endlessly enduring, always appropriate

I don’t ‘do’ gym yoga.

Between the shaky floors, loud music, and light pollution from the weight room and cardio area, it’s always been a fairly miserable experience: not to mention some of the teachers I've had have been suspect at best. Let's just put it this way, when a teacher instructs you to do deep backbends and twists within 15 minutes, hell, within 30 minutes of starting class [and class is started slowly WITHOUT heat inducing postures like sun salutations and yogic breathing], BE SKEPTICAL, VERY SKEPTICAL.
But yesterday, with the storms raging, I decided I would give it another shot...The yoga experience wasn’t great, but it wasn’t horrible either [I despise partner work and she had us do 3 series of it, ugh!].

The teacher started class by talking about how she had been speaking to someone about turning 30. He had made the comment that he had thought he was at his physical peak in his 20’s but by his 30’s he was reaching his emotional one. Nevermind the fact that I find both of these statements sad [because really, as I’ve blogged before, we should be striving to always be better, more complete, more whole, right?!], I withheld judgment and kept my ears open, thinking surely there was a nugget of wisdom about to come forth. The teacher commented, despite our anxieties, we should embrace the phases of our lives, all of the phases, because that’s what life is, it’s a moving through. She then simply stated, as if she had been reading my mind, or was aware of what I’ve been going through lately, “This is only a phase. Only a phase” and then she began instructing us through the postures. Well, I was on the brink of tears at this point: I felt my chin quiver and I offered a silent ‘thank you’ to God. I was where I needed to be.

[sidenote: I have this bad habit of leaving yoga classes early: I don’t know exactly why, I just do. Well, yesterday when I got up and committed to attending gym yoga I also committed to staying the entire time, not the entire time of moving postures but the ENTIRE TIME PERIOD. After feeling I got what I came for after the teacher’s intro wisdom I was tempted to leave class after about an hour. I made myself stay put. And am so glad I did.]

She ended class with a story. I don’t remember the specifics of it but I remember the main point. It was a tale of a student asking a master what he should inscribe the inside of his ring with. He wanted a saying that would lift him up when was sad and ground him when he was full of joy. The saying the master shared: “This too shall pass”…

This too shall pass. 

This is just a phase.

Namaste.