Oh her voice stays exactly the same, it’s still sweet, but she starts telling us to do things that I am beginning to think are only possible in an alternate universe where the inhabitants don’t have tendons or ligaments or joints or bones for that matter… maybe like slugs. Large purple slugs with cute little lavender yoga tops on where you can just see their belly buttons peek out when they do the ‘fish’ posture. And slug skin tight black yoga pants that don’t ride up when they do the shoulder stand.
We start out with some warm up moves while sitting down on the floor. She calls them ‘joint freeing’ movements, but the party is going to be over soon and we know it. We stand up waiting for the her to begin the warrior series with our lower lips quivering. Sarah tells us to place our feet as far apart as we comfortably can. Now bend your right knee, reach down with your right hand and place it next to the inside of your right foot. Level one. Lift your left arm straight over your head and look down at the floor. Level two. Now ONLY if you feel balanced, put your left hand on the floor on the right side of your foot and turn toward the right and lift your right arm straight up, palm facing right. Level three. Now hold this pose for 3 or 4 breaths. ( I’m thinking, Oh, I’m supposed to breathe too ? okay, breathe.
Pant, pant, pant, pant. Done.) Sarah, hey Sarah, we’re done back here in the back row. SARAH ? Is she still alive ? I can’t look over there to find out as I am facing the back of the room now. And I don’t know how to GET OUT of this posture until she tells me which limb to move first. Unless I want to practice the ‘collapse on the floor hollering’ posture. A definite faux pas in yoga class. Finally she speaks. (THANK GOD!) Now if you want to try level four, (level FOUR?!) lift your left foot off the floor and place the bottom of your foot on the top of your head. (Whaaat?)
I hear whimpering from somewhere nearby. Then I realize…… it’s me.
Eventually, step by step, she walks us out of this posture, and in dulcet tones says, ‘That was very challenging, you did so well, now let’s do the OTHER side. My right leg has turned into jello and is quivering. My left leg is quivering too because it knows that it’s next in line.
We are beginning to dislike Sarah. We are beginning to question her motives, sweet little pixie like smile or no. We want to see Sarah’s papers. Is she QUALIFIED to teach this class ?
We PAY her for this.
And to add insult to our vulnerable positions, the big hefty guys out in the weight lifting area of the gym point at us through the glass doorway and laugh because they think standing on one foot with your arms over your head is impossibly easy and why are we wasting our time anyway ? I remember when one of those young guys came to our class. I’ll bet he read in an article that yoga was a great way to stretch your muscles and he had decided to give it a go. I saw him crawl out of class after the first half hour. He’s never been back.
But here is the mysterious part of yoga class. When the hour is finally over, and we have attempted all the impossible moves she has told us to do. She has us lay down on the floor and cover our eyes with a little towel. (It helps sop up the tears) And then we do the ‘corpse’ posture. We do not have ANY trouble doing this pose. We even look ‘so natural’ doing this pose. While we lay there on our backs with our legs and arms splayed out she talks in soothing tones about melting into the floor and relaxing all our muscles. ( Can you call jello muscle? I don’t think so. ) But Sarah says so and we do it. After too short a time she tells us to pull our knees up over our chests and give ourselves a hug. ( and boy do we need one ) She tells us to tell ourselves how good we have been to our bodies. ‘Namaste’, she says. (which I think means, ‘I release you from my spell.’) Then the mysterious thing happens. You sit up and look around, ( everyone is still alive ! ) and you suddenly feel like you have had the most wonderful massage. You feel like you have been lying on a massage table being kneaded like bread dough for an hour and a half. You feel taller, younger, thinner, smarter, you feel like Bruce Lee ! It’s a miracle !
We LOVE Sarah again. Sarah is a genius. Sarah is a Yoga Goddess. We break out into applause. We can’t WAIT to get back to class and do it all over again.
But let me tell you, in case you ever wondered about trying it,
Yoga is NOT for wimps !
Don’t forget your towel.
Namaste. :-)