Thinky think yoga practice

nobody@vox.com(kpacklight) — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 12:49:07 -0500

This lovely image of baby yoga is from Flickr's creative commons photo pool... by user: Upsilon Andromedae.

It reminds me of just how I felt doing yoga this morning. Like it was all new...except I didn't have that sweet sense of play and freedom — nice when it happens, but certainly not a regular occurrence. Actually, I had an all over feeling of tightness and holding on and worry. I must have held myself crazy tight all week, particularly in the way I sat at my desk, so every pose felt like a fight at first. My spine did not uncurl easily.

That's fine, of course. The point is to work with the breath and bring the mind back to the body again and again and again and again and again. To not worry about "doing it right" but instead to just inhale more deeply and exhale all the way, even further than you think you can as you lean into the pose. I'm sure there are a whole lot of other points, but right now, at the beginning again, for not the first time in my life, that's the point.

But the back beat of mental activity today was like having a drum & bass thing going on inside. Kind of clashes with the ocean sounds new age music and heady fragrance of Nag Champa, you know?

Over and over again my mind returned to something I said without thinking earlier and how that made someone else feel. One of those moments where you say sorry but know that it's not enough and that you really have to work on this one thing because it happens too often. To get a whole lot better at measuring the words before they leave your mouth because it's just not always about you. Even when that's what you're talking about. You.

Breathe, bend, hold legs and arms strong, back straight, breathe, breathe, breathe. Release.

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Thinky think yoga practice