The Choice – Convenience vs Commitment
I attended another weekend yoga workshop in Bellur this weekend. This time I didn’t stay overnight (here’s a short video of what its like to attend an overnight yoga retreat there). I drove down on Saturday and reached in time for the evening session. By the time I got home it was 10 pm. The next morning I returned, starting the journey at 6 am.
Last time I took Kalindi and Animesh with me, but it’s now 15 months postpartum and I feel it’s time to start attending retreats without the necessity of taking my entire household with me. Honestly, I never thought what yoga retreats after childbirth would be. But I instinctively knew I shouldn’t wait for when I’m ready. I will have to coerce myself to remember how wonderfully valuable and transformative these immersions are, and that might me resist the temptation of convenience and remember my commitment.
The Workshop – Reflecting On My Self-Practice
Workshops with Murli Sir require honesty and humility. They also help me assess how well I’ve been working in my postpartum yoga self-practice. My body no longer lumbers heavily through an asana practice, the fog of unfamiliar hormones has somewhat cleared from my brain.
The workshop focused on twists, and the importance of extending the spine when you twist. We discussed how to extend and expand the back muscles so that the spine is free to move. Although I treat workshops as an opportunity to explore and experiment with myself,
I feel that often the most important lessons come by observing others’ practice.
In the workshop there was a slightly older gentleman who felt because of the height of the chair he was unable to extend his back in uttanasana. Murli Sir, in his characteristic style said, “Impossible!” He asked the practitioner to remove the chair and try the asana, and surprisingly removing the chair made no difference to the lack of extension in the back.
This drove home the point that the props are neutral. They help or hinder your asanas depending upon your understanding of your body, mind and knowledge of how to use the props. I see a lot of students being dismissive about props, thinking of them as crutches they don’t need. Props are actually tools, and the best practitioners (yes, the ones who can do ganda bherundasana with ease) are the ones who know how to use props skilfully.
Ganda Berundasana
Motherhood and the Practice
Now that I can contemplate leaving Kalindi at home, in the care of others who love her, I am grateful for what these opportunities actually ask of me: to prioritise. In my third trimester, my dance teacher asked me to remember that children and motherhood are not the defining aspects for a woman – she is a sum of everything she’s accomplished and been so far. Motherhood often brings with it the slump of fatigue (responsible for me missing my 6 am classes with Raya for the last two weeks). We often feel that asana practice will drain us of whatever little reserves we have, but ironically it’s the practice is what will energise and rejuvenate us. I sense that from now this is my new normal. Yoga after motherhood is about figuring out childcare and other things so that I can spend a few days away filling my cup.
I often think about the women practitioners I’ve met at RIMYI, spending weeks away from their households to fly to the other side of the world to drink the elixir of yoga from its source – and on many days that’s all I need to unroll my mat.
No Comments