THIS body, THIS yoga

Our own body is our best teacher. In the midst of injury, limitation or physical weakness, this is a difficult thing to remember! My life injuries have taught me more about my body, my emotional response to challenges and difficulties, and my ability to persevere with both faith and self-compassion, than any outside yoga teacher, yoga training, workshop, or book.

As a dedicated yoga teacher, I am diligently committed to ongoing training and continuing education. Each year, I travel overseas for a few weeks to study with my main teacher and with others on the path who inspire me. However, at the same time, what I offer in class is not just the result of any one specific training, memorized sequences, or alignment principles from a manual but it is the product of my OWN experience of being a body, mind, and spirit that practices this yoga every day.

And, every day, MY yoga changes. This body and its needs shift moment to moment. This week, I found in my practice a very troubled knee. My familiar and favorite postures, comfortable from years of dialogue with my body, of wearing into them gently like a favorite pair of shoes, were all of a sudden more of a struggle. Balancing postures on one leg, almost impossible! And, if the physical struggle wasn't enough, then the ego speaks: No time for this now Katie! You're hosting a workshop next week. Body needs to be in peak condition!! These inside voices are very hard to quiet.

I made a choice to back off my usual active yoga practice and spend some time in quiet contemplation with my breath. Letting my breath dissolve back into its natural, undisturbed, unambitious rhythm, I found that I was prepared to better listen to my body. And with this new body and new intention, I pulled out my "mental" toolbox of anatomy, alignment, and therapeutics techniques and went to back the drawing board. In sketching the shape of my practice anew not only was I able to find some relief for my knee but I was reminded again of the profound and precise healing capabilities of the Anusara alignment principles and the heart oriented, self-honouring approach to practice that I try to teach every day.

Within the beautiful flow, softness, release, and flexibility of yoga, there IS a quality of precision. Precision has two aspects. First, there is awareness. We survey the inner and outer landscape, opening our self up to what this moment (this body, this mind!) is offering. Second, there is clarity of intention. On a physical level, this involves setting the foundation of a pose in a way that will best open AND support the body and the heart. With awareness and clear intention, we can make the active choice to align our body in a way that better allows us to have an experience of freedom.

Many people think of yoga as a practice that involves only the manipulation of the physical body in various shapes and acrobatic flows. However, we must remember that this outer "shaping" and outer framework is there to support the opening and flow of the inner channels, the inner body. We don't practice yoga to tear our bodies apart. There must be integrity, cohesion, even the setting of boundaries and limits on movement in order to better and more deeply expand inwardly.

In life, many of us choose to commit ourselves to just one person. Most often, we share a physical living space with this person. And, by making this choice, we certainly limit our personal freedoms. It is no longer always an option to do what we want, when we want, with who we want. However, within the context of this limited cohesive relationship, we find inside a greater capacity for intimacy, abiding respect, deep friendship, deep trust, and persevering love.

May we joyfully embrace and celebrate the limits that come with this embodied experience of life! May we find on our yoga mats a way to explore with openness and curiosity those limitations of the body that naturally arise and those limits that we create for ourselves in search of better support for our expression! May we use precision in our practice to not only to heal and prevent injury but to always connect back to the clarity of our intention--to draw together rather than pull apart!