Backward Circles

November 4

My daughter is 10. She is thin and lovely and very, very bendy.

I was never like her.

I remember being flexible – but I never had her budding popular look or her way of ease about me.

I can only watch in awe.

She springs and glides into dancer and king pigeon touching her toes to her nose with the same attitude as she throws her book bag to the middle of the floor.

Just so we’re clear – in these poses, the practitioner takes their leg backward and catches it with their hand – in pigeon the arm comes over the head – so that the entire side forms curves and creates a backward circle.

There is a tinge of jealousy – of ease of shape of vitality. That is, indeed, the way the pose is suppose to look…

Of course, I not only hear Sweet Teacher say, but believe these days, that the yoga has absolutely nothing to do with the body (even as she insists on a squared leg for our warriors).

She is Sunrise. In the yoga teaching we move through life like a day. Sunrise is about movement and feeling. Learning and energy.

Midday is for strength and stability. “Householders:” I never noticed the word hold in household before.

It is my great honor that she has little to hold right now. For certain she has her kid fears, and I wouldn’t do it all again. But her life, thank goodness, is mainly without challenge, without flight. 

Flight without fight.

So when I sink into my struggling warrior today – to strengthen my weakened base – I will dedicate it all to her – as I almost always do.