Sunday, January 13, 2013

Power in the Stretch

If you are a follower of this blog, you know that one of the plants missing in my garden since I moved to the PNW in July is a just-right yoga class. I found the studio I love, and a teacher I like, in Olympia; but the class has not challenged me. Well. They started a new class this week, Yoga 1 and 2. I got my challenge; days and several Advil later my pectoral muscles are almost recovered.

I never would have chosen to place my mat behind the cute young thing that came in late and put her mat in front of mine, her yoga clothes showing off all her well- developed, clearly cared for parts very nicely. I groaned. Great. I know it’s not a contest and I am supposed to keep my eyes on what’s happening on my own mat, but I couldn’t help watching her. I couldn’t help it because when my 60 can out-yoga someone’s 20-something, I am going to pay attention. Maybe it was the first time she had done yoga, but I accept all affirmation. We did five full sun salutation vinyasas. I haven’t done even one since last spring. Mine weren’t pretty, but I kicked her cute butt.

In the middle of a warrior pose with a serious hamstring stretch, the teacher reminds us to gently stop the chatter in our head-the chatter that takes our mind off the discomfort of the stretch. “Keep your mind with the stretch, that’s where the power is.” The stretch is where the power is. That phrase has been singing through my mind, along with the sore pecs, all week.

After living alone for eight years, living with Mama is stretching me. It’s stretching her, too. Living in community, and doing it well, is not easy. Living with a blood relation is hard. Living with someone who is in a very different life-stage is challenging. Knowing that I am on a fast track to that same life stage is terrifying. What it is, is opportunity. Opportunity to stretch, to learn, to be curious. For that to happen, I have to keep my mind on the stretch, that’s where the power is. That’s where the opportunity is.

Mama says something that comes from a place of who she is, and it pushes a button in me. Perhaps a button from childhood, perhaps one that takes me back to an adult experience. I react out of that long ago, probably unexplored place of pain. Most of the time I shove my riposte away without voicing it, but I feel it well up before I let the mind chatter cover it. As is my way of being, I let it fly away and never look at it again. Ignoring feelings is learned behavior; learned in this very home I am again living in. I wonder how I would better serve myself to be curious; to stay with the stretch. Like: “Wow, where do I feel that anger that rose up in me, or that fear? Oh, it’s in my chest. I’m going to feel that, stay with it, investigate it.” Or come back to it. Stay with the stretch, it’s where the power is.

The last time I returned home from Seattle, the snow-covered Olympic mountains were glistening on the horizon against blue sky. I sped down I-5, skirting the city, and could glimpse them beckoning to me behind the Space Needle. It was morning, I wasn’t really in a hurry, and I thought about getting off at the Seneca Street exit and driving through the city center in workday traffic to the market on the shore of Puget Sound where I could get a full view. Robert Frost flitted through my mind: "stopping by the woods on a snowy evening," slowing down, taking time to enjoy beauty. But I was on the interstate fast track; it felt like too much energy to really think about getting off. I kept going. As soon as it was too late, I regretted my non-decision to stick with inertia. I didn’t keep my mind on the stretch to get off the highway, I let the opportunity pass me by. I read this somewhere a few days later: “Anytime we lop off the fantasy and romance from our daily lives we are hacking away at the quality of our existence.” I just lopped off that longing, and kept on going.

Spontaneity is not in my repertoire. Friday, after the fog dissipated and the day became crystal clear, after Mama’s physical therapy appointment, after lunch, as my head chatter tried to tell me it was too much of a stretch to spontaneously take off exploring in CuRVy-maybe I should curl up with a book-I remembered the missed opportunity in Seattle. I grabbed my camera and took off over the hill. I had no plan; I even forgot the Lewis County map. I didn’t know where I was going or what I would find. I wasn’t disappointed.

There is no power in the status quo. I’m developing my muscles and learning to keep my mind on the places that stretch me: physically and spiritually. The new day is dawning…I have a full tank of gas.


  

 

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Happy Sunday driving, Gretchen!
-Phil

Anonymous said...

"Look!" says the One, "I am doing something new!"

Donna Knox said...

I read your post just as I was about to drag my own sore muscles out the door to yoga today. I usually spend my time there wondering why all the others can hoist themselves into a sit like little ballerinas while I must grab my butt, grab my legs and then grab the woman on the next mat to get up off my back. I am in pain. I am bored. I am generally not having fun. The clock surely stands still and tricks me into spending two hours there instead of just the one. Tonight, though, I will try to focus on the stretch...literal and figurative...in hopes I will finally learn to enjoy the experience.