Breathing into Ease and Flow with Yoga

I prefer flying trapeze. I'd rather jog with 80s dance music blasting from my headphones. But yoga gives me something that nothing else does.

Last night I showed up for yoga after wrestling with myself about why I didn’t need to go. I could stay home, watch TV while sitting in splits. Voila! Flexibility accomplished without missing a minute of SportsCenter.

I showed up anyway.

Honest question? Does anyone actually enjoy doing sun salutations? One or two, even three, great. But four of each series makes me nauseous. Literally. And holding downward dog for five deep breaths usually makes me think, I could be breathing at home, cuddled on the couch with JuJu, who is at end of life. Going to yoga class is robbing me of the last moments of precious time with my beloved dog.

For reasons I don’t understand, showing up for yoga when I least want to practice usually brings some sort of breakthrough. Last night was no different. By the third sun salutation, my breath had synced up perfectly with my movements. I felt my breath reach depths I’d not experienced before. The entire practice became a moving meditation where I was breath and movement without thought. I felt bliss.

Not the adrenaline high bliss of flying trapeze. Nor the dopamine surge of jogging. Last night, I felt calm and centered and capable of facing the challenges that JuJu’s end of life presents.

Yoga’s dark side sometimes eclipses its light

I used to love yoga. For years, I practiced daily. I made my second bedroom a yoga studio. Friends joined me at 7 a.m. for a 90-minute Synergy yoga practice. I became a certified yoga instructor and began teaching. Disillusionment began surfacing on a yoga retreat in Costa Rica when the teacher leading the retreat turned out to be insane.

Disenchantment piled on. Drama at the studio where I received my teacher training. Drama in the San Francisco studios in which I practiced. I was taught the purpose of yoga asana (yoga is a system; the physical poses — asanas — are but one branch of that system) is to prepare the body for meditation. I didn’t see a whole lot of mindfulness going on in the classes I took.

Every major yoga style practiced in the US was popularized by a guru now known to have been either a sexual predator, physical abuser, or both. Remember Bikram Yoga? Now, the thousands of instructors he certified during his long and highly abusive career have dropped his name. Now, it’s just Hot Yoga. And he can’t sue anyone because he’s a fugitive who cannot return to the US.

Two weeks ago, Ashtanga yoga’s long history of abusive teachers reached new heights of infamy. Teachers are squabbling on Instagram and TikTok. Reddit subs are flooded with posts calling out teachers of both sexes and accusing others of knowing about the abuse yet remaining silent.

When I look at the yoga branches with which I am most familiar, it’s now difficult to see them in a spiritual light.

Last night in the Ashtanga class, the instructor wisely addressed the abuse. He did so with sensitivity and grace. I could feel he genuinely believes he has found a path to the infinite through his physical practice.

And last night, for the first time in a long time, I understood.

Yoga’s light

Yoga poses are exercises. There’s often a right way and a wrong way to do them. But doing the postures “right” means doing them in a way that does not cause injury.

I come from an old-school, 1960s, European ballet background. Nothing we did in class was ever good enough. The feet can always be more pointed and turned out. The leg could always be higher, straighter. The turns could always be more. Head, arms, fingers, torsos, neck, even the eyes — not one body part was exempt from correction after correction.

In yoga, the corrections are different. It’s more of an exploration. Can you lift your leg higher? Can you reach your hands closer to your feet in a backbend? Can you straighten your legs more in a forward fold? It’s curiosity versus criticism.

And how liberating that was for me when I first discovered yoga. When I fall out of a balance pose, it’s nothing. I just get back in. I can fall out 20 times, and the teacher doesn’t say a word. No sneers. No disparagement.

Ashtanga’s founder, the highly controversial K. Pattabhi Jois, gave one correction more than any other — “Breathe.”

Last night, I spent 75 minutes breathing. My body also did some really cool things. But it was the breathing that brought me so much joy.

I’m not giving up on yoga. I am, however, giving up on gurus. Most humans are not capable of saintly behavior. And the ones who try to evoke that image the most might be the least capable.

Yoga has taught me that my power comes from within. It is God-given, and as long as I meditate, I can access it. I don’t need intermediaries to connect with God. I merely need stillness and breath.

Namaste.