a way to be here

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"It's clear to me that a crisis like this requires us not even to think of G-d. Like the writer says, to go beyond thinking. Into a place of forgetting, even. Maybe even beyond creating, receiving, aligning. Maybe this sort of crisis requires the individual to unlayer down to our most true naked nature. Where there is just the beating of the heart. And the breath. Held by love." - Laura Munson from This is not the Story You Think it is.

Yoga.

What I like most about yoga is this: My teacher's soft voice like a lullaby.

And the sound of her feet sticking to the floor as she moves generously from student to student dropping lavender oil on our palms. I can't help but hope she comes over and presses those healing hands onto my shoulders in savasana, melting the stress away with her alchemy and warmth.

In those moments, I am reminded of what it feels like to be a little girl, safe and secure as the adults work magic around you. Drifting off to sleep, you can hear them talk in hushed voices in the room down the hall. My dad is there too; big, soft palms gently caressing my face, putting me to sleep.

It works every time.

I like feeling stretched out like a lazy cat laying in the sun. Like there is more space between my shoulder blades and rib cage. I like feeling like there is room to breathe.Like I just grew three inches in length.

I like that my neck no longer feels stiff and my hamstrings no longer tight.

I like that when I am drowsily rolling up my yoga mat, the one that has a big bite mark on the side from when my rambunctious puppy ate it 3 years ago, that I feel like I have visited my therapist as well as the spa.

I like that yoga is a reset button so even if I had Heathbar Crunch yogurt yesterday and afterwards, I may just have a piece of pumpkin bread, I am still detoxifying and exercising now.

I like it best when my teacher says, "Find a way to be here." Because sometimes here really hurts. Especially when attempting a split. But there is always a way to be here.

Find a way to be here. I repeat this to myself today in class as I smell the gardenia, and the lemongrass and ginger. Find a way to be here, I think, when here feels like my heart is breaking. Find a way to be here, I think, even when here is tight and chaotic. Find a way to be here, I think, choosing to pick a new narrator of my story because anxiety is no longer welcome.

But the soft ocean waves of others breathing as it rolls in and out around me, inviting in light, softness, authenticity, and grace certainly is.

This is the way to be here, through breath, through our beautiful breath that whispers to us, also in a hushed voice, that we are whole, and never truly broken.