When good practice goes bad

I often joke with friends that in my next life I am going to be a dancer. I have a dancer's build and a good sense of balance, and I have always held a soft spot for ballerinas, gymnasts, acrobats, and the lithe bodies of street performers and mimes. While I am not necessarily good at following direction backward in a mirror, I have a decent sense of rhythm and spent a fair number of nights as a young adult on a dance floor where I escaped alcohol and drugs by getting lost in movement. I have gravitated toward sports and activities that promote graceful lines, powerful energy and a feeling of expansiveness. One of the many things I love about rock climbing is that I often feel like a dancer moving across stone. The height, the airy terrain, the play of the wind in my hair all add to the allure and keep me returning for more.

Yoga is a natural fit for someone who likes to dance. And the discipline of ashtanga appeals to the inner gymnast in me that never had a shot at the balance beam or the parallel bars. Granted, I am well into my middle years, as they say, but my practice continues to surprise me as I unearth reserves of flexibility, fearlessness, and stamina that remain accessible. Until recently. For the better part of 2013, I have had on-again, off-again problems with my lower back, more specifically the sacroiliac area of my back. A part of me would like to blame this trouble on the number 13 in this year, but I do not tend to hold superstitions accountable for what happens. Instead, I am prone to investigate, and the writer in me who can be alternately brave and self-deprecating makes me inclined to look more deeply for both reasons and solutions.

What am I doing wrong? Am I too old to complete the second series? Why does my body resist? Is it something in my personal life that is interfering, blocking my progress, my energy? Perhaps it's my underlying sentiments toward teaching? My recent change in yoga studios? And on it goes.

I have been growing increasingly disheartened of late by the way my body feels. The tightness where I once enjoyed suppleness. A persistent and pervasive undercurrent of holding on where I once felt an emptying out, a release, a keen sense of letting go. During the past seven years, yoga has become like a bookend to my weeks. I look forward to my time on the mat, stretching body, mind, and spirit in ways that have helped me connect more fully to my life, my work, and the people I love.

Certainly, the ego is involved. The ego is always involved; it is always present and will take whatever opportunity afforded it to weigh in and make a mess of things. And, if it's not looking to make a mess, it will certainly enjoy stirring things up. This, I believe, is where I am. All stirred up. My practice does not feel as it once did. Some days, it does not look the same either. My progress has stalled, my back is constantly talking to me. This morning, I talked myself on and off my mat my entire practice. Diagnosis? Ego. Yes, there is definitely an ego problem, but the ego is not the only problem. The truth is, I have an injury. My body, specifically the sacroiliac, is experiencing strain. My back is telling me, "Back off!" Literally.

Here's the real issue: Am I aware enough to take heed? My practice is telling me to take it to another level--and maybe not the level where I believed I was headed. Am I willing to listen? Or will I continue to listen to the voices quick to assure me that I am going to lose what I have worked so hard to build; I am going to have to start over; my yoga practice will never feel the same again.

Maybe my practice will not feel the same again. And maybe, just maybe, that's the point. Alignment is very important to a safe practice. It is important to remember that what works for one body will not necessarily work the same way for another body. Sometimes, it's important to back off and begin again in order to go forward. To unlearn the bad habits that have led me astray. In practice, this is always so much more difficult to do, especially when the ego has such a good memory and is equally good at reminding me of what I was once able to do.

For my birthday this year, my husband bought me an expensive, chic, very a la mode yoga outfit from that company that has made a fortune from selling yoga wear. I have received many compliments when I have worn this ensemble, which I have found both flattering and disheartening. Sure, the outfit makes me look good. For the cost, it had better, right? But now my old tired yoga attire feels, er, um, old and tired.

This is one of the many snags of the contemporary yoga scene, and will be better served in a discussion in a future blog. Perhaps....

The real reason I mentioned my birthday yoga outfit and this company has to do with the very colorful, very clever recyclable bag that my yoga outfit was placed inside when my husband purchased this generous gift for me. On the bag is written the Sanskrit word brahmacharya, which translates as moderation. Brahmacharya is one of the five moral restraints that make up the Yamas, or the first limb of the eight-limb path of yoga. As I sit here today, composing this post about my ongoing yoga practice, I am reminded of brahmacharya, or, rather, my back seems to be chanting brahmacharya and I am listening. In many a post, I have acknowledged that ashtanga is a rigorous practice. We ashtangis pride ourselves on how disciplined and passionate we are about our practice. In our practice, it is all too easy to become rigid about that requisite discipline, and, over time, we can become hard on ourselves, dismissive of our off-days and our tears and strains and injuries. I actually believe that ashtanga attracts students who are naturally hard on themselves. Why do you think we persevere?

Yoga teacher and author Rolf Gates writes in his book Meditations from the Mat "the posture never ends." What Gates means is that the asanas, the yoga postures we take and hold in practice, do not end with the posture. They go beyond the posture to the space between one posture and the next, which is where the breath is still doing its job. If we're lucky, they go beyond even that and out into the world with us where we can practice them in the midst of living our lives. Just as we are reminded that our breath takes us beyond our bodies in the asanas, Gates is reminding all of us practitioners that we are always practicing the posture whatever it is we are doing at the moment. In other words, everything is an opportunity for transcendence, all interactions are holy. Forget the levels, the series, where you were yesterday, four months ago, today. I am forever the student learning the lesson in front of me now. Like Keshab's quote, which I share semester after semester with my students by including it on page one at the top of my syllabus, "I am born a pupil. Everything that exists is my master. I learn from everything!"

My back is whispering brahmacharya. Moderation holds a lesson for me. It is reminding me enough, enough, enough.