As I sit here on the first beautiful beach day on Cape Cod, first through ebb tide, and now as I watch the waves push themselves toward me, I remember the tidal thoughts I had in yoga class this morning. The ebb and flow of the class can be likened to the tide cycle.
The standing series is very much like low tide. It moves slowly, carefully inching me into my practice. Pranayama breathing is controlled in and out, always grabbing then releasing air, much like the outgoing tide first grabs, then releases pieces of the sand bar. Half moon to the right, is always me stretching myself further toward things. Half moon to the left, is seeing how far I can go before I have to retreat. Backbend is always bending over backwards for the people I love. Standing head to knee is always about losing and regaining my grip. Standing bow and balancing stick are all about reaching for a mirror I will never touch, but I do it daily, anyway. Tree and toe stand are all about regaining my balance in preparation to change direction.
The two minute savasana is the ebb tide. I don't move at all. Just lie there and let the journey I just took pulling away, stretching, and breathing, take hold. At the end of the last minute it's time for wind removing pose. The first movement of heading back toward shore. Then comes the force of the first sit-up. Now I know I am once again rushing toward the shore I left so far in the distance. The forward movement is always more forceful, requiring strength in the next four floor postures on my stomach. The spine is now required to lift, squeeze, and hold. Fixed firm and half tortoise ready me for the big push – camel – that lands me back up on the beach with a vengeance as I struggle to hold it to the end. Now, finally from rabbit through spine twist, I reclaim the beach where I began 90 minutes ago.
One complete yoga class. One complete tide cycle. Yoga class daily reshaping my mind, body and spirit, just as the tide is reshaping this shoreline in front of me. Change, whether we love it or hate it, happens to us incrementally as we move through our days. Trying not to change would be like stopping this tide from going out again. Somedays I do not like what the tide did to my beach. It exposed rocks and littered it with seaweed through and over which I must navigate painfully and uncomfortably. Somedays, especially in January, I love what the tide has done to my beach. It covers the painful rocks with beautiful stretches of smooth sand and gives me a soft path to walk. Just as somedays I don't like the pain change pronounces me with, and yet, other days I welcome the things change has graced my life with.
I have no control over how I am going to find my beach tomorrow, just as I have no control over how I am going to find me, tomorrow, either.
As so, as another day goes by, I hug my knees tighter to my chest as another ebb tide begins, and …I have written.
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