Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Behind door number one...

One of my favorite aspects of life is its ability to surprise me.

I never, ever dreamed of being a yoga teacher when I was a littler person. I was more the studious type who played in the school orchestra and dreamed more of being like Madame Curie, then, say, Mary Lou Retton. The world of sports is still a world that doesn't really employ my personal skill set. As I will tell my sports-loving friends, it's not that I dislike the sports. It's just that they, if I'm being completely honest, do not like me. So, as with any relationship based on mutual understanding, they (the sports) and I (glasses wearing Asian mildly afraid of objects hurtling through the air) have decided to keep a healthy distance apart. I find this an agreeable solution.

Except...bummer. There's a lot of pretty nifty things that come of sports. And until I met yoga, I was busy excluding myself from this whole realm of healthy fun entertainment that is encompassed under the "sports" label.

And like any good story, yoga and I fell in love at first sight. And like any good lover, yoga has stuck to me like a molasses laden bow upon a newborn baby's fuzzy bald head.

Some people would argue that yoga isn't just a sport.

And those people...they are totally my people.

Yes, there is a rigorous physical aspect to yoga. And a personal goal setting aspect to yoga. There can even be a teamwork component to yoga in certain partnery classes.

But yoga, if I may take the turn down Dramatic Road here for a bit, is not merely a sport. Yoga is a lifestyle. The practice of asana took my life, spun it around a few hundred degrees and demanded that I make something more of my spiritual self. All this while challenging me to test the limits of my physical self through countless sun salutations, arm balances, inversions, and the ever elusive marichiasanas (woot my yoga people out there).

And so we come full circle to making something of this 22 year old's dream. Come September 29th, I will be hopping on a 14 hour plane ride to live in Rishikesh, India. For one month I will be meditating, practicing asana, and most of all, learning how to transmit the love I have for this more-than-a-sport to other people.

Can I get a Weeeehhhaaaaawww????????

3 comments:

Marisa said...

As a certified yoga instructor who did the five-week-live-in-a-tent-at-40-and-do-yoga-twelve-hours-a-day thing, I applaud your goal and I envy your destination! May it be enlightening and soul satisfying. Namaste!

Po said...

Sweet! I didn't know you had done that. Where did you study?

Marisa said...

I studied at Shoshoni in Nederland for the first 200-hour certification in 2002. Then at Mount Madonna in Watsonville, CA for another two weeks (five years later) to start my 500-hour certification (I need one more week-long course to be done with it). Both times were a) not what I expected, b) physically and mentally demanding, and c) some of the best times of my life. I loved eating vegetarian but never sustained it back in the "real world". And you will find that becoming a Person is just that: a process of becoming. Learn to enjoy the ride and know that all is as it's supposed to be.