiet meditation with a poem and a chant.
I was happy to be there, sitting next to a friend who was leaving town and among others I knew as well. I felt cozy as evening fell outside the windows, darkening the room in a stillness filled with the rhythmic voice of the instructor.
Read More“Today is where your book begins. The rest is still unwritten. ~ Unwritten, Natasha Bedingfield
My son was home for a holiday, and we had the rare occasion to tool around town, having lunch and the chance to walk and shop in the sunshine of the first warm day of the season.
I have no place I have to be, he exclaimed, grateful for such unusual circumstances. There’s nothing I have to be doing right now.
We stopped in a refurbished firehouse that was home to a cool, new shoe store. The interior was designed like an old library, and as we sat down on a plush, oversized couch, I pointed out several shelves of blank books, none of which had covers, words or titles.
Look, I said. None of the books are written. They’re all blank.
Read MoreFive hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes. How do you measure a year in the life? ~ Seasons of Love, Rent
When is it time to start something new?
And when does that something new become part of what you always do?
Most things seem to have a season, and I’ve always found comfort in the traditions that follow.
Come spring, I always find myself out on the porch and planting flowers in the pots outside the front door. The summer often means slowing down and more freckles. The fall has Halloween and sweaters and boots and Thanksgiving. I hibernate in the winter, coming out only to celebrate the holidays and New Year’s.
Like clockwork, the seasons pass, a quarter of each year like a quarter of each hour; the minute hand like our lives, gliding through what it is we do during those times.
Off schedule and out of the ordinary, I started going to yoga during the fall season a couple years ago, right before my usual winter hibernation.
Read More"Friendship is a single soul dwelling in two bodies." ~ Aristotle
The other night at yoga, we practiced with our eyes shut.
We moved without seeing for 75 minutes. Apparently, it was the night to focus on our Third Eye, the body’s energy center for insight and intuition.
I, myself, am more focused on not falling. And, I have to admit that I open my eyes a few times.
The first time is to make sure I’m not the only one with eyes closed, which, of course, makes me the only one with eyes open. The second time is to check the pose. And a couple more times, I have to say, is because I just can’t help it!
Aside from that, I move deliberately through darkness with those around me, listening to the matching melodies of the instructor’s voice and the music. Periodically, we sit back on our heels and bring our hands to forehead center for a look inside.
Read MoreMay you have a strong foundation when the winds of changes shift ~ Forever Young, Bob Dylan
I’ve been taking Rocket yoga for more than a year now.
Three times a week, I go to the same class with the same teacher. She mixes it up, and we fly and invert and lock and lift.
I rarely miss a class, so I figure I’ve practiced Rocket more than 100 times. How is it, then, that I’ve only recently realized that at every practice, we move through a foundational sequence before we take off?
Am I the only one who didn’t know we were putting on the undergarments of our practice before getting dressed for the rest?
Like most young girls, I was taught my first foundation lesson at an early age: to always wear nice underwear in case I’m in an accident and wind up in the hospital.
Foundations can last a lifetime, and that’s why every day, I’ve got on pretty underwear under there. And I think that’s also why we are working on a foundation at Rocket. It’s not just for that day’s practice, but for the rest of our practicing days.
Read MoreFrom the time I was little, I was taught to stand up straight and sit up straight.
Even in my little-girl ballet classes, when we folded forward, we had to hold the fold so straight that even the teacher’s lipstick case would not roll off our backs.
Summers would find me at camp, seated with my bunk mates on benches instead of on chairs at each meal. I remember part way through one summer, the counselor looking at all of us hunched there and exclaiming, You all started out sitting up so straight, and now look at you!
We rose to better attention and, for the rest of the summer, made a conscious effort to sit up straight.
And, yes, a la Marcia and Jan Brady, I even spent several months with my sister going to what was called Charm School, where we walked around balancing a book on our heads.
Today, there are studies about the positive effects of a positive posture. Posture can be what it takes to fake it ‘til you make it on any given day because how we carry ourselves is how we care for ourselves.
Read MoreAnne Samit is an author and a yogi, moving every day and writing it all down along the way.
