SARAH WOLF | WRITER, READER, GAMER
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My Inner Worlds
Last night I experienced my second Bikram yoga class, followed by hot Yin. I’ve been practicing yoga for over five weeks now. At first Bikram held no attraction, and I felt no intention to try it. The yogis in my Yin class spoke highly of it, and one of the instructors gave me a gentle nudge to attempt another style of yoga. When Raleigh Yoga Company hosted Billy Batten to lead a Bikram workshop, I thought it would be a great introduction to a form that intimidated me (see post here). I gave myself permission to wait until the August class schedule was published before signing up for an actual session. Slight procrastination, but with a deadline.
This past Sunday’s Yin class led by Susan Heller kicked me in a deep place (see post here). I obviously feel safe at this studio--with the instructors, as well as the yogis who share their energy in the room. My emotions released and I sobbed—yeah, one of those people, although I tried to hold it back. Afterwards Susan lent me her autographed hardcover of Bikram Yoga by Bikram Choudhury since she knew the next day would be my first class using this method. Reading the philosophy behind Bikram gave me a framework to appreciate it and to begin letting go of my fear of the unknown. I’ve ordered my own copy of the book so I can study it in leisure and reference the poses between practice.
My first Bikram class was a blur. Twenty-six poses seamlessly woven together while we sweat in a room heated to 104 degrees doesn’t allow for extraneous thoughts. However, those tricksy feelings lurk and wait for that comfortable moment when they can strike and say, “Don’t forget we’re still here!” Usually it’s my hips that hold this distressed voice, but Monday’s Bikram session opened a figurative scab in my upper neck where I thought my pain was a solid bone fused in unhappy union with my skull. While this may sound negative or gross, it’s a hopeful turn for healing something I once thought permanent. If the chronic pain I experience is truly a scab covering an old wounded spot, I can work to process the underlying issue. My chiropractor treats the bone, the alignment, and has done well for where I have been these past five years. However, I’m ready to move into a new body and a new way of seeing Sarah.
I want to use Bikram yoga as my magnifying glass to show me all the places where my balance is off, both literally and figuratively. If you’re in the hot room with me, you’ll see that I stumble out of the poses requiring balance. That helpful orange wall may develop a permanent handprint until I find my equilibrium. Who knows, maybe I’ll start a trend and all newbies to Bikram will get their handprint on the wall, in a color of their choice of course.
Bikram says, “Is it better to suffer for 90 minutes in ‘Bikram’s Torture Chamber’ or for 90 years?” I choose the 90 minutes so my coming years will be bliss. Yin has already begun a change within my mind and body. Where will I be when I have five weeks of Bikram under my mat? Tune in after Labor Day for my five-week check-in. I won't be able to hold the pose shown below in that timeframe, but I will eventually be limber and strong enough due to a loving community of yogis who cherish the success we share in each class.
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My body has held a frozen pose for too long. Its beauty neglected, its form stiff and fragile. This morning’s yin practice opened another blossom that has grown through the crack of my mindless being, an unnatural posture that I’ve maintained for what feels like centuries. My analytical accountant identity breaks under the pressure of All I Am. My so-called control has been shattered as I take breaths of new vibrancy, blasting open a vista my eyes don’t yet see. Or if they do see, I can’t comprehend the new landscape they transmit, images blurred into feelings of loss and sorrow.
Who am I? Why am I scared of the unknown hidden inside? Why have I held back for countless heartbeats? When do I fully become who I am? This process is unrelenting, yet gentle. It takes me one loving step and waits while I catch up to a new space, a new place where I can be all of me. I chose my path, and this freeing won’t stop until one day my true dance reverberates through every part of my beautiful body and soul.
Yesterday I took a workshop taught by Billy Batten of Bikram Yoga Wilmington, hosted by Raleigh Yoga Company. I have now been practicing yin yoga for four weeks and continue to love it. Bikram is the next step for me, and I wasn’t sure what to expect from the afternoon’s training. I was the only one there who had never taken a Bikram class. Thinking the workshop was for people like me, a total newbie, I was a bit surprised to see folks there who have decades of experience in this method. I chose to feel special for being the only true beginner out of a room of eighteen yogis.
Billy said Bikram yoga is for the broken, physically or emotionally. I’m doing yoga to help with my spinal pain (see post here), and I can always become more emotionally healthy (see post here). Bikram uses the body to change the body, an empowering tool. He asked us why we come to yoga. If the reason is to look good in our poses, we can lose our motivation. My intent is to relieve the constant pain in my upper neck that gives me headaches and blurs my vision, as well as deepening the connection with my body’s knowledge and understanding. I’ve ignored the body’s quiet song long enough.
After the workshop I moved into the regular yin yoga class, which had more people in attendance than usual. The studio has been open for just over two months, and I’ve been spoiled by classes with only a handful of students. I can sometimes get overwhelmed by a crowded room and will avoid situations where I know there will be a lot of people. But this is yin yoga. I breathed and allowed the energy of everyone there to softly flow within my imagined space. Yin embraces discomfort, and I had an opportunity to be vulnerable inside a packed room. The class felt short, which tells you how good it was—the hour flew by. During an intense hip pose, I finally let go and cried through the pain that’s been in my left hip for some time, hindering my gait during walks. I had a chance two weeks ago to cry it out during Saturday yin, but I didn’t want to sob with a medical doctor on the mat next to me. Yes, I have my unfair prejudices.
In final savasana (“corpse pose”), I allowed the tears to fall and relaxed into the posture. Towards the end of it, I saw in my mind’s eye a circle of concrete blocks beginning to crack, transforming into living flowers. It was a beautiful image, and I feel the flowers are within my strengthening body. They aren’t there yet, but I have a picture to use each time I go to yoga—I’m transforming concrete into beautiful blossoms.
Thank you to Billy for sharing his wisdom, and to Laura and Susan for inviting him into their studio. I’m grateful to be a part of Raleigh Yoga Company’s growing practice. Travel messes with my routine of morning journaling, exercise, and health-conscious eating choices. I loved seeing my dad this past weekend and staying in my sister’s new home, but every family has their own rhythm for how a day plays out. I adjust and go with the flow, but arrive back home tired, weighing more, and ready to get back to my own operating system (I’m an IT geek’s daughter and love to use nerdy words).
This past trip I actually journaled every morning, an unusual travel accomplishment for me. It helps that my sister has a similar routine where she rises before the sun and sits down with her notebook, fountain pen, and coffee. We actually power-walked one morning, giving me an exercise credit in an otherwise sedentary trip. However, I cheated on my refined sugar intake and accidentally ate gluten. I rarely cheat with sugar, but never with that wheat-based substance that hates my GI tract. My lack of consciousness about what I ate appalls me. I’ve felt crappy for two days now and keep telling my depressed thinking that it’s a false low—I’m not really sad, it’s just the sugar spiral that happens every time. Is publishing this my way of staying accountable? I suppose. I’ve never been able to hide my sugar indiscretions from Matt because mood swings are kinda hard to control. But this is a first putting it out into the cyber world. In the spirit of honesty, I also skipped a scheduled yoga class Monday night. I had intended to go, but felt too dehydrated for the hot room. My first hot yoga session two weeks ago had me sick in bed the next day because I didn’t realize how much hydration sweating for an hour in a 100-degree room required. I’ll get back on the yoga wagon with tonight’s hot yin. I love my family and enjoy our visits, but I’m glad to be back home and ready to start a new page of living the healthy lifestyle my body craves. |
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