When It Takes Effort to Experience Effortlessness

"I made that," I marveled, not for the first time, as I watched Jake at school this morning. He was banging two farm animal puzzle pieces together, making a loud clacking noise appreciated by no one but himself. His eyes were clear and as blue as his shirt, which hung over the top of his baggy little jeans, which collapsed on top of his miniature cool shoes. His smile was as big and pure as only a toddler's smile can be. I was stunned by his beauty, unable to stand up and get on with my day.

Being Patient with Your Practice

Yesterday, I wrote about how I had managed to stop moving for an afternoon and how being still showed me there was a lot more time than I thought.

When I finished, I gave a deep, happy sigh. It was just after noon. A whole afternoon stretched ahead of me, free of urgency or panic and full of time to run to Target for some greatly needed toilet paper so I would no longer have to resort to the box of tissues I keep in the bathroom to clean the hairs off the sink.

How I'm Learning to Take More Naps

I took a nap with Jake yesterday.

It was an overcast day, and a cool breeze with the smell of rain puffed through the open window. Jake and I were wrapped up together in my duvet. I'd had a lovely, strong home yoga practice that morning while Jake had pedaled about the park with his dad on his Radio Flyer tricycle, his knees knocking against the handlebars and impeding his progress. We were horizontal and warm, and I had squishy baby cheeks to kiss. Many people would find a nap a perfectly natural occurrence under these circumstances.

I would not be one of those people.

How Losing a Little Bit of What's Central to You Can Be Kind of Centering

It hit me somewhere around the time I was half-heartedly kicking my right foot up toward a handstand in the middle of the room. Something had radically changed in my life.

Respecting Your Body (and, of course, your child's) in a World That Doesn't

Boy, you think you're a careful, concerned parent doing everything anyone could to ensure that your child will never contract autism or cancer or any of the other scary diseases that seem to lurk everywhere in our toxic world, and along come abundant assurances that you could be doing so very much more. It's enough to make a tired mom collapse in a puddle of tears and resignation.

Surrendering When You Can't Decide How to Put Your Child to Sleep (or How to Make Some Other Important Parenting Decision)

The worst part of lying awake in bed at 4:30 this morning listening to Mike's deep sleep breaths was not knowing if I'd done the right thing.

I'll bet we all have that one area of parenting that refuses to yield a clear course of action. No matter what we decide, we find ourselves wondering if we should have decided differently.

Sometimes It's in Your Nature to Take Your Toddler to Play at the Mall

A good friend told me yesterday how difficult she finds it to spend a whole day entertaining her twenty-month-old alone. That, she realized, is what those weekly Target outings are about.

"Target?" I thought to myself. "Target? Honey, you haven't sunk to the depths of toddler entertainment desperation until you become a regular at the play area in the food court of the Asheville Mall."

Taking Some Time on Sunday Morning to Honor My Heart

I woke up in a cranky mood this morning.

"Great," Mike said when I informed him of this fact, and I don't blame him, even though I sort of did at the time. One of the hardest things about being cranky for me is knowing that I am taking it out on him. (I was going to say "taking it out on others," but the truth of the matter is I can pretty much hide it from anyone else. Mike, I don't try so hard. That's part of the satisfaction of being cranky, isn't it? Making the person who chose to spend his life with you maybe regret it a little bit?)

What Not Being a Real Buddhist Has Taught Me About Motherhood

Last night as I was washing the day's sippy cups I listened to a podcast of Fresh Air featuring Pico Iyer, who has known the Dalai Lama for 33 years and recently wrote a book about him.

The only one awake in the still house on a soft spring night, fresh from dinner out at Marco's, a family friendly pizza place where Jake joyfully played peek-a-boo with the two-year-old at the table across from us, I felt peaceful listening to stories of this man I so admire. But at the same time I felt a small rasp of unease, like an emery board being softly drawn across my Buddhist convictions.

Why I Can't Take a Compliment (Even of My Kid)

When I picked Jake up from school yesterday, one of his caregivers told me he'd been "doing much better lately."

Since I thought he'd been doing just fine for some time now, I found this cheery message about as welcome as one of Jake's epic morning poops.

A Temper Tatrum Teaches Me to Be in the Moment

I am feeling deep gratitude for Jake's latest temper tantrum.

How Being Kicked in the Face by a Baby Reminded Me that Energy Is All Around Us

I'm really tired right now. And not just because I spent most of the night being hit in the face by my baby.

Learning to Let Go of Frustration While Walking Through the Mall with Jake

It's amazing how our children can teach us things even in a place so little conducive to spiritual enlightenment as the Asheville Mall.

The lesson that needed learning began yesterday morning, when Mike more or less demanded I see a doctor. I didn't put up much of a fight, probably because I was too busy coughing in a high pitched wheeze of tears every time my swollen glands brushed up against the little bumps decorating my throat. I've spent nearly three weeks now shining a flashlight into my mouth every night before going to bed, as if just knowing how scary it looks will make much of a difference in my recovery.

I knew the road to a doctor's appointment would be bumpy. It's bad enough trying to contact my primary care folks. But just imagine trying to get in to see an internist when your primary care physicians are a bunch of midwives. Who, for some reason, didn't strike me as the most qualified people to look at my throat, even though I'm all too happy to trust them with the far more harrowing experience childbirth.

Still, I gamely called the office and asked to speak to the desk nurse, figuring she could provide me the necessary referral.

"I'll have her call you back," the receptionist said when I made my request.

Now, call me dense, but isn't a desk nurse's job to sit at a desk and field questions from patients? I just can't imagine what else she was doing during the hour and a half it took for her to return my call.

"We don't work with any internists," she informed me when she finally did.

"BOOWH!" Jake yelled in my ear as he tried to settle into my lap with said book. He was staying home to play with his grandmother on her last day in town and was plenty bored with us both already.

"And most internists won't see a new patient for several weeks, or even months," the desk nurse informed me helpfully.

Jake hit me in the face with his book and grabbed at the phone. I considered letting him hang up on her. Instead, I managed to ascertain that if I could find an internist willing to see me, she could provide me with the referral.

Jake's grandmother and I settled him at the table with a cup of blueberry yogurt while I set about the task of finding an internist willing to see me. As soon as I lowered him into his high chair he curled into a recalcitrant back bend reminiscent of an inside-out slipper lobster and turned a shade of red reminiscent of the same creature after spending a few minutes in a pot of boiling water. With a sigh, I settled him into my lap and avoided the flying gobs of blueberry yogurt as I called our neighbors who have raved about their GP and left a message asking for his name.

Rachel called me back as Jake was scooping the last of his yogurt into his mouth with his hands. His grandmother seems hopeful that the right encouragement might convince him to use his spoon more consistently, and even to do so without turning it upside down on its way to his mouth. I passed that stage of wishful thinking weeks ago.

After I spent several minutes on hold with Rachel's doctor while fending off Jake's attempts to decorate my shirt with blueberry yogurt I was informed the doctor was not accepting new patients.

Feeling personally rejected, I wiped Jake's hands, sent him off to play with Grandma, and got the number of a family practice near our home.

Jake wandered toward the living room and then noticed I wasn't following. "MAMA!" he insisted as he clawed at my lap.

There is nothing so frustrating as being caught in an unclear phone tree when your throat is killing you and you just want to see a doctor and the doctor's office is plainly doing its best to thwart the efforts of anyone to hoping to become a new patient. Except doing so when there is a toddler in your lap yelling in your ear as his grandmother just as loudly tries to engage him in a game of coloring on today's newspaper.

Eventually, with the relief of a first-time marathoner limping across the finish line, I managed to get a person. I explained my situation.

"We're not taking new patients," she said, not unexpectedly. "The only way we're taking new patients is if they're referred."

I was hoping all it would take was one call back to the desk nurse, but of course the receptionist told me they'd already put my file away so, naturally, I'd have to wait for her to call me back. She eventually did and promised I'd have a referral . . . tomorrow. Which was better than quietly dying of throat cancer, as I had stubbornly decided I would do out of spite.

None of this, of course, brings us to the Asheville Mall.


It's Only Frustrating if You Rush It

Much has changed in my life since the days when I owned a leather mini skirt and drank beverages served in martini glasses late into the night. Now you can spot me in the middle of the food court, surrounded by the smell of french fries and a land of soft vinyl playthings.

What brought us to the mall was crappy weather. I've been shouting about it being spring much the way Jake shouts about all the balls he is spotting -- most notably in the produce section of EarthFare yesterday afternoon, where every orange, tomato, and onion suggested its resemblance to the bouncy rubber things he loves to play with.

Yesterday's crappy weather was proof that I am crazy to have ever left California. Not only was it cold and overcast and gloomy. Not only did it start to rain while Jake was taking his nap. But it actually hailed for several deeply depressing minutes. Given the elements, there was nothing to do for afternoon entertainment but take Jake and Grandma to the play area at the food court in the mall.

It was on our way out that Jake slowed us down and I found spirituality at the mall.

Mall-walks generally make me tense -- all that useless merchandise screaming at you, an eerie lack of sunlight or any suggestion of a world outside retail hell, corridors going on and on in an endless trek of piped-in music and fluorescent lighting. Now I was forging through it with a twenty-five pound toddler in my arms, and he was not being cooperative.

Tantrums are a new talent of Jake's. Just in the past three days, it seems, he has realized how much he has a mind of his own, and he seems determined to express it, even if he lacks the words to do so. Belatedly, I think of the baby sign language book I optimistically purchased six months ago. I can still recall how to say "dog" and "cat" and "fish," but gave up on teaching them to Jake because he seemed to be geared up to get language before he hit the Terrible Two's. That may be his plan, but he has compensated for it by developing his belligerence at a mere fifteen months.

In this instance, Jake decided he was going to walk through the mall. Furthermore, he was going to do so without holding Mommy's hand. Nor with any thought of following Mommy. Not when there were so many opportunities to walk the wrong way, stare at himself in plate glass windows, and grab at the sunglasses foolishly displayed at toddler level.

My frustration level could easily have been as high as it had been earlier in the day when I was caught in the maze of the doctors' office phone trees so much like the maze of the mall. Progress was no more within my control now than it had been then. The distractions were far less pleasant than blueberry yogurt-covered hands and baby yells. And my desperation to get out into fresh air and sanity was much, much stronger than my determination to see a doctor.

But none of this mattered because Jake was being so darned cute.

How can you not smile when your toddler is throwing a big, earnest smile at some stranger, getting her to slow down and break into a smile even wider? Why not choose to laugh when your boy points at the candy machines and bellows "BAHW!" with an insistence that suggests he wishes every person within earshot to praise him on recognizing a ball when he sees one? Far better to find creative ways to coax him forward than to end up hurt at how vociferously he rejects any assistance in moving more quickly, even though you really should know better than to take it personally.

And there, in our walk through the mall, I learned a lesson in finding beauty in unlikely places.


Beauty Exists Everywhere

Everything, I was recently reminded, shares the same energy. Put it in yogic terms or scientific ones, whichever you believe, but they both amount to the same thing. We are all made up of the same energy (atoms, molecules, whatever -- I dropped out of AP chemistry in eleventh grade and never looked back).

This means many things, but for present purposes, it suggests that the same beauty I find looking out my window at the budding trees exists somewhere in the stale, dim artificiality of the Asheville Mall.

I'm not suggesting that the physical pieces of the mall hold the beauty of a tree in spring. Artificial is artificial, and the mall per se can no more soothe my senses than Diet Coke can nourish my body.

But the energy is there nonetheless, squeezing its way past the revolving doors, beating in the hearts of the other mallgoers, bursting out in the joy of my boy discovering that he can walk on his own past The Gap and Stride Rite and the Complete Laser Clinic of Asheville. The beauty is there, waiting to be found, if you can bring yourself to open to it. Which, admittedly, is a lot more difficult in the mall on a cold, rainy day than it is in the park on a beautiful, sunny one.

And there's the lesson. It is up to us to find the beauty in our lives. Sometimes the Universe makes a gift of it -- like in the faces of our children. Sometimes, though, we have to make the choice to find it ourselves. We can react to the frustration of a doctors' office phone tree by becoming angry and shut-in and by poutily deciding to just be sick because no one is willing to help us get better. Or we can refuse to let the frustration be anything more than what it is -- an annoyance, a discomfort, but nothing that should blind us to all the beauty that is in our lives regardless.

Children, I figure, offer a constant refresher course in this concept. At least twenty times a day, you will have the opportunity to give in to frustration and exhaustion and a weepy sense that you will never get to do anything you want and need (more, I imagine, if you have a teenager). And each of those times, you get the chance to blink your eyes and see past the red, bunched-up face winding up for a tantrum because you do not wish to be hit in the head with a picture book. You get to pull up the corners of your mouth just a little bit and exercise your ability to smile at this precious little person whose very recalcitrance is, if you think about it, pretty charming.

Do I necessarily want to be hit over the head with this lesson twenty times a day? Not any more than I want to be hit in the face with Jake's picture book. But it's one of the complicated, twisty parts of being a parent -- all the joy and the frustration and the figuring out life in a new way bound together like strands of the DNA of our souls that have been altered by the bits of our DNA running around the living room spilling juice out of a waved sippy cup.


Eka Pada Raja Kapotasana (King Pigeon Pose)

Nothing is as beautiful in the yoga asanas as a full back bend, and few poses are as difficult to open to. Eka Pada Raja Kapotasana adds a further challenge because it requires open hips as well. But it is also a lovely way to find the beauty in whatever version of the pose your body embraces. And remember, as difficult as you may find it, it's a lot more fun than being stuck in the mall.

Kapotasana (pigeon preparation)

1) From adho mukha svanasana (downward facing dog), step your right foot forward. Bend at the knee and bring your right ankle toward your left wrist as you lower onto your back (left) knee. The intention is for your shin to run between your hands, parallel to the front of your mat, but few of us have hips open enough to support this version of the pose. Instead, bring your right ankle down toward your left hip, bending your right knee, until you find a comfortable position.

2) Take a moment to see if your body is tipping toward your right hip, lifting your left hip off the floor. If it is, place a folded blanket under your right hip to elevate it so it is even with your left hip. Many practitioners continue with this pose with their hips out of alignment, risking lower back pain. I strongly recommend taking the time to use a blanket instead.

3) Place your hands by your hips with your fingertips on the floor. Perform a shoulder loop -- forward, up toward your ears, and down your back. Draw your navel in toward your spine and up toward your heart and let your heart sing.

4) Stay here for several long, deep breaths, strongly engaging your abdominal muscles, as you feel your lower back and hips release.

5) As you are ready, slowly start to fold forward. First, place your hands in front of you, inhale and lengthen your spine, then exhale and fold a bit. If you can place your forearms on the floor, stop here, inhale and lengthen your spine, then exhale your way a bit closer to the floor. Stop wherever you feel tight, placing blankets or a bolster under your body if you would like to have something to rest your body on. Some people will be able to rest their bodies on the floor.

6) Wherever you find your edge, stay and breathe, stretching your left leg strongly behind you to maintain your alignment, letting your weight fall evenly between your hips, and keeping your shoulders from creeping up to your ears. Bow your head and look inside for the beauty of this pose.

7) When you are ready, slowly walk your body up.

Eka Pada Raja Kapotasana

1) Still sitting with your right knee bent in front of you and your left leg extended behind you, bend your left knee.

2) See if you can grasp your left foot with your left hand. If you can't, use a strap looped around your foot. Flex your left foot strongly to protect your knee.

3) Remain here and breathe until you feel your left hip tendon relax. Try to square your shoulders to the front of your mat.

4) This may be your pose. If so, remain here, breathing, and let your heart open into a bit of a back bend. Find your beauty.

5) If you would like to move on, swing your left fingers around the sole and to the outside of your left foot and continue circling them around to the front. Your left elbow will bend toward the ceiling, your palm will rest on the ball of your foot, and your fingers will face the front. Push your foot strongly into your hand and you push your hand strongly into your foot as your knee bends more deeply with your opening quadricep. If you feel any knee pain, release the pose. If you are at your edge, stay here, breathe deeply, and let your heart open into a back bend. Find your beauty.

6) If you would like to move on, hook your left toes in the crook of your left elbow as you bend your left arm and reach your left hand toward the front. Reach your right hand toward the front then up toward the ceiling. Bend your right elbow and see if you can grasp your left fingers with your right fingers. Breathe deeply, and let your heart open into a back bend. Find your beauty.

7) If you are exceptionally open, release your right hand back to the ground for balance and let your left foot slide out of your left elbow toward your wrist. Stick out your left thumb (like a hitchhiker) and grasp the outer edge of your left foot between your thumb and fingers. Rotate your left elbow overhead as your hand shifts to hold your left toes with your fingers on the top of your foot and your thumb on the sole. You may keep your right hand on the floor or circle it overhead to join your left hand on your left foot in the full pose. Breathe deeply, and let your heart open into a back bend. Find your beauty.

Repeat on the other side.


We all will have different versions of this pose, just as we all have very different children. But just as each of our children is beautiful in his or her own way, so are each of our poses, which come from us just as our children do. The best part of the eka pada raja kapotasana, just like the best part of motherhood -- and of life -- comes from finding the beauty.

Making the Little Choices

I'm on my way to the Carl Sandburg house, and wondering if I learned anything at all yesterday.

It was Saturday, I'd been cutting into my work time entertaining relatives, and I really just wanted to stay home and get some work done. Still, there's a difference between deciding to get some work done and deciding to let Mike and his mother take Jake off for the afternoon without me.

I'm not suggesting anything dramatic here, just a depressing inertia when it came to choosing between staying at home or joining the rest of the family on their outing to the Cradle of Forestry.

I haven't exactly been wanting to visit the Cradle of Forestry since moving to Asheville eight months ago. In fact, I haven't a particularly clear idea of what it is. Mike has this special gift for finding strange little things to do on the weekends that generally involve driving long distances while twisted around in the passenger seat trying to entertain Jake, who is no fan of the long car ride himself.

No, the crux of my indecision had nothing to do with the particular destination. It was the fact that the rest of the family had a destination and I didn't.

For some reason, it's always been difficult for me to reject a planned activity, no matter how uninteresting, for time spent alone. Analyze it if you will, but bear in mind that now Jake has been introduced into the equation. At this point, it has as much to do with giving up time with my boy as with my own issues about being left alone.

So, hoping to have learned from the yoga lessons I've offered here, I carefully considered my options and waited to hear what my heart had to say about it.

And here is where I imagined someone reading this blog, taking my advice, and throwing up her hands in disgust.

What I realized as I meandered about the house watching Mike pack Jake's diaper bag and mumbling something incoherent when he asked if I was coming was that the choices we make are sometimes of little consequence to our hearts. My heart, apparently, was busy with bigger questions than whether to leave my house for a few hours or stay home. It simply had no answer for me.


It's Not Always a Question of Heart Versus Head

The lesson here, I think, is that yoga, like anything that seems to make life easier, can become a bit of a crutch. I spend my days grabbing at bits of yogic philosophy -- like learning to follow your heart instead of your head -- and somewhere along the line I become convinced that there is a simple solution to every neurotic hiccough of my mind.

So yesterday, as the adrenaline started to buzz up from my ankles toward my brain at the prospect of choosing between a Saturday afternoon alone or on an outing, I grasped for something to ward off the panic.

"Do what your heart tells you," I reminded myself. The adrenaline buzz tapered off to a slight humming in my fingertips. "Don't get caught up in what you think you should do."

Ah, relief was on its way. I didn't have to be beholden to what I thought I was supposed to do as a good daughter-in-law. One trip to the Cradle of Forestry simply wasn't going to appreciably affect my mother-in-law's estimation of me. Nor did I have to stay home because I had set some artificial deadlines about getting work done. So few people read this blog to begin with that I sincerely doubt anyone will really notice if I go a day or two without posting anything.

"Well," my mind said, giving up with nary a struggle as it turned to my heart. "What do you say?"

My heart responded quite clearly. It really wanted to spend time with my baby boy and the husband I see so little of during the week and the mother-in-law I don't see for months at a time. But it also really, really wanted some uninterrupted writing time, some time to be alone and quiet after all the noise of family gatherings.

In other words, my heart wasn't going to give me an easy answer.

What a beautiful gift. Of course I wanted yoga to make all of my life easier, especially the bits spent trying to figure out how to be a good mother and a happy person. But part of figuring these things out -- part of anything important, really -- is engaging in a struggle. Life just isn't always easy, answers rarely are when you're a grow-up, and having several equally good options is, when you think about it, a blessing.

Put another way, do I want my asana practice to be a challenge or do I prefer to drift through it without testing my limits?


Discomfort Versus Pain

It still kind of bugs me when I mention doing yoga to someone who doesn't and they smile kindly and say, "Oh, yoga," in a way that conjures up images of a bunch of people lying around on the floor being mellow. The point of a yoga practice isn't merely to relax, though it's a lovely benefit. It's also important that we challenge ourselves.

One of the essential elements of an asana practice is learning to face discomfort with calm. And the whole reason we challenge ourselves to experience discomfort is to help us face the discomforts that are a part of life.

It's kind of uncomfortable just acknowledging that life isn't always comfortable, isn't it? I think about the stories I hear of women who schedule Caesarean births without a medical reason. I don't mean to judge them, because they may have perfectly legitimate reasons for doing so. But they are also recognizing that the miracle of birth (and, cheesy as it sounds, it is a miracle) comes from the supreme discomfort (for both parties) of a vaginal birth.

[Wow, just re-read this a few hours after posting and realized it sounds like I'm saying the miracle of birth somehow doesn't come from a Caesarean section, and boy would I be offended if I had had one and read that. Thank goodness for the Caesarean -- and thank goodness for the vacuum-delivery I had. But most of us do -- again, unless we have medical reasons -- get to experience just a little bit of the discomfort that was, until modern medicine starting saving many a woman's life, the precursor to a vaginal birth. And really all I meant was to point out that the Universe often demands we move through discomfort to find joy.]

Pretty much everything does, when you think about it. (I mean, pretty much everything good comes from discomfort, not, specifically, the discomfort of a vaginal birth.) No one floats through life in a cheery bubble of ease. And all the efforts of those who think it's possible are just giving them a false sense of control. After all, what is it that people most often turn to to avoid discomfort? Money? Possessions? Drugs? We all know by now that they don't make you happy; they just distract you enough from real life to make you think you are.

So I was pretty off-base yesterday when I was hoping I could avoid the discomfort of deciding to spend some time all for myself by using a bit of yogic philosophy. Because why would yoga help me avoid discomfort when it's all about helping me face it?

Then there's the other piece of discomfort that reminds me I should feel gratitude for experiencing it.

In every asana practice, we have a chance to experience discomfort. But we also have the power to experience pain. Take any pose, push yourself too hard, and pain can result. Pulled muscles, a broken toe or two, a sore neck. So not only do we get to learn to face discomfort, but we have to learn to face it without causing ourselves pain.

Of course, the difference between an asana practice and real life is that on a yoga mat, in the safety of a yoga class, we get to choose between discomfort and pain. In life, we don't.

So, in the end, wasn't I lucky all I had to deal with on Saturday was a little bit of discomfort? In the big scheme, the decision I had to make was beyond minor. Having it be difficult let me practice experiencing discomfort with grace. And, if I chose to take the lesson to heart, it was also an opportunity to feel grateful that there was nothing painful involved.

Aren't we all lucky if we're living in a moment without pain? And, if so, what's a little bit of discomfort but a reminder of how lucky we are?


Experiencing the Joys of Discomfort

I ended up having a perfectly lovely Saturday afternoon -- so lovely that I had intended for it to be the centerpiece of this essay. Instead, I have wandered off to discover more important things to discuss and, in the process, have inadvertently deleted the paragraph I wrote about just how lovely it was.

My afternoon went something like this: A ringing loneliness in the house as I found myself alone with the dogs, who rarely accompany me to my office as cozy hounds should, but sulk in the living room all day waiting for someone to rub their bellies or take them for a walk.

This feeling was something akin to that first moment you start to stretch a tight muscle. Not so great.

But rather than dwell on the loneliness, I sat down at my computer to do the writing that was the point of my staying home -- much as stretching a muscle is the point of undertaking the asana that starts out making us so uncomfortable.

As I wrote, I forgot all about the loneliness. I was absorbed, satisfied, following my heart. I had found my edge -- that point of discomfort in a pose -- and stayed with it until the discomfort melted away.

As I continued to stretch, I finished my writing and felt so much energy that I installed the long overdue gate at the top of the stairs. For the past eight months, I have merely cautioned Jack to stay away from the stairs, often with a worried yell from the bedroom when he wanders out as I'm getting dressed. Naturally, the reason he has not fallen down the stairs is because he was listening to me, not because I am really lucky.

And then I was done working and got to experience the joy of sitting outside reading a book on a Saturday afternoon. I'd like to repeat that because it's not something I ever thought I'd be writing about for the next ten years or so. I got to sit and read a book, and it wasn't the ten minutes in bed at the end of the day before my eyes clunk closed with the utter exhaustion of entertaining a toddler.

The point is, I experienced joy in a way I just don't think I would have if I hadn't come to it through discomfort. And, believe it or not, I have experienced joy in stretching asanas as well, even if they start out mighty uncomfortable indeed.


Pascimottansana (seated forward fold)

Pascimottanasana is so simple and yet so often not fun. It involves stretching hamstrings, which we rarely do and therefore allow to get really tight. It also requires an open lower back and strong abdominals -- both sabotaged by years of sitting in chairs. And it just isn't a very sexy pose, so it's hard to get excited about embracing it in search of joy.

It is also, however, a wonderful way to meditate on discomfort and to find how quickly the discomfort dissolves if we just stay with it.

1) Sit on the floor with your legs out in front of you. Place your hands next to your hips for support. If you can not sit this way without bending your knees, try sitting on the very edge of a blanket -- just your sitting bones should be on the blanket, not the backs of your thighs.

2) Flex your feet so your toes point toward the ceiling. At the same time, let your inner thighs roll toward the floor.

3) Very gently pressing your hands into the floor, let your shoulder blades slide down your back while your heart lifts. Pull your navel in toward your spine and up toward your heart. Your lower back should lengthen.

4) Sit here for five deep, long breaths as you gaze at your toes. Observe where you are tight. Don't back away from it. Instead, breathe into it, seeing if it releases on the exhale.

5) Inhale again, consciously lifting your heart and drawing your navel in. As you exhale, let your heart lengthen toward your feet as you lean forward. Let your hands move down the sides of your legs to support you.

6) Stop when you start to feel discomfort/tightness. Place your hands on your thighs or shins (or, if your are very open, your big toes or the outsides of your feet).

7) Check in to make sure you haven't backed off by flexing your feet, straightening your knees, and letting your sitting bones subtly move toward the back of the room.

8) Inhale and lift your heart again as you lengthen your spine.

9) Keeping this length, exhale and fold forward until you find your edge -- the place where you feel discomfort but not pain.

10) Be here, breathing, observing. Try not to let your mind wander -- instead, let it check in with the integrity of the pose. Feel each inhale travel from the soles of your feet out your sitting bones. Let each exhale move from the base of your spine out the crown of your head.

11) Notice when the discomfort dissolves and decide if you want to move a little deeper into the pose.

12) Hold for anywhere from 10 long, slow breaths to several minutes.

13) Release slowly, letting your heart lift your torso. Bounce your legs around in any way that feels good to release them

A simple pose for a simple choice. Who can believe I'd write so much about not going to the Cradle of Forestry?

Facing Life's Daily Detours Like Bamboo

Yesterday I planned on writing a YogaMamaMe entry even though I really didn't have time for it.

As a result, I found myself with 10 minutes to go before yoga class began as I threw myself into the car and marveled yet again at how it always seems to be 5 minutes later by the car clock than I could swear it was a moment ago by the clock in the kitchen. Suddenly, I had just 5 short minutes to drive to the studio, perform a quick but respectable parallel park, throw my shoes into a cubby and my name onto the sign-in sheet, and set up my mat while pretending I was really calm and unhurried.

Already I was learning a lesson. I hate rushing. And yet I often am in a rush. Perhaps, I considered as I cruised past the Montessori School at a speed I hoped was appropriate both for the setting and my current predicament, I should resist stubbornly sticking to my plan to write a YogaMamaMe entry when I really don't have enough time. Perhaps instead of writing about surrendering, I should actually surrender to the fact that sometimes we just don't get to do what we had in mind. Or we insist that we do and we end up rushing around in a sweat, swearing like a sailor in a tsunami-sized storm when we accidentally hit the lock button on the car keys instead of the unlock button and are momentarily stymied in our attempts to take a panicked leap into the car while late for yoga class.

The only thing to do when you're late, by the way, is to accept that you're late and do your best not to be any later. This is easiest done when you are on your way to an astanga class that you know will begin with several minutes of sun salutes so you can unroll your mat and jump right in after class begins without too much stress.

Except when you open the door to a class fuller than you have ever seen it. So full, in fact, that there is no easy place to quietly unroll your mat and blend in with the sun salutes. So full that the teacher instructs you to place your mat in front of hers -- in the dead center of the room with all the other mats facing you from each side.

Hey, okay, I've taught enough yoga classes to be comfortable with being on stage. In fact, I took this awkward opportunity as a gift. Practicing where another student momentarily confused about which mat belongs to the teacher might look to you for an example of dwi pada sirsasana (look it up; it's scary) helps one maintain a certain amount of focus.

I quickly unrolled my mat where the teacher had indicated and joined the class in downward facing dog. It was as I jumped forward to the front of my mat that a wiggle of doubt made its way into my brain. I was face-to-face with the teacher, maybe a foot away. And as we swept up to standing I couldn't help cringing as our heads narrowly missed each other in their flight toward the ceiling.

Then we were sweeping back down, heads flying toward each other, and I began to wonder if maybe I should be facing the other way. I wouldn't be able to see the teacher, it was true, but I could probably muddle through anyhow. And, of course, I wouldn't have to swerve each time I feared a head-on collision.

Swish. Our heads greeted each other as we stood, and swish, they waved goodbye on their way down again. I was beginning to feel mightily distracted. I was pretty certain it was traditional to face the teacher's mat and equally pretty certain the teacher didn't mind. At least, she wasn't giving me any pointed looks suggesting I'd made some sort of horrible mistake.

I checked out my options during my next downward facing dog. No go. Inches beyond the back end of my mat was woman whose perpendicularly-facing mat was pulled way out so that it nearly intersected mine. If I were to turn around, I'd end up folding forward right around the vicinity of her ribcage, probably with spectacular results. Best to avoid collisions with the trained professional in front of me instead.

So once again I embraced the unexpected. This was not punishment for trying to do too much and running late, I am sure. It was merely an opportunity to practice, to let my choices be my choices and to enjoy what came of them. And, lucky me, to enjoy a great yoga class as well.


Sometimes the Reward for Facing Chaos with Calm Is . . . More Chaos

Think I got a big, fat reward for embracing this lesson?

I sure thought so, as I crept out of the yoga studio a few minutes early to make my noon therapy appointment. I noted that I would like to avoid future appointments that backed up to a sweaty class, since it was pretty uncomfortable heading out in drenched yoga pants and matted hair. But therapists are trained to ignore such unpleasantness and act as if someone like me immediately after a sweaty yoga class is not, in fact, distinctly off-putting.

I skipped stickily toward my car and then noticed a familiar blue stroller on the lawn of the church across the street. In fact, that guy sitting next to it looked an awful lot like my husband. And damned if the child asleep in the stroller wasn't my son.

"I had to pick him up from school," Mike said grimly as I approached. "I wanted you to at least get your yoga class in."

Seems nothing in particular was wrong with Jake, but the director of his school -- who pops in to his class once or twice a month to make the regular teachers edgy and nervous -- thought he seemed unhappy.

He wasn't playing with his friends, she told Mike. He suggested that 15-month-olds rarely do, being a little short of that stage of development.

He had mucous pouring out of every orifice, she continued. I haughtily informed Mike that I had brought his nasal spray to school for exactly this eventuality.

The workers, the director claimed, said he had been this bad all week and coughing forever. We should probably take him to a doctor. This, Mike allowed, was where he had lost his patience, as he doesn't much like being accused of neglecting his child.

Mike called Grandma as I drove him back to his car. I prayed that she could come watch Jake very soon, since a shower was becoming an increasingly urgent need.

Then my phone rang. "Hi," my therapist said expectantly.

I told her we were having a child care crisis. I told her I was just getting ready to call her. I told her I'd pay for the session. She didn't sound happy. But, hey, I was generously offering her her very own lesson in rolling with the unexpected punches of life.

Grandma went to lunch with my brother-in-law before coming to the house, so the sweat had a chance to dry on me in white, salty patches. But Jake did consent to play with her while I showered and didn't start howling for me until I was toweling off, so we avoided the embarrassment that results from your mother-in-law almost seeing you naked. Most importantly, he didn't seem particularly sick or miserable to me. And the three of us had a lovely afternoon together.

In case you were worried, I did smooth things over with the daycare people. They are, after all, trying to take care of all the children, even if they get a little bit hysterical about a cough inspired by post-nasal drip. And, although they aren't aware of it, they are providing me valuable lessons in surrendering to life and motherhood.


Be Bamboo -- Vrksasana (Tree Pose)

In Chinese medicine, my acupuncturist informs me, the wood element is fundamentally important. If it is strong, we too become strong, yet flexible, able to bend to the events around us without breaking.

It made more sense when he explained that the wood of the wood element is bamboo. Much easier to see bamboo as flexible than, say, a redwood tree.

It also makes sense when you practice vrksasana, tree pose. Like a tree, you must be willing to sway in this pose, to bend without crashing to the ground. Practicing vrksasana, it seems, should strengthen the wood element. And, depending on the variation, it offers a lovely opportunity to open your heart to whatever the Universe brings. Which means not only can you survive unexpected changes, not only can you actively surrender to them, but you eventually welcome them and trust that something beautiful is coming your way.

Vrksasana Instructions

1) Stand in tadasana (mountain pose). Take a few moments to feel deeply rooted in the earth. Lift and spread your toes and feel them settle back down. Let your inner thighs release toward the back of the room so your tailbone has space to tuck, causing your navel to draw in toward your spine and up toward your heart. Let this core strength travel back down your legs into the earth.

2) If you are still new to balance, place your hands on your hips. (Otherwise, you may place them in front of your heart in angeli mudra, prayer position.) Check in to see that you are still engaging your core by tucking your tailbone and drawing your navel in and up.

3) Actively draw energy from the soles of your feet to the crown of your head. Feel how the energy fills the space between your vertebrae. Let the energy surge into your heart so your sternum lifts and your shoulder blades slide down your back.

4) Find a point on the floor several feet in front of you to gaze at. With your eyes thus occupied it will be easier to quiet your mind.

5) As you are ready, with either an inhale or an exhale -- whichever works best for your energy -- lift your right foot off the floor, bending the knee. Do it slowly, so you don't introduce energy that might knock you off balance. Instead, try to tap into the energy around you, becoming a tree, or a bamboo reed.

6) Turn your knee out to the right side as you lift your leg and place the sole of your right foot on the inside of your left leg. It may rest anywhere that is comfortable except on your left knee, as this will create too much stress on the knee joint. If you feel steady, you may reach your hands for your right leg to help draw it further up along the inside of your left leg.

7) Try to find the balance between pressing the sole of your right foot into the inside of your left leg and pressing the sole of your left foot into the floor. Press too hard and you start stirring up your own energy without regard to the energy around you. (Just like making your own plans for life without accounting for the fact that other forces are at work.) Maintain your gaze on the floor to stay calm and let your heart lift you.

8) If your hands are not already in angeli mudra (prayer position), place them in front of your heart. Remember, this is your center, both physically and energetically. Let your heart sing with trust as you let your right knee continue to open to the wall behind you.

9) Be the flexible tree as you open your heart, open your right hip (the site of emotional energy), and experience the subtle energy around you. Welcome it, work with it, and honor it.

And, remember, the key to balance isn't maintaining the balance. It's maintaining your sense of calm when you fall. Think of that when something more important than a yoga pose makes you lose your equilibrium.

Vrksasana Variations

If you feel steady in the pose and would like to hold it for a longer time, you can work on these variations. Each one opens your heart even more strongly as it challenges your balance.

1) From full vrksasana, above, press your palms together (not too strongly, as this will create too much energy and knock you off balance) and draw them overhead.

2) Gently let your arms separate so you are holding them in a V, welcoming energy, letting it funnel into your heart. Don't let your shoulder blades creep up with your hands; keep them strongly down your back for balance and heart opening.

3) If you feel steady, you may let your gaze travel up in the direction of your hands. Welcome all life has to give and trust that it will not knock you down.

4) When you are ready, you may bring your palms back together and draw them down to your heart.

Or you may continue with the following variation.

1) From the pose above with your hands raised and your arms in a V, carefully draw your arms in a big circle behind you. Hold onto your elbows with your hands or, if you are able, press your palms together behind your back in reverse namaste, or a prayer position. Your pinky fingers will rest against your spine and all your fingers will point toward the top of your head while your shoulders must open strongly. If your palms do not come together, I do not recommend reverse namaste, as it will place too much stress on your wrists.

2) Remain here with your gaze at a point on the floor. Or let your heart lift, drawing you into a backbend. Your eyes may travel upwards with your heart as well.

3) Enjoy the unique sensation of grounding and opening simultaneously and marvel at all the different ways your body can bend simultaneously. Supple as bamboo indeed.


For The Balance-Challenged (both on and off your yoga mat)

I feel like I ought to add one note here as a balance-challenged person. It took a lot of practice for me to get the balance thing.

For a while I blamed my feet (high arches), my eyes (too nearsighted to focus), and the other students (all their falling near me sent me toppling right over). But honestly, I think I was trying too hard. I'd press too strongly into the earth and bring all my energy down, and me with it. I'd lift my heart too strongly and lose my roots. And, of course, the more frustrated I got, the more I fell.

It's sounding like life all over again, isn't it? Push too hard for what you think your goal is and you are going to be knocked off balance. Maintain your calm when you do fall, work more gently to find your pose again, and you are more likely to find your way back. Work with the larger-than-us energy that throws things your way, and you will find your balance, your trust, the beauty of an open heart.

What the Friday Morning Bothered Blues Can Teach You About Time

"Is this the kind of day I'm going to have?" I whined as I pinched my fingers in the buckle of Jake's stroller while rushing to get him to school.

YES! boomed something much bigger than me a few minutes later, when Jake dropped the windshield scraper he so loves to carry to school on my toe.

Of course, I wouldn't bother being bothered by such minor annoyances if I weren't already agitated. Especially on a beautiful morning like this one, when I awakened to the sounds of birds calling and the gentle shuff of the breeze slipping under the blinds. It's Friday, and it's spring, and I should be suffused in a melty vacationy feeling.

But agitated I am, and perhaps a bit more so for knowing I am going to spend most of this beautiful morning inside and will emerge from yoga class into a predicted thunderstorm, another appointment, and an afternoon entertaining my mother-in-law instead of hunching over my computer getting work done now instead of, harmlessly, a little bit later. Not that the thunderstorm is anything more than yet another minor annoyance brought to ringing life by the bigger things nibbling at my composure.

The first, and biggest, is that I don't have time to finish a proper post. Or, more globally, every time I seem to settle into a regular work life with a big sigh of now my life can have a modicum of order I am interrupted for . . . visits to the pediatrician. . . . visits to the vet. . . . grocery shopping. . . . entertaining guests. . . . or, just as I was typing this, calls from the CPA's office informing me that we somehow missed a message last week that our returns are ready and we must pick them up immediately, or at least before Tuesday. I am tempted to pull the old blood pressure monitor that Mike bought a few years ago out of the closet. He never used it much, but I enjoyed seeing how low I could register. This was before I had a child.

Then I arrived at Jake's school and started trying to list all the instructions for dealing with his allergies on the three lines allotted on his daily form intended more for comments like, "Didn't eat breakfast," than details about which sheets to put on my child's cot for his nap and which kids he can't sit next to at snack time because they sometimes have peanutbutter. I crammed it all in with as many exclamation marks and smiley faces as I could to lighten the tone, but I know for a fact no one is going to bother to read yet another one of my tomes on how to care for my kid when they have so many others to tend to as well.

I walked home practically in tears, certain that Jake is going to grab his friend's peanutbutter crackers and end up in the emergency room because I was being too polite. And then I started to hyperventilate because I really would like to write about this issue, but I knew I had just an hour before yoga class and therapy and meeting my mother-in-law downtown to spend the afternoon because I'm the only one of her sons and daughters-in-law here in Asheville who doesn't absolutely have to be at work on this particular Friday afternoon. And then I began to wonder what happened to that marvelous ability I developed earlier in the week to let life intrude on the things we think make up life, like our work weeks, and why I couldn't just enjoy my melty vacationy Friday afternoon.

Giving up my yoga class, by the way, is not a solution. Sometimes it is -- like last Tuesday when my relatives were arriving. But sometimes yoga is exactly what you need, especially on days like this one when I feel like obligations are encroaching when they're really not. An hour and a half spent not spinning out mythical deadlines will be very much more beneficial than spending that hour and a half resenting the fact that I am doing things that can wait instead of going to yoga class.

So, with just 15 minutes left before my day takes me somewhere other than my computer, I offer my solution -- which perhaps will translate to your next Friday Morning Bothered Blues day:


There Is More Time Than You Think

First, I let go of the rigid deadlines I had set for myself and allowed that maybe things will take a little bit longer than I'd like -- getting the YogaMamaMe website set up, finishing the YogaMamaMe book proposal, using the spa certificate gathering dust on my dresser because I am saving it for when I have finished the YogaMamaMe book proposal.

Once I surrendered to the fact that life sometimes happens at a different pace from the one I've set for myself, I felt like I could breathe again. It was like the jumble of all my obligations were bouncing around inside a pinata and a gaggle of laughing children burst it open, creating infinite space. (Of course, this would not be a pinata filled with sweet treats, but something more like the one a Weight Watchers devotee friend of mine concocted for her kids -- filled with little boxes of raisins and other disappointments.)

And to get that rhythm back into your game next time you feel the Friday Morning Bothered Blues yourself, I'll give you some quick instructions for Surya Namaskar (traditional).


Surya Namaskar (Traditional) (sun salutes)

1) Stand in tadasana (mountain pose). Be still for a moment, to remind yourself that it's okay to stop moving sometimes (even when yoga class starts in 15 minutes).

2) Press your feet into the floor as you inhale and circle your arms overhead, gathering prana (energy) for your practice. Let your hands meet at the top.

3) Sweep your arms to the side as you exhale and swan dive, leading with your heart, into a forward fold. Keep your legs strong.

4) Inhale and lift your heart, keeping your fingers on the floor or, to create more space for your spine, your hands on your shins. This is a moment to offer your heart and your trust to the Universe.

5) Exhale and fold forward, stepping back with your left foot into a lunge (high with knee off the floor or low with knee and top of foot on the floor).

6) Inhale and lift your heart. You may keep your fingers on the floor or circle your arms overhead, lifting your body.

7) Exhale and replace your hands on your floor while dropping your hips for a deeper stretch.

8) Inhale into plank pose. This is an upper push-up, which demands that you pull your abdominals in strongly and keep your legs very strong. Make sure your shoulders are directly over your wrists.

9) Exhale slowly to the floor, keeping your elbows close to your sides.

10) Inhale into cobra pose -- pelvis, legs, and tops of the feet on the floor, elbows close to your sides, shoulder blades down the back as you lift your heart and lengthen your spine.

11) Exhale and lift your hips as you tuck your toes under, shifting back to downward facing dog pose.

12) Inhale as you step your left foot to the front of the mat. Use your abdominal muscles to help control this movement. And your hands if your foot needs a little extra help.

13) Exhale into this lunge.

14) Inhale and lift your heart and, if you wish, your torso.

15) Exhale your hands to the floor. Lift your hips and step your right (back) foot forward. Continue to exhale and squeeze out the last of your air in a forward fold.

16) Strengthen your legs, lead with your heart, and inhale in a reverse swan dive to standing, circling your arms overhead.

17) Exhale your hands in front of your heart.

18) Repeat, starting with the right leg stepping back (and stepping forward in #12).

Pardon all the typos in this entry -- I'm off to yoga.

Grandma Versus Jack's School, or Trusting Myself as a Mother

I didn't apologize to Jake's grandmother for taking him to school today. This is a sign, I believe, of progress.

An awful lot of what I've done as a mother is apologize -- for decisions I've made as a mother (sure, everyone tells you you're right because you're the mom, but do you ever really believe it?), for seeing to my own needs (the better I get at this the more I seem to apologize for it), for not taking care of everyone else nearly as well as I might have once upon a childless time. And, like pretty much every other mother I know, I've done all this apologizing with about the same stealth as a teenage boy copping a feel. And probably the same level of enthusiasm.

Progress, of course, comes in small increments. If I'm being completely honest, I do still feel the urge to apologize to my mother-in-law for not apologizing to her. I imagine her observing how Jake got to stay home from school yesterday, when his aunt and cousin were in town as well, and feeling stiffed. In my mind she becomes someone very different from who she really is, and turns to me with a crafty gleam in her eye saying, "I can watch him while you work, you know."

Then I practice being in the moment and I see how happily she walks him to school with me and how uncomplainingly she spreads out the newspaper for a bit of quiet time when we get back to the house. And I feel gratitude to us both for helping me learn not to apologize. And, yes, not to apologize for not apologizing.


Apology-Free Motherhood

The daycare thing is so fraught as it is -- even though it is an inevitable decision for most of us who can't afford to do it any other way.

In the days when I was still foolish enough to make pronouncements about how I would raise my child without realizing that he and life would have something to say about it, I decided that I wouldn't send Jake to daycare until he could walk. I can't say why walking seemed so significant to me. At the time he wasn't even crawling, and I suppose his lack of mobility convinced me that without one-on-one care he would languish, forgotten, in a corner somewhere, his eyes gradually clouding over with neglect.

Just for the record, he's been going since he was ten months old and just getting the hang of crawling.

Talk about getting twisted in knots. Even now, when Jake loves school so much he waves me out of the building with a cheery "Goodbye, I'm going to play now," (that's what he means; I understand he does not actually say it) I leave with a residue of guilt. How can I possibly prefer having some quiet time to write to playing with my child? Why do I never manage to make it there by 4:30, his documented breakdown time? It's unabashedly about me, this guilt, but it's how my love manifests itself, and I'm pretty convinced it's part of every mother's life.

Now, add to the guilt over sending my child to daycare a dollop of guilt on top over denying my mother-in-law precious time with her grandchild. ("A large dollop," my niece said last night as I asked her how much whipped cream she wanted with her key lime pie.)

To be fair, I'm planning on picking Jake up early tomorrow and not taking him at all on Monday, her last day in town. Still, a certain amount of panic tip-toed through my veins this morning when my brother-in-law -- with whom she stayed last night -- called to say she was on her way here.

"Wait!" I wanted to cry. I thought this was my day to work and go to yoga class and take Jake to school guilt free.

Well -- all mind-generated, panicked evidence to the contrary -- it is. We had breakfast and sent my sister-in-law and niece on their way back to West Virginia and walked Jake to school. It would have been easier on me if Jake hadn't made it seem like I was lying when I told his grandmother he no longer cries when I leave him, but he did have a pretty awesome time with his family yesterday and you can't blame a guy for failing to understand that we weren't all planning on having another party today without him.

The only problem was my urge to apologize for not apologizing. It did that thing to my brain where I could not for the life of me think of anything to talk about on the walk back home. Because I was trying too hard to think of something to talk about and all that was coming to mind were justifications for my decision to send Jake to school today.

So we walked home pushing an empty stroller to the sound of birds calling out their welcome to spring.

It was when my mother-in-law was helping me unload the dishwasher that I realized all she expects me to do is live my life and make her a part of it. She doesn't expect an apology. And, when you stop to think about it, very rarely does anyone else we think wants us to apologize for something we don't think we should apologize for (but kind of worry that maybe we should). I just don't think most of the people I know care that deeply about what I do that they think I have to explain it to them one way or another.


Goals, Expectations, and Intentions

An asana practice is fundamentally built around the understanding that we should replace our goals with intentions. As an illustration, a goal is losing 15 pounds in time to put on a bikini this summer; an intention is taking care of one's body, eating healthy food, and exercising so when the time comes to go to the beach you can put on whatever feels comfortable. Which, if you stay true to your intention, may very well be that bikini, collapsed mommy bellybutton and all.

Expectations can come only from goals. If I set a goal of losing a certain amount of weight (even if it might turn out along the way that I don't need to lose that much -- or any -- at all), I pretty much expect myself to do it. Or, worse, expect myself to fail. Either way, I'm going to have this expectation looming over me and weighing me down (so to speak).

And there, on the next beach towel over, is the woman who set an intention instead of a goal and hasn't failed to meet any expectations because she never had any. Or, when she realized that she actually did have certain expectations -- because, come on, this is a pretty fraught analogy -- she let them go. Most of us feel plenty bad in a bikini as it is, without heaping failed expectations on ourselves as well.

So let's firmly push away the idea of having to wear a bikini and return to the matter at hand. With goals come expectations.

But it gets even more insidious. Because when I start to form my goals around other people, I assume expectations for them without so much as a quick consultation to see if the thought that I am supposed to do something in particular had even crossed their mind.

Hence, if my goal is to make sure my mother-in-law enjoys her visit, I expect her to have expectations of what I will do when she is here. It's like I have to make her enjoy herself, as if I and I alone have that power; and, in turn, as if she expects me to do so. Frankly, I'm a lot lower than that on her important-people-in-Asheville list, considering she has two sons and two grandchildren here who must rank above me, no matter how much she loves me too.

Without a doubt, my intention is that she enjoy herself, and looking at it that way helps me recognize that there are a million ways she can do that. It lets me let go of expectations -- the ones I have for myself and the ones I create for others.

Best of all, for the first time in a long, new mother time, I feel like I can once again just be me around my mother-in-law.


Getting the Kinks Out with Supta Padangustasana (Reclined Head-to-Knee Sequence)

As an homage to how twisted we moms and our expectations are, and to remind us that it's not that hard to straighten ourselves out, I offer supta padangustasana, reclined head-to-knee pose. Only that's a really bad translation because right away there's this goal that my head is supposed to actually touch my knee and this expectation that if I practice faithfully enough one day it will. Plus, if you want to get technical about it, your head eventually touches your shin, not your knee. But wipe that vision out of your head because head-to-knee is hard enough to deal with already.

The neat thing here is that twists in yoga actually untwist you inside. The best image you can carry with you when performing twists is of wringing out a washcloth -- a very supple, beautiful washcloth with a heart, but one that is also soaking wet and thus laden down. As you twist, you wring out the tension that we all hold along our spines. And if we back off of goal-focused yoga and don't twist beyond our abilities, our hearts have more space to sing.

Supta padangustasana has the added pleasure of starting with some straightening. The first two phases of the pose allow you to open your hamstrings and hip sockets. Done properly, they also align the spine. By the time you become that happy washcloth, you're dripping with stuff to release.

Best of all, there are many variations of this pose, so you can really let go of your expectations and see just how beautiful your body and life really are.

Supta Padangustasana A

1) Lie on your back. Take a moment to feel the alignment of your spine. You should be able to breathe freely and easily and feel an evenness in your body, especially between your two shoulders and two hips.

2) Bend your right knee toward your chest and give it a hug to release your lower back.

3) Let your knee move away from your chest so your lower back returns to the floor. Let it rest here as you: a) loop a strap over the sole of your foot and hold the ends in your right hand; b) hold onto your calf with your right hand; or c) grasp your big toe with the first two fingers of your right hand between your big toe and second toe and your right thumb on the outside of your big toe. (Tighter hamstrings consider the a) option; more open ones move toward c))

4) Keep your lower back relaxing on the floor as you straighten your right leg overhead. If this is enough to help straighten you out, stay here.

5) Check in with your left leg. Make sure it is still strongly stretching out along the floor. Keep your foot flexed so your left toes point toward the ceiling.

6) Place your left hand on the left side of your pelvis to help keep it down on the floor. Its tendency will be to pop up to accommodate a deeper version of the pose than your body is ready for. If you let it do so, you are letting a goal get the better of you.

7) If you are able while keeping your lower back on the floor, slowly start to bring your right foot toward your head. As soon as you feel your lower back start to leave the floor, stop and observe just where your body is.

8) Let each exhale relax your lower back more and more. Let each inhale move up your spine to open your heart. Stay here for 5-10 breaths.

Supta Padangustasana B

1) On your next exhale, press your left hand firmly onto the left side of your pelvis to keep your balance and honesty, and start to open your right leg out to the right in a straddle. If it is easy for you to lower your leg to the floor, start to draw your right foot gently in the direction of your right ear.

2) You may have to switch from fingers-on-toes to hand-on-calf or to a strap here. This is not a failing because you shouldn't have any expectations of yourself.

3) Strongly draw your right femur bone into your right hip socket for support and don't forget to relax your lower back into the floor.

4) Stay here for 5-10 breaths and let go of the struggle.

Supta Padangustasana C

1) On your next inhale, draw your right leg up to the sky again. Replace your right hand grip with your left hand (holding straps, on the outside of your right calf, or on the outside or your right foot).

2) As you exhale, let your right leg lower to the left side, drawing you into a twist. You may find it far more comfortable to bend your right knee here, and will get just as much of a benefit from the twist with bent knee. (All a straight leg does is help open the IT band on the outside of your leg.)

3) Take a moment to find your spine's alignment here. You may need to scoot your left hip (the one now on the floor) over to the right a bit. Both of your shoulders should relax into the floor. If your right shoulder is lifting, back out of the twist or bend your right knee. You want to give your heart space to sing by letting your chest face the sky.

4) With each inhale, let your heart lift up and out. With each exhale, feel the distance between your right (top) hip and your right armpit. Stay here for 5-10 breaths.

5) When you are ready, either with your right leg straight or knee bent, roll onto your back, hug both knees in, and realign your spine.

Lower your right leg straight to the floor and repeat on the left side.

Remember, you're just straightening yourself out here. No one expects anything of you.

Though they surely will appreciate you acting with love and kindness. And that's so very much easier to do when you can credit others with acting with love and kindness (or their best approximation of it) toward you.

When Family Visits Cross Paths with Our Personal Journeys

Any moment now, my mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and niece are going to arrive at my house.

I am, I report with pleasure and a little bit of pride, not in complete meltdown mode, despite just now sitting down to write when there's really no time left to do so. While this was my priority when I woke up this morning, I somehow found it more pressing to clean the shredded bits of tennis ball off the living room floor and toss the yogurt-smeared tablecloth in the washing machine. Then I noticed the diaper pail odor emanating from Jake's room and attacked it with a bottle of orange-scented Seventh Generation bathroom cleaner (perhaps not intended for use on plastic diaper pails, but bathroom functions are bathroom functions). As long as I was paying attention to things I should clean far more often in Jake's room, I figured I ought to give his sheets a wash -- which is harder than it sounds because the organic crib mattress we bought for him seems to be just a half an inch bigger than the standard crib mattress, so that lifting it up enough to change the sheet requires a certain amount of grit. And there was the dishwasher to unload, the huge, plastic screw organizer to move from the kitchen counter to the sun porch that has become one giant tool box, the winter coats to transfer from hallway hooks to the deep storage of the coat closet.

Do I seem nervous?

There's nothing wrong with letting visitors shake us out of our "what mess?" torpor. But there's a certain edge of something else when the visitors are relatives, especially the ones we inherited by marriage.

Did I worry this much before we had Jake? I just don't think so.

There are so many layers to trying to be a mother in front of your partner's mother. Especially one who was as good at it as my mother-in-law was. Really good. Also, I discovered on her first post-Jake visit, different from me. Of course, every mother is different. But, still, if my mother-in-law mothered differently from me, and she was a good mother, what kind of mother does that make me?

If you're reading this without your mother or mother-in-law in the house, you are probably calmly saying, "Why can't you both be good mothers?" Try asking yourself the same question next time you're in my shoes. Unless you don't think much of your own mother's or mother-in-law's parenting skills. In which case, I'm sure you will have no trouble finding someone else who makes you feel similarly inadequate.

It's one thing to follow our own path, and it's another to look up and see that someone else is
following a different one. A fundamental way our minds work is by comparison. A child begins to understand who he is by recognizing that other people are different beings from him. And before you know it, he's attaching labels to others' differences. And with those labels, in short order, comes judgment.

It reminds me of my first year of law school (when people are not so very different from developing infants, in temperament at least). I kept telling myself that I must have known how to study reasonably well, since I got good grades in college and got into law school. But all around me, people were screaming that I had to study differently from how I had in the past. They were all rushing to study groups, briefing every case they read, spending their beer money on commercial outlines, and generally making me feel very, very insecure. It didn't matter what I knew in my heart; my mind convinced me that if there was a different way it was probably better.

And so it is with relatives. You know you're a good mother; you get to the point where you can hold your head up with a certain amount of self-assurance when you drop your child off at daycare. But somehow none of it's good enough when another good mother who happens to be related to you shows up. It doesn't matter how certain you are that you're a good mother who makes good choices; you start to wonder whether everyone else thinks so as well.

I realize I'm saying two things here, probably because I feel like I've found a way to push away the thoughts of the first so my mind tossed the second at me. The first is: "I don't feel like a good mother around someone I know is a good mother because somehow we can't both be good mothers if we're different." To be honest, I do feel like a good mother, even when my own mother is suggesting I'm not.

So along comes the corollary: "I know I'm a good mother. But does my mother-in-law know it?"

The answer is, yes. She tells me all the time. And yet. I fear judgment because I heap it upon myself. Why? Because I'm human.


Non-judgment

Who hasn't learned that the easiest way to feel better about yourself is to judge others? It's probably the only thing I learned in high school that I actually remember.

Well, no one said yoga was easy. But it does offer a better way to feel good about yourself without putting other people down to do it. And when I say "putting other people down" I'm not talking about the high-strung depressive saying nasty things about other people in a lofty tone of voice while you cringe in a corner because, while you might have learned this stuff in high school, you managed to grow up somewhere along the way.

I'm talking about the habit we all have, no matter how subtle, no matter how kind hearted, of judging other people, even if we ultimately proclaim them okay.

For example, when I arrive at Jake's school during snack time I look at what the other kids are eating, initially for ideas of what I can offer him. But when I see the scary bright purple and green goldfish on one child's plate, I immediately pat myself on the back for refusing to serve my child junk food. And then, being a yoga-centered person, I remind myself not to judge and allow that this child's mother has lovingly chosen perfectly nutritious food for her.

Or I listen to the mother yelling at her child in the airport bathroom and want to cry because I am convinced that child has lived without an ounce of soft affection and understanding his entire life. It takes a good while for me to convince myself that just maybe that mother was exhausted and frustrated by travel and uncharacteristically snapped just this once. Maybe that's not the case, but if ever I'm the mother yelling in the airport bathroom it will be. And will anyone know? Or will they just judge me as I have judged this mother?

So. We judge others because we are human. And because we judge others we expect to be judged ourselves. Being devoted yoga practitioners, we notice ourselves judging and let the judgment go. And, naturally, it comes back, perhaps less frequently, maybe less sharply, but without fail. And we continue to practice.

The problem is, sometimes you find yourself in a situation where feeling judged really throws you off your game and it's harder than ever to practice non-judgment. Like when your mother-in-law is visiting.

Such times call for a little extra intervention.


Savasana (corpse pose) meditation

Those of us who have a regular asana practice know savasana, corpse pose, as that period of blessed rest at the end of a good practice when you let your body relax deeply and absorb your practice.

But your practice, remember, is far more than the asanas you've performed for just an hour and a half out of your day. It's the emotions those asanas help release, the balance between future and past, the being in the now, the quieting of your mind. It is, for the purposes of this discussion, the practice of recognizing when you are judging, stopping, and then recognizing when you naturally judge again.

It seems to me I have two choices when I get wound up about being judged (no doubt 90% of it by myself). Either I can draw on the lessons of high school and judge right back in order to satisfy my mind that I'm a good mother. Or I can draw on the lessons of yoga and let my practice of non-judgment sink in.

I know which one I choose. And if I slip in the next few days, well, that's just more practice in not judging myself for judging someone else because I fear they are judging me.

Savasana (corpse pose)

It's easy to forget that savasana is a pose just like any other. What an opportunity, then, to truly appreciate it when relatives are visiting and you feel stretched thin and pulled away from your life and like you need to prove you're a good mother and the only yoga you have time for is lying on the floor of your bedroom practicing savasana before going to bed. If your partner tells you you are being crazy, assure him or her that you are trying to make yourself just the opposite.

1) Lie on your back on your mat. If you have a tight lower back, it may feel good to place a rolled up blanket under your knees. If your heart is feeling particularly closed in, you may roll a blanket along its longer edge and place it under your spine, putting a kink in it where your neck rests.

2) Close your eyes and take a few minutes to find the pose. Lift your right leg slightly off the floor and let it stretch away from your pelvis at a 45 degree angle (roughly toward the lower corner of your mat). Do the same with your left leg.

3) Lift your right arm to create space for a gentle shoulder roll, bringing your shoulder blade underneath you to support your heart. As with your legs, make space between your arm and your shoulder socket before letting the arm rest on the mat, palm up, at roughly a 45 degree angle from your body. Do the same with your left arm.

4) Roll your head gently from side to side until you find a comfortable resting place, Make sure your neck is long by very slightly tucking your chin and then releasing. Swallow to relax your throat.

5) Take a moment to feel your body. Start to scan it slowly in your mind's eyes, finding places where you are gripping, and letting them go.

6) Notice the moments when your heart lifts. When you have finished your scan, return to the presence of your heart energy and let it flow.

A Meditation Exercise

Now comes the hardest and most important part of the pose -- relaxing your mind.

1) Focus on the pause right after you exhale and before you inhale. Don't draw it out. Just observe it. Note how at this one moment you are perfectly still.

2) When you have found this stillness, observe the stillness right after your inhale and before you exhale. Notice what happens to your body and mind during this short moment of stillness.

3) After you have found your stillness, see if you can maintain it during your exhales. Feel as though the exhale is moving through your body into the ground.

4) When and if you have found this stillness, see if you can maintain it during your inhales. Feel as though the inhale is moving through your body from the air around you.

5) Notice what happens when you are still. Feel the energy of the Universe that now moves through you unimpeded. Let it lift your heart and release your heart energy.

6) Observe the ways the energy moves through your body and open to it.

7) Spend some time watching your heart open and release its own beautiful energy. It may unfold like a million-petaled lotus flower. Let this energy join the energy that is flowing through you.

Coming out of Savasana

1) When you are ready, return your mind one more time to your heart. Recognize your own beauty, your peace, your center. This is you without the need to find yourself by comparison to other people.

2) Become conscious again of your breath, deepening it and sending it into your body. Become aware of the shape of your body with a new appreciation of its beauty.

3) Very gently, as if moving for the first time, let your fingers and toes move. Try not to let this bodily movement disrupt the stillness of your mind and soul.

4) As you are ready, let the movement travel into your arms and legs. Continue to focus your mind on remaining still and remembering the beauty and peace and centeredness of your heart.

5) Bend your right elbow and start to stretch your right arm overhead. At the same time bend your right knee toward your chest and then your left knee. This circle of action will roll you onto your right side in fetal position.

6) Remain here for a moment with your head pillowed on your right arm. So often, I see yoga students immediately move toward the end of class. Instead, remain here and think of yourself as a snow globe that has been shaken when you rolled onto your right side. Let all the crystals settle back down again as you regain your sense of stillness.

7) As you lie on your right side, notice how your left arm naturally crosses in front of your heart, sealing your practice. It is this protection that allows you to move into the rest of your life and your house full of relatives with an open heart.

8) When you have found your stillness, keeping your eyes closed, find your way to a comfortable seated position.

9) Once again, let the crystals settle and find your stillness. It helps to rest your hands on your knees, palms down, first finger and thumb touching to bring your attention inside.

10) When you have found your stillness, release your hands and stretch them to the side, palms up. Circle them until your palms meet overhead, drawing in all the lovely energy you have created.

11) When your palms meet overhead, draw them straight down to rest in front of your heart in angeli mudra, prayer position. Recognize that in this position your are offering your heart. Know that when you offer your heart to others, they will offer their hearts to you. There's no need to judge because you share the same heart energy.

12) Finally, bow your head to your heart and feel deep, deep gratitude for who you are.


Carry that gratitude with you everywhere. You are a wonderful mother.

Honoring Where Your Heart Has Taken You

I was sitting at the local ball park with Mike and Jake yesterday, enjoying the spring day and the buzz of peanuts and beer and baseball gloves, when "Here Comes the Sun" came over the loudspeakers.

Normally, I resist writing essays built around a song that someone else has written. (I haven't ever written a song myself, so I suppose it would be more accurate to say I resist writing essays built around any song, but then my point wouldn't be as clear.) The last time I tried it, I am embarrassed to say, I wrote an entire college admissions essay about why my life resembled a Billy Joel song. Mercifully, I recognized that it was highly unlikely Billy Joel had more to say about me than I did and rewrote the essay before submitting it anywhere.

But what struck me yesterday wasn't so much the song itself as all it brought up in me.

I used to listen to "Here Comes the Sun" over and over when I was fifteen years old and hurting deeply. It was a period when I spent most weekends at a friend's house in a neighborhood full of kids our age. Like any teenagers, we spent our evenings drinking beer and smoking pot (for some reason I feel compelled to point out I never actually smoked any myself; some unwavering part of me passed the joint from the person on my left to the person on my right without any stirring of desire to try it). And, of course, we had our soap opera of romantic entanglements, friendship spats, and existential crises.

Much of the time I spent huddled over my bent knees crying to "Here Comes the Sun" and hoping one day it would, was, not surprisingly, due to a boy. We had a flirtation that was the closest I'd ever come to a relationship, and each time he showed me we had nothing more -- in that brusque way teenage boys have of demonstrating such things -- I crumbled into a puddle of despair.

But I now know it was much more than a boy. I was in pain when I was fifteen because I was in the process of leaving my heart behind and listening to the louder voice in my head.

After awakening to acting during my last year of junior high, I arrived at high school being told I had only one elective and must choose between drama and Spanish III. I chose Spanish, even though acting made my heart sing. Because, I told myself, it would help me get into a good college. I took that first step, doing what everyone but my heart said was right, and became the adult most of us are -- estranged from my heart and trying to find my way back.

Even now it makes me sad to pinpoint this moment in my life when my head took over from my heart. I stopped following my path, and my whole sense of being responded. I was unable to believe my friends who told me how pretty I looked in my new contact lenses. I felt queasy every time a boy asked me for a date and inevitably squirmed my way out of it. I joined the clubs my sister had joined -- the honors society, the school service club -- without stopping to consider that they didn't speak to anything joyful in me. And my self-confidence, my sense of me, quickly crumbled.

When I heard "Here Comes the Sun" yesterday, I looked from that fifteen-year-old girl losing her way to the woman I am now with her husband and her child and her life full of love, and I felt deep gratitude to the Universe for helping me rediscover my heart.

And so, I thought, instead of grappling with the questions that come from being a mother, I ought to take a day of YogaMamaMe to affirm the beauty of following one's heart.


Proof That You Know How to Follow Your Heart

Our children are living manifestations of what the Universe brings if you follow your heart. They bring us joy, and in doing so remind us that (here comes a vast understatement) joy does not come from being in control. There is no place we have less control over our lives than when we become mothers. And yet there is no greater joy.

Choosing to become a mother is an act purely governed by the heart. If we had stopped to think it through, how many of us would have logically concluded that we wanted to be parents? It's time-consuming, expensive, and exhausting, and the potential pay-off of having someone who might take care of us when we get old is so far in the distance and so uncertain that it can't possibly be a relevant factor in the decision. The only reason for doing it is because our hearts tell us it's what we want; it's incoherent, absolute, teeming with rightness.

So the good news is we all know how to follow our hearts. The bad news is we don't often have the benefit of hormones urging us to do it. But we do have one beautiful, larger than life example of what happens when you throw logic to the wind and do what you know in your heart you want to do. It's scary, it's unknown, but it's a true picture of what life really is. Because, even when you plan your next move to the last letter, you're only fooling yourself into thinking you know what comes next.

I literally tremble when I think about the strength it took to follow my heart, and where it's taken me. I quit a professorship right as I was invited to apply for tenure, choosing the absolute uncertainty of a new career as a writer over the most secure of all job scenarios. I asked Mike to move to Los Angeles with me two weeks after our first date, despite all my past experience with how the first blush of a new love almost always fades into deep puzzlement over how we could have been so wrong about the person a few months later. I married him, had a child with him, and moved to Asheville, a place I probably wouldn't have considered if Jake hadn't been the beneficiary. Today I read an article in the Los Angeles Times about the literally insane competition to get into a good elementary school in L.A., and I felt a little tap on the shoulder from the Universe telling me I did good moving from my old home to a beautiful new one with a wonderful public elementary school a block away.

I share this with you as a way of expressing my gratitude. I didn't make these things happen. I let them happen by trusting my heart. And this, I think, is the key to everything I'm trying to address with YogaMamaMe.


Motherhood Versus the Mind

Reading over what I've just written, I see it clearly: the crux of all the issues I've tackled nearly daily since starting YogaMamaMe. All the conflicted feelings, the guilt, the uncertainty, the wondering whom we've become since having children -- they all arise where our minds crash against the pure heart that is motherhood. I picture two swiftly moving ocean currents, one warm and strong, the other cold and roiling, meeting in an angry spume of foam and mist. We lose our direction, our grounding, any sense of safety, and we are tossed about as if a wave has knocked us down. We feel as if we are drowning.

The answer seems so simple. We need to come out of the current of our mind -- that part of us questioning our decisions as parents, teasing us with false, misty memories of how easy life used to be, urging us to make more out of our lives than the very much we are already making with them.

Of course, it takes a lifetime -- many lifetimes, if that's what you believe in -- to let our hearts take over completely. And a good thing for me, or YogaMamaMe would be over before it's begun.

So, okay, we've all got a lifetime of reminding ourselves over and over that any conflict we feel is nothing more than our own minds trying to triumph over the hearts that will keep beating, no matter what. The very thought can be wearying. Or it can be a cause for deep, deep gratitude.

Because if we didn't have a reason to remind ourselves to follow our hearts daily, we'd probably be floating along in a heartless life. We'd have all the indicia of control -- the secure job, the expensive things, the retirement accounts -- without the messiness that our hearts bring to the table. I'm not talking about little the moments of warmth our hearts bring us even if we don't take the time to listen to them. I'm talking about jump-in-feet-first, totally illogical, just-gotta-do-it moments of pure abandon.

Sounds like just what happens on the playground when you're five years old, doesn't it? Jump feet first from the jungle gym without worrying about whether you might (and you might, but you probably won't because your bones are young and more pliable than your parents') break your ankle. Engage in the absolute illogic of fantasy games and children's songs. Play because you want to play, without rules or winners or anything quantifiable at the end other than feeling tired and happy and alive.

I'd love to approach every asana practice as if I were a child on a playground. But I know I'm not there. I'm too bound up in my own mind, even as I observe it and learn to value what it adds to my life.

What I can do, of course, is watch my child at play and let my heart sing for him, and for myself in having him to watch.


Heart Singing in Ustrasana (Camel Pose)

I'm thinking of heart-opening asanas here, but I'm also thinking how usually when we practice them we feel the exact opposite of our hearts singing. Heart openers -- many of them back bends -- can be scary. We feel constricted, awkward, like we shouldn't go on.

When I feel that rising panic in a back bend, I remind myself to just lengthen my spine, make a little space, and -- aah -- my heart finds its release. So I offer the following sequence as a way of slowly, safely moving into a deep back bend. Even if you know you can move to the advanced poses immediately, try taking the full journey and see what happens when you are gentle with your heart.

Ustrasana (camel pose)

I choose ustrasana for several reasons. It offers many variations, so one can take the time to observe one's heart opening. It opens the heart toward the sky to remind us of the beauty that comes when we open to the energy all around us. And, perhaps most importantly for today's thoughts, we remain deeply grounded as we practice it.

Ustrasana preparation

1) Kneel on your mat with your knees about hip distance apart. For this first variation you may tuck your toes under or keep the tops of your feet flat on the floor (placing a rolled up blanket under them to ease any discomfort), whichever you prefer.

2) Place your hands on your hips and use your thumbs to physically coax your pelvis to release down in the back, allowing you to tuck your tailbone and draw your navel in toward your spine and up toward your heart. Use your abdominal muscles to hold your pelvis in place; doing so builds heat and strongly integrates your base energy into your heart opening, making it that much more your pose.

3) With your hands still on your hips, let the sides of your body lengthen and draw your shoulders in a shoulder loop -- toward the front, up to your ears, and down your back, carrying your shoulder blades down with them. Feel the connection between this simple heart-opening motion and the energy you are using to keep your abdominals engaged and your lower back long.

4) Place your hands on your sacrum (lower back), either with fingers facing up or, if this is not comfortable, with fingers facing down. Draw your elbows together to maintain your heart lift and check in with your abdominals to maintain your long lower back.

5) Inhale into your heart, letting it float up a little bit more. Trusting your heart, let it continue to rise, supported by your shoulder blades (which are still moving down your spine with your tucked tail bone), as you lean back until just the moment your mind tells you to stop. You may let your head drop back if you feel it's okay for your neck.

6) Check in to make sure you are supporting your body -- hands on lower back, abdominals engaged, shoulder blades down the back, heart lifting strongly.

7) Stay here, breathing as deeply and slowly as you can, until any discomfort or panic you feel subsides. Your lungs are slightly compressed in this position, so it will be difficult to breathe deeply. Be with this sensation and any others that arise until you feel safe and your heart can sing.

8) When you are ready, let your heart lift you up out of the back bend and sit down on your heels. If you are done, you may move into balasana (child's pose), and experience gratitude. If you wish to continue, do not do balasana, as bending your spine back and forth between the two asanas can put undue strain on it.

Full Ustrasana

1) Lift your buttocks off your heels and return to the starting position for ustrasana prep. Repeat all the safety checks -- checking alignment, engaging abdominals, performing a shoulder loop.

2) Tuck your toes under so your heels move away from the floor (rather than leaving the tops of your feet on the floor). Even if you have practiced this pose before and know you can bend deeply enough to leave your feet flat on the floor, trying starting in this gentler position.

3) Place your hands on your lower back and let your heart lift you once again into ustrasana preparation, taking care to keep your body supported as before.

4) When you are ready, reach one hand at a time for your heels. You may grasp them with your fingers or lower your palm all the way to the heel. Whichever works for you, do not collapse your heart. Remember that your heart guides and supports you in this pose.

5) Remain here, observing any panic or discomfort that may arise. When it does, check in with your heart and think of ways to let it sing. Check the ways you prepared for this pose -- let your tail bone lengthen toward the floor, let your navel move in toward your spine and up toward your heart, let your shoulders move down your back, along with your shoulder blades.

6) If you are comfortable, and would like to move deeper, keeping your heart where it is, release one foot at a time so the top of the foot is flat on the floor. You should not collapse when making this change. Your heart should have you almost literally floating.

7) Breathe deeply, keep lengthening your spine, keep opening your heart. When you are ready, move your hands one at a time to your lower back, let your heart lift you out of your back bend, and sit down on your heels.

You may perform this pose again, starting with the tops of your feet flat on the floor and seeing if you can move your hands to the floor between your feet without collapsing, or repeat the pose starting with your toes curled under as above, or move into balasana and experience gratitude.


Laghuvajrasna (An Advanced Ustrasana Variation)

If you are experienced with all the variations above and feel open and secure in ustrasana, you may choose the following advanced variation to challenge your body and -- more importantly -- your mind. I still find this variation frightening, and learned to do it with a blanket on the mat behind my feet.

1) Follow the instructions above to set yourself up for ustrasana, placing the tops of your feet flat on the mat to begin.

2) Bring your hands to your heart in namaste mudra (prayer position), and remind yourself that you are offering your heart with no expectations about what you will receive in return.

3) Strongly supporting your lower back by engaging your abdominal muscles, pulling your shoulder blades down your back, and lifting your heart, move into a back bend by imagining that your heart is lifting. Your head will move back without your help; you must keep your mind strongly with your heart to support your spine and maintain its length.

4) When you have gone as far as is comfortable into your back bend, reach one hand at a time for the backs of your knees. Keep lifting your heart with everything you have in you to keep from collapsing. If you do collapse, come out of the pose, rest in balasana, and feel gratitude to yourself for having the courage to try this variation.

5) With your hands on the backs of your knees, keep lifting your heart and lengthening your spine as you let your head move slowly to the floor. See if you can maintain this position for a breath or two without collapsing. If you collapse, come out of the pose, rest in balasana, and feel gratitude to yourself for having the courage to try this variation.

6) To come out of the pose, lift from the heart until you are out of the back bend, drawing your hands into namaste mudra in front of your heart, and sit on your knees. Or, more likely, tuck your chin and let your back come to the floor. Draw your knees into your chest and give yourself a hug before rocking up to sitting and resting in balasana.


Whatever variation you journey to, be sure to end in a wash of deep, unabashed gratitude to yourself for the courage you exhibit every day, for following your heart in some way every day, and for allowing yourself to be where and who you are.