Inside Job

Yoga: the ultimate inside job

On Friday I had SUCH an exciting thing happen -- unfortunately I don't have a photo or video of it, but I dropped from standing into a backbend!

In Ashtanga this is called a dropback, and I had only been working toward it over the last couple of weeks. When my teacher told me today that she thought I was ready, I was SUPER surprised, but I just decided to go with it.

Maybe the best part of the whole experience was having the woman next to me say to me afterward: "I was watching you and you just went for it without any hesitation!"

It made me feel soooooo good to have been that person: fearless, if even for a moment. I've lived with so much fear in my life, and it's stopped me from so much, and I'm just so, so, so thankful that I've been doing this inside job for 10 years or so now and IT'S CLEARLY WORKING.

Sing it Eddie:

Underneath this smile Lies everything
All my hopes, anger, pride and shame
Make myself a pact, not to shut doors on the past
Just for today, I am free

I will not lose my faith
It's an inside job today

I know this one thing well
I used to try and kill love, it was the highest sin
Breathing insecurity out and in
Searching hope, I'm shown the way to run straight
Pursuing the greater way for all human light
How I choose to feel is how I am
How I choose to feel is how I am

I will not lose my faith
It's an inside job today

Holding on, the light of the night
On my knees to rise and fix my broken soul again
Let me run into the rain
To be a human light again
Let me run into the rain
To shine a human light today

That's me for sure -- shining my human light!

House of the Rising Sun

When I make my gratitude list at the end of the day -- which I don't do every day, but as often as I will -- Ashtanga frequently warrants a mention. I feel very fortunate to have found this path, and I am highly motivated to stay on it with fidelity to the practice and the way it was intended to be practiced, which is 5-6 days per week. Practice takes 75-90 minutes, so this is no small commitment. It often involves rising early in the morning, when I don't feel like I've had enough sleep, and taking a body that is often sore from other activities through numerous challenging postures.

A lot of people who practice Ashtanga have a teacher, but our group in Madison just occasionally imports them or hits the road to practice at their shalas. One local-ish teacher that I've mentioned before is PJ. PJ is an amazing teacher, and an eloquent writer about what it means to be on this path. Here's what he said yesterday about the role of a teacher with this kind of practice:

"A true teacher gives power with their presence, their care and faith in our process, their belief in us saddled with their experience is the light that guides us through the darkness of our fears and ignorance. It can also be the spotlight that shames us, an accountability that blames us and a responsibility that names us when we choose to give up inside."

Damn.

Luckily, I'm not about to give up inside, but my main practice partner and I were considering taking the day off today. Until I read PJ's post last night, and then texted my friend and told her we were NOT taking today off.

Lucky for us, we were rewarded in multiple ways:

1) With the practice, which is its own reward;

2) With the best coffee in Madison afterward, EVP;

3) With the best scones anywhere afterward, from Lazy Janes;

4) And with this classic tune coming through the walls from the fitness studio next door to our practice space:

There is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God, I know I'm one

My mother was a tailor
She sewed my new blue jeans
My father was a gamblin' man
Down in New Orleans

Guruji: the man we have to thank for the practice of Ashtanga!

Now the only thing a gambler needs
Is a suitcase and trunk
And the only time he's satisfied
Is when he's on a drunk

Oh mother, tell your children
Not to do what I have done
Spend your lives in sin and misery
In the House of the Rising Sun

Well, I got one foot on the platform
The other foot on the train
I'm goin' back to New Orleans
To wear that ball and chain

Well, there is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God, I know I'm one

Put it all together along with the smiling mug of the gentleman pictured here (now passed), and you have yourself a banner morning!

My Country Tis Of Thee

Full moon today, and in the Ashtanga tradition, that means rest. It's not easy to take rest, when you are used to starting your day with a vigorous practice, but when I asked PJ how to deal with the rough feeling that can come on a day of rest, he suggested I do what he does: stay in bed most of the day.

So I decided to try it. Sans phone. Sans computer. Just rest. I also read -- finished my book, polished off a couple of issues of the New Yorker -- it was heaven. Later in the day, I did manage to get outside and garden, but I didn't leave home, and the only person I talked to was my neighbor.

It was glorious.

And I'll tell you what else was glorious: the article in the New Yorker about Aretha Franklin. Wow. She has not had an easy life, but dang, does she have a gift. Although I've blogged about this song already, if you haven't seen the video of her singing Natural Woman with the President crying in the background, it is well worth your time. So phenomenal.

Speaking of being moved to tears, patriotic songs like this one always do that to me, but with Aretha at the mic, well, I'm moved even more:

My country, 'tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrims' pride,
From ev'ry mountainside
Let freedom ring!

My native country, thee,
Land of the noble free,
Thy name I love;
I love thy rocks and rills,
Thy woods and templed hills;
My heart with rapture thrills,
Like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,
And ring from all the trees
Sweet freedom's song;
Let mortal tongues awake;
Let all that breathe partake;
Let rocks their silence break,
The sound prolong.

Our fathers' God to Thee,
Author of liberty,
To Thee we sing.
Long may our land be bright,
With freedom's holy light,
Protect us by Thy might,
Great God our King.

These songs always inspire me to keep trying to make good on these promises for all Americans. Also in the New Yorker was a story of the mentally ill in Florida prisons. I cannot abide treating human beings inhumanely, and I'm going to do what I can to change it. Call me a hug-a-thug (term from the article) if you must, but all people deserve to be treated with dignity.

After all, how can we expect more from others than we refuse to give of ourselves?