Embrace your strengths.....

This morning in class I noticed that Jessica, one of our dedicated 6am practitioners, had a really gorgeous Cobra pose. She is super flexible, especially in her upper spine. When I started setting the class up for Locust pose, Jessica went in for a third set of Cobra. This is not unusual, especially at 6am when people are just waking up. But I made a joke, "Jessica", I said, "No matter how gorgeous your Cobra pose is, you still don't get to do a third set."
She laughed and set herself up for Locust. "Wouldn't life be great" I thought out loud to the class, "if we could live our lives only doing things we were good at."

I've mused about this idea many times in my blog. Challenge, pushing one's limits, getting outside of our comfort zones..... This morning though, I thought about it differently. Jessica wasn't consciously doing a third set of Cobra. Her body just went there. Maybe her body went there because it was more comfortable there, happy there, with her bendy upper spine. My happy place is in Eagle. I get positive feedback every time I practice when I'm in Eagle. "It's because I have really long arms and legs," I think to myself when I hear the 'good Eagle' compliment, "anyone with long arms and legs can do this posture."

I spend a lot of time trying to cultivate a sense of acceptance when I teach. I spend a lot of time trying to find that place in my personal life too. Acceptance isn't just about acknowledging our limits in class (and in life), taking breaks when we need them, backing off in a posture if necessary. It's also about accepting our strengths, enjoying them, embracing them. Girls and women especially are well-trained to down-play their power. We brush off compliments, deflect that attention in another direction, make it not about us. Over the weekend, I went to a kids' Yoga training where I spent two full days with a handful of people pretty intimately. At the end of the two days, we each had to stand in the middle of a circle while people complimented us!!!! Our only instruction was that we couldn't reply, just receive. I wish I could tell you what these lovely people said to me, but I cannot because I was completely dissociated. Though I smiled and nodded as each person spoke, I could not absorb the words.

After class this morning, I checked in with Jessica, "Did that make sense?" I asked, "That adjustment about your upper spine being super flexible?"

"I'm flexible?" she clarified. "Very" I emphasized. "Thanks," Jessica said quietly. "....I guess. I'm super sore today." I wouldn't have thought for a second that Jessica was sore this morning watching her gorgeous strong Cobra. But maybe she needed to lessen the compliment. Maybe it was too much, the praise. I understand completely.

Jessica has the gift of flexibility and a beautiful Cobra pose. Her body wants to own its flexibility by doing a third set of Cobra. But like many of us, her mind hasn't caught up. As the mother of a daughter, I want to crack this one wide open. I know it starts with me. If I can figure out how to receive, to be open to accepting and embracing my strengths, that's what Lucia will learn. Like everything, it's a practice. As do many things in my life, this practice too will start in the yoga room.......the next time I do Eagle pose.

Catch them being good.

Yesterday I heard a bit of parenting advice that made me want to weep. "Catch them being good" was the simple phrase uttered from a former special education teacher. So very simple. So incredibly profound.

Parenting is unbelievably hard work. Disciplining your child-- that little sprout that grew so patiently in your belly, the person who depends on you so fully-- is imperative. And painful. Sometimes it can feel like crushing their little spirit, breaking their fragile little heart. Constructive discipline is also what's going to help your child grow up to be a pain in the ass or an asset to society. So when I heard "catch them [kids] being good," it was like I was hearing in 10th grade geometry that I could get an A simply by liking parallelograms.

With Lucia, I feel like I catch her doing good often-- at completing her daily reading, at brushing her hair, at practicing piano. These are all things Lucia enjoys so it's not a big deal to note her success with these chores. Other realms-- not interrupting grown up conversation, unloading the dishwasher, hanging up her bathrobe-- are all tasks that Lucia resists. Because of her chronic opposition compliance in these areas, I have developed a narrow lens that sees only the negative when it comes to these responsibilities. Rarely do I note when Lucia proactively does these things. Note to self--- catch her doing good.

I realize in this whole examination of my parenting that one of the reasons I love teaching yoga is how many opportunities I have to catch students "being good." The student who used to leave the room like clockwork to fill his water bottles who now fills two before class. So good. The student who can finally look at herself in the mirror for a full posture. Excellent. Two shoulders in one line. Yes! If I noted in each class how many ways students were being good, I wouldn't be able to teach the nuts and bolts of the class. I have so much gratitude that I get to watch this goodness every day.

Why is the goodness more challenging to catch in my role as a parent? Maybe it is because I have only one child and it's all on her. She's the good, the bad, the everything. As a kid, I was one of several, so there was more to look at, more to compare. It's a good lesson for me. Yes, I need to be firm with Lucia. I want to create a good, solid form in which she can grow to be a person that I am proud of; that she is proud of. At the end of every class I teach, I say goodbye to all the students, one final check in of our time together. On their faces, almost always, I can see that they feel good. They feel proud.

Most of the time it's the experiences in my daily life that I turn into helpful lessons I can impart in my role as a yoga teacher. Catching the goodness is something I learned in the yoga room. I thank my students for this wisdom.

Face your fears

A few weeks ago I wrote a blog about finding your voice. This week, I am writing about facing your fears. Last week Penni, our beloved SweatBox teacher, took her first ever 6:00am class. I had the honor of teaching it. Penni has been practicing Bikram Yoga for more than 15 years and she's never braved an early morning class. When she peeked her head in the studio door at 5:45am, I was shocked, but not as shocked as she was.

Penni, despite her prolific, long-term yoga practice, has always been afraid to practice at 6:00am. After Penni practiced her inaugural 6:00am, she reported feeling great! She was surprised, she said, by how much she enjoyed her class and plans to take another very soon. The day after Penni took my 6:00am class, I took her 9:30am class. She talked in class about how proud she was of herself for breaking the mold, practicing at 6:00am, facing her fears, about how we all need to do the things we are afraid to do. Great words Penni.

Last week I was reading an article in the New Yorker about sleep. The writer talked about how people are Larks or Owls. Larks are people who rise early, are perky right off the bat, perform at their best earlier in the day. Owls, on the other hand perform better later in the day and into the night. They take time to get warmed up and often don't reach their optimal activity level until mid-day. I'm a Lark, 100 percent. I write better in the morning, clean better in the morning, cook better, teach yoga better, practice yoga better. All of it.

Watching Penni face her fears made me think about all the ways I am stuck. For example, I would always choose to practice at 6:00am over 7:00pm. By 7:00pm, I'm usually winding down, craving my sheets and heavy comforter, even in the summer. I worry I won't have enough energy to practice well so late in the day. I'm happy for Penni that she's got a brand new practice time, that she's learned about the new and different strengths she possesses. And I've learned from her.

I've watched a lot of people this 30-Day Challenge push their Lark and Owl edges. Owls are crawling in to the 6:00am to get days 14 and 16 done and Larks are yawning through the 8:45pm to squeeze in day 23. Practically speaking, they are getting their yoga class in, but if you look at the bigger picture, they are getting out of the familiar, facing their fears. Great work everybody. I hope to see you soon at the 7:00pm class.

It's a hard habit to break.

One of my favorite things Frani says when she teaches is, "Breathe well." My interpretation of those two words is to breathe. Simple, remember to breathe-- through the easy postures, through the hard ones, through the stillness, through life. It's such good advice. We grow up hearing, "Eat well", "Sleep well", but "Breathe well" is one that we rarely hear. Breathing well in yoga can make or break your practice. Good breathing promotes a state of calm, as well as an efficient, energized practice.

I recently bought a new car. It's a hybrid, my first one. On my dashboard is a little monitor that tells me how many miles to the gallon I am getting as well as what my average mileage per gallon is. Having a hybrid has made me keenly aware of how I am driving. Pre-hybrid, I was a spaz. I paid zero attention to my speed or how my driving patterns affected my frequency at the gas pump. Now I "drive well." When I'm going an even 63 miles per hour on the freeway, getting 42 miles to the gallon, I think to myself, "why couldn't I do this when I had my non-hybrid car?" I knew then that going at a more regulated speed would offer better fuel economy, but I wasn't alerted visually the impact, so I just ignored it.

In yoga, when Frani says, "breathe well", it's usually a reminder for me, not a direction that changes what I'm doing already. I've been practicing long enough to have a habit of breathing well, but her gentle prompt helps me tap into the importance of good breathing. When I'm driving in my responsible new hybrid car, having big brother remind me how my heavy foot affects my mileage bottom line, I drive better.

Habits can be good and bad. Good habits are harder to form. Why?! I think because they are less fun, less indulgent. It's more fun to speed and whip in and out of the lanes to get to your destination quickly. It's more fun to eat bacon on your salad than just have salad. And once we start on these bad habits, they stick. Breaking the bad habits to create good ones in their place takes commitment and discipline. Having support-- gentle, loving reminders, makes changing these habits from bad to good more palatable.

When my little hybrid monitor shows 99.9 miles to the gallon as I cruise down the hill to my house, I feel like I'm getting an A+ in driving. And I want to have a 4.0 average. I really really do, so I am going to keep driving like that. Eventually it will be my good habit just like breathing well in yoga.

You're never too old to change

Bikram has a very famous saying, “Never too old, never too bad, never too late, never too sick to start from scratch once again.” All Bikram teachers, and most regular practitioners know this saying and hopefully try to abide by the idea. New beginnings are always possible.

In December my grandmother died. She was 96. Until about a year before she died, she was pretty lucid. Grandma, or GiGi, as my daughter and her cousins called her, was not a flexible woman. Raised in North Dakota by Danish immigrant parents, she was a by-the-book conservative. Grandma majored in home economics in college and was tough on diet and physique. Grandma was wholly concerned with appearance both physically and socially. Once in my teens when the fashion among my clique was to wear men's pajamas to school, she hid me behind a large potted fern to take my photo so that just my head peeked out. At Grandma's house in Fargo, we did all kinds of crazy stuff that never happened in our bohemian-oriented, liberal house in Chicago. We made our beds, said grace before dinner, vacuumed the Oldsmobile, ate beef.

My grandfather was also conservative, a small-town doctor and 100% republican. But Grandpa somehow tempered Grandma's strictness. When my grandfather was alive, he would tease Grandma about her rigidness, "C'mon Sally, let'm have a big scoop of ice cream." My grandfather died when Grandma was in her late fifties and I think that might have made her tighten her rules-belt even more. When she visited us in Chicago, she organized my drawers and my closet, bought me Lanz of Salzberg nightgowns to replace the oversized t-shirts and underwear I slept in, and spent lots of time in the kitchen, scrutinizing the bizarre goings on..... the wok, the rugged butcher block table my family gathered around, the half-open bottles of wine. As a teenager, I always stressed out a bit before visits with Grandma. Would she like my outfit? My haircut? Once I became a parent, I stopped worrying so much. Grandma became GiGi. She loved being a great-grandmother. The focus was now off of me and placed lovingly onto my then tiny daughter who could really do nothing to offend GiGi at her young age.

When GiGi was in her eighties she got remarried to John. John had been a close friend of the family for years and after his wife Florence died, he and Grandma hooked up. John, unlike my republican physician grandfather, was a former academic, and a democrat. Grandma was totally smitten with John. She would coo, "Isn't he clever?" And he was. John published word puzzles that he'd distribute all over their retirement community, doing his part to stimulate his sharp mind and keep all the other old brains fresh. John mellowed Grandma out a lot. She was so in love, so tickled to be in a stimulating partnership, to find romance (again) this late in life, that she stopped really caring about what anyone else was doing. It was a joy to visit the newlyweds at their little apartment in Sun City, Arizona. They were truly happy.

In 2008, when Barak Obama was running for president, Grandma shocked us all by voting for him. My grandmother's first democratic vote, our first African American President, at the age of 92! Growing up, I remember hearing the adage, "s/he's too old to change" about people far younger, and far less rigid than Grandma. Sometimes when I'm teaching I tell this story about Grandma voting democratic. I watch people following their same old habits (we all have them). "If my republican Grandma can vote for Barak Obama at the age of 92, you can resist wiping your brow in Standing Separate Leg Head to Knee!" Never too old. Never too bad. Never too late. Never too sick. Cheers to Grandma!

Kids doing camel

On Thursdays, I teach yoga to at Lucia's elementary school. It is a surreal experience in many ways. The school is 'open-concept' which means that there are no walls. In many ways it is great. It feels like a true community. Everyone sees everyone all the time so, even if you are not personally acquainted, it is as if everyone knows each other. The downside is that people literally walk through the yoga space throughout the class. The school secretary announces messages on the speakers during Savasana. The janitor pushes the rolling recycling bin through our Namaste circle. It's always something. But these kids are pretty used to these distractions and manage to focus in spite of the surrounding chaos.

The little Yogis and Yoginis in the kids' yoga class are amazingly able to be still in Savasana. They know that when they are in Savasana, quiet, eyes closed on their mats, perfectly still, a surprise Beanie Baby will land on their belly. When the get out of Savasana, they get to meet the animal and keep it on their mat for the remainder of class. It's amazing how still they can be.

Lucia, now eight, a know-it-all, and fairly experienced yoga practitioner for having assisted me in every kids' class I've taught, insisted this session that I teach Ustrasana (Camel Pose) to the kids. "Sure," I said, knowing that with the natural spinal flexibility kids have, "it would be pretty easy for them." Two weeks ago, I introduced the kids to Camel. "Ooh!" "Owwww!" "Ahh-Ahh!" "Whoooaaa" they peeped from all around the room. Some little ones flailed their arms to regain their straight spines. I watched little bodies collapsing, tiny wrinkle-free faces turing pink. "Jezum," I thought to myself, "these kids are dramatic."

The next day I was teaching at The SweatBox. When Camel Pose came round I watched the grown up responses-- furrowed brows, clenched teeth, bright red faces. They were doing the posture and they were managing to do it in silence. I know that most people were really struggling, but they kept it inside. I had a flash of the little kids owwing and oohing and ahhing the day before in class.

I love teaching yoga. I love the connection that comes through the struggle. I love feeling inspired by the hard work and dedication. I love the authentic energy that emerges through dedicated practice. I get something different from teaching children and adults. With adults, I feel empathy, compassion, and so much love for the students. I've been there. I know how hard it is. I admire them so much. With children, I feel pure joy, renewal, excitement, and love. I see how utterly authentic they are in their experience with their bodies. They've yet to learn about assigning judgement to themselves in the way adults are so well-versed. They are truly open. Savasana. Ustrasana. Both really challenging postures, with very different physical reactions. Kids go into Savasana with relative ease, most adults struggle. Ustrasana. Kids don't hold back their immediate, intense responses to the intensity of the pose. Adults grit their teeth and bear it.

As always, yoga offers great metaphors for life. When we are young, we are open and free and light. As we get older, we pile on layers of life that inevitably make us less so. These layers of life can act as distractions when we are trying to still our minds in Savasana. And they serve us well to find our determination to be still and quiet in Ustrasana. As for the kids, they are exactly where they should be-- unburdened by adult troubles in Savasana and letting it all hang out in Ustrasana. My hope is that, as kids continue their yoga practice, just like us grownups, they will learn how to use their life experience to help them in their yoga and how to use their yoga practice to help them in their lives.

At least I'm sure about my nail polish

I sometimes think my ultimate quest in life is to feel certain. About anything. I second guess most things I do-- before I do them, while I'm doing them, and after they are done. This self-doubt might stem from being a twin. Until college when my twin sister and I split up to go to college three states away from each other, I pretty much followed her around. She was cool, new-wave bordering on punk, the kind of high school kid who dyed her hair platinum and wore the wishbone from dinner as an earring to school the next day. I was a nerdish jock. I tried to be as rad as Katherine, but the farthest I really got was dying a chunk of bangs peroxide orange. The result was a really bad Flock of Seagulls look and really irritating grow out. College for me was kind of a disaster. I hid in the familiar nerd-land that was mostly where I was comfortable, and let all that stuff that Kat exposed me to go by the wayside. And I think I missed that stuff. Even though it was Katherine's it felt kind of like part of me too.

My adulthood since college has been twenty years of exploring different "ways of being." Deep down my foundation is still N E R D and as the years have ticked on, I've been able to expand that identity. But I always have been and always will be a twin, so the self-doubt persists. In 1990 Katherine and I drove our grandmother's 1978 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme from Chicago to Seattle. We were going to open a restaurant in Portland but kept driving because we had friends in Seattle. Katherine stayed for about seven years and during those years I still followed her lead. After she moved, it was like college again, only I was a moderately less nerdy.

Yoga is the one really clear thing in my post-gcollege life that has helped me to feel more secure in my decisions. When Katherine left Seattle, I was already doing yoga, but after she moved, I got way more serious, practicing several times a week on a regular basis. Three years after she moved, I was becoming a teacher, opening a studio. In many ways, I think this was my first big breakthrough, leaving my old "do-gooder" social worker job, taking a big risk to open a business, stepping out into something totally separate from Katherine. Since then, I've made lots of little decisions that are just mine. The other day in yoga, I was doing Padahastasana (hands-to-feet pose) and I noticed my newly manicured toes (I'll call the color coral-persimmon). I had a moment when I thought to myself, "Laura, you made the 100% right decision about that color." It felt so good, that feeling of being certain. These days Katherine wouldn't be caught dead wearing nail polish. Funny how things change.