An 8:15, Again

Ooof oooof oooof. Did you ever have a day where--no matter how well rested and how great your weekend was, how blissful you felt gliding into the long swan song of Sunday, how ready and fueled up you felt, how prepped you were--Monday was just a giant fail?

Monday was a not-giant fail. But not a great day. By 2nd period, I was irritated with my students, and irritated with myself for being irritated, and for not being a masterful teacher who could turn a class around and make a lesson work. Instead, I forced it through in two different periods, and ended up feeling a little broken. Oy, these students. Such power they can have--and so often, they choose to let it go--mostly, because they aren't old enough to recognize what power they do have, or how to use it wisely.

But I left school feeling keyed up, planning on how to prevent failure instead of ensuring success (TOTALLY different things, especially in the classroom) and am still nervous now, because my supervisor is observing me tomorrow in my history class. NOTE: I am not a trained history teacher. So, this would be my...oh, third...history class EVER, and I am feeling fairly wildly out of my element. I have prepped and planned and Xeroxed and created, and frankly, have no time before 8am tomorrow to hunt down any genies in any thrift store bottles.

And, I face down demons of neurosis every day, demons that tell me that if I'm not pouring myself into every worksheet, every project, every nuance of every word, every decision which should really be guided by a goal and a mission, every every every detail of classroom life--well, then I'm not dedicated enough as a teacher, and I really need to either change or leave. Do other professions come with such soul-searching, so constantly?

Tonight, I find myself yearning, just yearning, for both the power of Bikram and the soothing certainty of it. Although I can't guarantee anything about class after the first minute, I can agree to find myself in some moment of some posture tonight. I can agree to find myself, a little bit truer to myself, and a little more real. Rabbit will follow Camel, and all I need to do is show up to that moment, and let someone else figure out what comes next. I can thank Bikram for helping me realize that a fail day is just a day, not a life sentence, and that at some point, the galloping horse that is teaching will seem less like a death threat and more like an adventure.

Erm. Theoretically. I'll let you know how tomorrow goes.

Makeovers from the Inside Ot

To feel more beautiful:

breathe.
sit by the ocean for as long as you can.
think about things you love.
drink coconut water and kombucha and green tea and water and feel juicy from the inside out.
laugh at babies screaming with joy as they run on the beach.
find something wonderful to focus on. if you can't find wonderful, choose good. good is still great.

soak yourself with your own sweat for 90 minutes. in those 90 minutes, try to focus on "so....ham" as you breath. try not to focus on Drill Sergeant Instructor looking at you. try not to focus on anyone else's practice. remember that you are loved and wonderful and amazing. be proud of yourself for showing up. do what you can, as much as you can. and give it up when it is over. let the sweat drip in your nose and ears and eyes. smile. feel the calm light glow inside you during those silent 20 seconds, and know it's yours, and it lives in you, and it is you, and it is a certain, true thing.

resolve to never let 4 days go by without yoga again.

Paige Williams says it best, in her recent part-2 of her O Magazine featured Bikram journey:

"One afternoon in the middle of ustrasana, or camel pose—a killer backbend that some consider the toughest posture in the whole practice—it occurs to me that if I can remain calm and focused while in such a physically stressful state, I can get through anything. The studio around me is full of people who know just what I mean. They practice not because a Bikram studio is a particularly lovely place to spend 90 minutes a day but because without it, they would be angry, inflexible, immobilized, fatigued, intolerant, petty, pained, and maybe even dead. The type-A personalities feel calmer. Every student has a story. "

It's exactly like that for me, too: with Bikram, I am calm, focused and engaged. Open, willing, fierce. I can find myself more easily. I can stop those tearing, wild jags of stress and strain and even self-hatred before they become storms. I am beginning the construction of an inner harbor that holds me safe, and keeps me healthy--not just physically, but as Iyengar describes it: healthy of mind, body, and soul. Four days, and for each (well, every one except Friday; I was just plain lazy last night) I had an excuse. And really, I thought today's class would be so impossibly difficult it would set me up for a reason to never go again--you know, oh, sheesh, I went back, and it was just so terrible I never went again, oh whoops, oh jee-willikers.

But it was beautiful. From start to finish, it was like a stream of water being poured into me. I had no attachment to any part, any pose. I was just there and I did what I could, and it was the fastest 90 minutes yet. I felt like I was dancing with all the different elements: my impatience, my fear, my breathing, my tight right side and my weaker left side, my willingness to get back up, my sweat, my inner voice, my points of calm--and everything was just weaving together into some greater journey.

Really. It really did feel just that good. It is not lovely. I don't particularly like having sweat drip inside my ear. or into my eyes, or trying to hoik my legs up in Locust, or try to rotate my hip down in Balancing Stick. But I do love loving myself. And I certainly do love being calm. I hope to find myself in a hot room again. Because in that hot room is the road to myself.

And I feel like making a discovery.

This is Why I Do Yoga

It's 6:25pm, and I am halfway through a bottle of wine and a box of Cheez-Its.

I realize that does not sound like a normal beginning to a yoga blog, but here's the rest of the story.

I teach middle school. Grades--for the entire semester--are due the day after tomorrow. I just finished inputting my final grades, and realized that the average midterm grade for one of my classes was really low. So, I went to go ask my administrator what to do--scale them, curve them, write a letter home, etc. And he said, ooh, those grades really do suck, you should delete the progress report if you can. So, I went into the grading software system, and hit what I THOUGHT was delete for just that one test grade--you know, thinking that I could just re-enter them tomorrow, really no biggie.

Except.

Except, I accidentally deleted EVERY SINGLE TEST GRADE FROM THE WHOLE SEMESTER.

Now, take a deep breath to get the full enormity of what I just said.

If you are a teacher, you are CRINGING right now.

I had to send out an apologetic email. My gradebook may not be able to be fixed. I may have to enter in only the two test grades I have a record for (because oh, yeah, I sort of forgot to record the third test in my paper roster, so I only have three grades on hand). Or, it may get fixed. Or, it may not. I have 36 hours to fix it. And, I'm teaching two brand-new, never-ever-been-taught-before classes tomorrow.

Where does the oh-goody-I-do-yoga thing come in?

Because I'm not all that freaked out. Aside from the initial crying fit, I feel pretty okay. I know that one way or another, everything is going to get worked out. I did what I could to fix it. I've been honest with the parents, and I'll get their kids' grade to be as accurate as I can. And right now, that's the best I can do.

It's not the wine talking, either: it's something deeper, more real, and more lasting than just a nice wine buzz. It's the calm that I earned from the last four nights of committing to being steady, present and doing as much as I could, as I could do it.

So: do Bikram so on those horrible days, when you haven't eaten anything and you planned a class badly and you accidentally delete every test from your entire semester with no immediate means of retrieval and you still need to cut up the makings for an entire quilt before you go to bed and you have no clean coffee mugs, underwear or plates because you've been so busy you haven't had a moment to do errands and yes, you GET that Cheez-its aren't dinner...

So that on THOSE days, nothing really steals your peace.

gratitude and appreciation.

I'm grateful for...

--the cards and notes my 7th graders made for me after their finals were done
--that I've got 3 out of 6 classes graded
--that I just woke up from a nice nap
--that I'm going to be able to make a 6:30 class tonight--thank goodness for multiple studios in one city!

Headed to the bigger studio, further away for class tonight. It's the one that I began going to a few weeks ago, when all this yoga madness started, and at the time, it was the only one I knew about. I just spent a week at a smaller studio closer to my house, and...look, after 3 classes, the instructor was calling out my name and giving me corrections, which is NICE. It's got fewer classes, and the changing room is small, and the room itself is pretty small--but it's also more human.

I need this class so much--my cramps this month have been worse than they usually are, and my lower back feels like someone spent a few hours knotting it. I'm tired tired tired, and my wrist is sore from grading 100+ essays and exams, and I'm tired tired tired--but I will not take two days off in a row again if I can help it. Don't think, Miss M.--just go.

Will I Make It?

I took two nights off--one, the planned-on rest day, which was very nice, and after which I really wanted a class. So, Tuesday night, I'm driving to the studio, having accidentally (I think I was surfing the old Net-ski, or something totally useful like that) and get caught in traffic SoCal style. Which meant going about 15 feet every 5 minutes, and which meant I got all of half a mile closer to the studio before I officially missed class. Self, I said, that's fine, you really want to get to class, and you should. So, I planned on the 8:30--the class I knew they had because they had it the night before...right?

I head back out, all clothed, all watered, all ready, and I drive all the way back (which is not so far in SoCal terms, but it's long enough to make it an annoying waste of gas)...

And they only have the 8:30 class on Mondays and Wednesdays. Shit, to be totally blunt. Shit.

I was a little annoyed. The happy spot, she was not to be found. My own fault for not checking the schedule, but AAAAARRGGH.

Work, by the way, is impossibly difficult right now--it's finals, and everyone is stressed, teachers and students alike. Teachers are pissy because we have to grade 100+exams and write 100+ report cards and deal with 100+ stressed-out students, and students are stressed because they now have to be able to recall 9873 bits of information they're really never going to be called on to use again. I am not a fan of finals. And, major administrative drama takes place. And, it's just a long, long week in general by this point.

So you'll understand just how much I wanted to make the 6:30 class last night--and I did, by the skin of my teeth. I was peeling off my heels and tights practically as soon as I hit the door--threw on my bra and shorts as quickly as a human being ever has, and was the last person in the door.

God, it was nice. Two days off is too much, really. It was a hard class in a lot of ways--I hadn't eaten very much yesterday, and was really lightheaded by the middle of the floor series, and my balance was just off, and to be honest, I had a hard time getting out of my own head. But I was there, and I did yoga, and it was good.

I am going to try my best for the 8:!5 tonight, but it is my moontime, nudgenudgewinkwink, and I am crampy and sore. I know plenty of yoginis blaze right through, regardless, and I know I'll feel better....someone convince me...

(As soon as I typed that, my next door neighbor started blaring evil European techno. Yes, that will get me out the door.)

A Rest. And, a Lesson.

Tonight is a rest night, after three classes in a row. And a lesson: no matter that there's an 8:30pm class offered at the studio:

I do not want to take it. I am constantly lulled by my relative get-up-and-go at 6:15, when I'm home and chilling out finally, into thinking that hey, 8:30 is doable! And also, great! Let's go!

And despite the fact that classes are like pizza--in general, it's very rarely bad, I am winding all the way down by 8:30, and don't want to be out driving around San Diego at 10pm.

So, this week, I'm planning to succeed to find myself in class at 6:30--which means packing clothes and keeping them in the car, bringing good food to school so I don't have to drive home but also don't find myself eating the leftover Hanukkah candy for dinner, and I think most of all, realigning my intention. The idea of going to the 8:30 class does not create peace, but sets up a struggle for yea!/ eh...domination.

Plus, it's finals week. And no matter how hot that room gets, no matter how many drops of sweat make their way into my eyes and ears, no matter how challenging the entire Standing series gets: it is better by far than grading.

Class #11: It's Interesting That I Don't Want to Teach

It struck me yesterday that I had no desire to teach Bikram, really.

Which is interesting as all get out to me, since in every aspect, every arena, every experience of my life, I have thought:

I could do this. I could do it like this. I would do it this way. I can see myself up there, and when I get there, I'd do it like this. I have spent entire vinyasa yoga classes running my own dialogue through my head; I have entered grad programs--yes, plural--and spent countless hours analyzing and rethinking and, let's be honest:

Snarking. Sadly, there is no other way to gloss it that is authentic; I may have thought about improvement, but it was really me saying, "I am better."

And really, was I even listening? All those hours, and jobs, and bosses, and programs, and classes? Was I even there, or was I waiting impatiently for my imaginary moment to shine and be seen?

Now, maybe the difference lies in the fact that I really am a teacher, and exquisitely, painfully aware of what it means to teach--of how hard it is, and how challenging it is to remain authentic and honest and open and turned out instead of in. Many have been the days when I drag myself to the car and drag myself home and make a something for dinner, too tired from the emotional life of school to think about anything. Many, conversely and of course and thankfully, have been the days when I feel like I'm getting closer and closer to my calling, where I could stay in a classroom forever, when I know what I'm doing is right the way rightness is meant to be...

But the point is that teaching is h-a to the capital effing RD. And when I get to class, and the excitement is building, all I'm thinking about is the giant 90-minute break hidden inside a hellaciously sweaty and almost-but-not-quite too hard experience.

In those 90 minutes, I just do. I do and I push and I stretch and try and fall and gulp and sweat, and maybe I check in with the thought that says, "nope, not this!" and try to make it eat itself--but I don't think. I don't plan. I'm just there.

And I think that's a really freeing thing for me. I set my intention and I throw myself off the bridge and I get through, however gracefully or ungainfully those 90 minutes prove themselves to be. I'm not a teacher. I am taught.

And I like that enough to not try to do anything else about it.