“peg, you have a beautiful rabbit pose (forward bend) - but perhaps you should attend a few more back bending workshops to get that more perfect.”

thanks brother.  a few weeks ago, i’d have been crushed.  (especially as this advice was handed out from the pulpit in front of 60+ students in a crowded hot yoga room.)

but that’s what we instructors sometimes do, we think it's our job to contort students into cover models of perfect postures – forgetting to ask at least one important question:  how do you feel?

when i was a kid, i used to love cartwheels on the lawn, handstands underwater, and back-walkovers.  blessed with an abundant curve of the spine, it seems i was a natural.  or so i thought ...

because then i started practicing yoga and learned all the ways i did it wrong. 

so me and my pre-J.Lo, “duck butt” found a safer haven within the primary series.

until one day,  the gates of hell were opened and i was moved on to the fires of ashtanga’s second series … once again face to face (back to back?) with my frenemy of asana - backbends.  

hips forward … feet parallel … lift up your chest … squeeze your thighs … reach for your heels … now your ankles …

but when does anyone look past how it looks and ask me how it feels?

last week, someone actually did.  ready to drop back with my usual scowl, he stopped me to ask, “what’s wrong?”

“i’m stuck - that’s what’s wrong.”

 feet cemented in the rules and regulations and with arms tightly bound by the knowledge of what is right (and therefore wrong) – my body is rigid and i cannot move.

“forget what you’ve been told – and focus on how it feels.”

but it’s been so long.  though released from captivity, i can’t begin to know how to use my newly granted freedom.  baby steps that begin by widening my feet and relaxing my shoulders.  soon, i am breathing my arms overhead and moving with a flow that required no thought.  joyful movements filled with ease slowly begin to overtake my struggle.

isn’t that what yoga is all about?  when did i forget that my best teacher is not the one standing in front of me, but the one who resides inside of me?

if something isn’t feeling right – it usually isn’t right.  uncomfortable is one thing, but painful is another.  and much as it will please the mongers of alignment, finding your heels in kapotasana or keeping your knees straight as you bend backwards will not cure world hunger.  

this yogi will no longer be bending over backwards to please. because, i’d rather bubble with joy though slightly off kilter, than jam myself miserably into your textbook example.

and to my well meaning instructor – my backbend may never indeed make the cover of yoga journal, but it now feels fucken fantastic.  so thank you for asking.