Chop Wood, Carry Water

by Jamie Shane

  Ultimately, it is up to you to decide what kind of experience you desire. But you should also consider this: The program you want may not be the one you need.

  Deciding to become a yoga teacher is not a blithe decision. Its not like saying, “Oh, I think I’ll wear white today.” For, despite its many perks, being a yoga shiromani is hard. You will constantly be aware of what you are saying, doing, demonstrating. You need to continually study. You will always be questioning, questing. You will agree to accept certain changes in your lifestyle and, furthermore, to share these changes with others. It’s a tough way to make a living. Because, while the schedule is great, the pay can really stink and you are forever finding yourself either up on some strange pedestal or down at the bottom of somebody’s nose. Becoming a yoga teacher is something one does only after careful examination.

  I encourage anybody who wants to deepen their personal experience of yoga through teaching to really shop around for a program that is complete with asana, philosophy, karma, mantra, meditation & lifestyle. The program should immerse you in the yogic way of living—ideally in an ashram environment. Because to really understand what you are agreeing to do, you need not only learn the asanas, but to have the original experience.

  Being a teacher is so very much more than just posture, alignment and sequence. There is a great art to it. You can begin to understand this with a training program that sets you back on your heels, if not your butt. A good program should fill you with the joy and wonder of yoga. But I also think it should rock your very foundations. It should shake loose any rubble of wrong thinking and bad living. If you don’t question yourself and your decision to be there at least once, I think your program might be missing something.

  Yoga is a self-shaking experience. At some point in time, you will have to empathize with a student who is just discovering that and has questions. How can you know what they need if you’ve never been shaken yourself? Programs that don’t give you this will ultimately be doing you a disservice.

  And if you intend to become a teacher of yoga, you owe it to yourself—and to your students—to really understand what that means.

  96

  There are two kinds of people in the world. The ones who will tell you that you have spinach in your teeth; And the ones who will let you go on about your business with spinach in your teeth. Which is the better approach? Momentary embarrassment? Or delayed embarrassment?

  I always prefer the momentary. Whoops, sorry. Spinach in my teeth. How embarrassing, did I get it? And that is why I am a proud member of the former grouping. I will always tell you about the proverbial spinach if it means you won’t be further embarrassed. So, please, bear this in mind as we go on about our business.

  I am asked about starting yoga nearly every day. People call and email to ask how they can get the ball rolling. What kind of class should I take? Should I buy my own mat? I try my best to steer them to the place they will be most at ease.

  But when it comes to ‘What should I wear?’, my reply is constant. “Something comfortable, a little stretchy; No buttons, no zippers. Whatever you usually exercise in is fine.” However, I find now that this reply is creating a little spinach that maybe you should know about. My fault entirely.

  Suitable bottoms for the practice of yoga can be pants or shorts. A suitable top is a fitted t-shirt or a tank top. But. Certain understandings must be applied. You can’t just throw on a pair of old running shorts or stretch pants and a giant t-shirt and consider yourself prepared. Going to a yoga class is not the same as climbing onto a treadmill, or bench pressing a couple of bars.

  You certainly don’t have to run out and buy yourself a new ‘yoga wardrobe’. Generally, people pull some type of old athletic attire out of their closet and that is usually fine. But the more of these ‘comfortable’ clothes I see, the more I realize that some of y’all don’t know what your old stuff does when you start moving. Some of those old clothes really share your business, if you take my meaning.

  For instance. Gentlemen. If you want to wear running shorts, great. But please (please) wear briefs beneath them. Ladies, same goes. A wide leg short gapes open when you lay down. And rides up when you bend over. If you are wearing your ‘athletic’ thong, or no panties at all…well. Need I really detail the image?

  I practice in a good-quality, closed leg, stretch short or pant. Because they don’t gap and they generally don’t ride. But, if the last time you put those bottoms on was 1986, you should be aware: Lycra thins in the seat as it ages. When pulled tight, it appears very sheer. In other words: You can see right through it. And if you have again decided to eschew underpants….

  To determine if your clothes are yoga-friendly, try this simple experiment. Put them on. Stand with your back to a full length mirror. Now bend all the way over and look between your thighs at the image. What you see in the mirror is what I see in class. Does your shirt fall so far open that you can see your tummy or girly goods? Do your pants put the ‘hoohah’ on display? If so, the answer is no. These are not good clothes for yoga.

  You want to be comfortable. And that means not only physically, but in a way that aligns with your own sense of modesty. Don’t be embarrassed, be aware. So you got a little spinach in your teeth. So you showed a little tushie in class.

  I wouldn’t tell ya if I didn’t love ya.

  97

  Ladies, ladies, ladies. I know where your heart is coming from, truly I do. I have a man, too, and I want him to live forever. I want him to exercise, to eat better, to see the doctor without whining like a four-year-old. I wish he would take as good care of himself as I try to, really I do, with all of my heart.

  But if wishes were wings, pigs would fly.

  So, please take this in the loving and understanding fashion with which it is offered. Please do not drag your husband to yoga class if he really doesn’t want to go. I’ve seen it, I’ve tried it, I’ve taught it. It’s a freaking nightmare. Now, feel free to cajole and harass him. Needle and nag to your heart’s content. I did. It didn’t get me very far—but then, my husband is a mule, so I’ve long since given up.

  Yoga will help your man in more ways than he can know. We understand that. It will keep him healthy for many years to come. We want that. But it will only be so if it is something that he wants to do—and keep doing. If he comes to class just because you made him, odds are that he won’t receive the full benefits yoga has to offer. That is because it is a fully personal experience, and a difficult one that will only take root if the practitioner is sincere.

  And a sincere wish to shut you up is not the sincerity we need. I’ve seen more husbands staring at the clock than I care to admit. I’ve seen more wives quietly frustrated that their partners are staring at the clock than I like. Even worse, I’ve seen and heard hushed arguments in class as yoga-wife tries to convince her husband into a posture that he is convinced he will never make. In those instances, the experience is ruined for them both. (And for me, taking charge of that in a class is straight up awful.)

  The very best way to persuade a stubborn man to experience yoga is to simply live by example. Continue on with your practice, keeping your attention on what you learn. What you experience. What you discover.

  Then just take it home with you. He can’t help but to be intrigued by your newfound peace and serenity. He can’t help but to be a little jealous when you stop sharing complaints about common aches and pains.

  There may come a point when you manage to demonstrate to him how much better life is with yoga by just simply being who you are.

  My mule will never come to a class. I know that without doubt. And at this point, I wouldn’t take him to one if he begged. I refuse to sympathize with an aching back after years of telling him how to alleviate that same back problem. He gets no “poor baby” from me when he complains of a sciatic problem that has been nagging him for moths. You know what I tell him?

  You should have taken up yoga when I told you to. Oddly enough, it was this approach tha
t finally worked. Now he just comes to me and asks for stretches or postures to take care of things that bother him. And I’m alright with that. Because it comes down to the plain fact that you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.

  Same thing goes for mules.

  98

  I had a massage not too long ago where I commented to the masseur that I just couldn’t fathom why I had such pain in my leg. And he replied (very blithely), “Well, you’re an athlete, that’s why.”

  Now, to a girl who more often than not caught the kickball in gym with her face and not her hands, this was an astounding proclamation. I’m no athlete; I’m a yoga instructor. I don’t compete. One of my very fundamental teachings is that we don’t treat yoga like a sport, it’s a practice, an experience. I am the very antithesis of an athlete in all the ways that count.

  Or am I?

  I’ve slowly come to realize that anyone who participates in a physical activity with diligence, regularity and joy is an athlete. If you run the streets of Naples and never a marathon, you are still an athlete. If your golf game would make Tiger Woods cringe, but you love it and do it, you are still an athlete. If you play tennis with your grandmother every week and lose, you are still an athlete. Athletics is about participation and attention to the body or to the activity, not necessarily about successful competition. So, in a way, all of us who play are athletes.

  And that means we are all susceptible to athletic injury.

  Frequent participation in a beloved activity often leads to repetitive motion injury, muscle strain and physical imbalances. Sports that involve swinging, such as golf, tennis and baseball, all ask the body to twist and move in a consistently same motion, which can lead to back and shoulder problems. Sports that involve running often create troubles in the ankles, knees and lower back due to the pounding of the feet on the pavement, grass or turf. Activities that require extreme flexibility, such as gymnastics and, yes, even power yoga, can bring about pulled muscles or tendons. You may play your sport for years and never a problem see, but one day, be assured, it will arise. The athletic body needs constant attention. It needs you to give consideration to what you are doing. It needs you to listen and hear even the faint messages of pain or strain that you create when you play.

  Many of us just assume that aches and pains are par for the course. And, to some extent, they are. If you use anything the same way frequently, you are simply bound to see some wear. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything you can do about it. A practice of gentle yoga can help balance out these repetitive motion imbalances, create flexibility and fluidity in stiffening joints, ease back pain or strain. It is an athletic supplement par excellance.

  Yoga does this by bringing the body back to balance. It teaches you the skills needed to really listen to what the body has to say. It shows you how to create a state of absolute focus. You might just be surprised at what you had never noticed. I won’t promise that all of the dings you put in the body after years of hard use will just vanish, but I can assure you that this practice will create a difference in how you feel. In the body, in the mind, in your sport. Every athlete—professional, dilettante, or weekend warrior—deserves the benefits yoga can bring. Yoga is the mate to your activity. The yin to its yang. The Spock to your Kirk. It helps maintain the foundation on which the health of your athletic endeavour grows.

  So, no, maybe you’ll never be Peyton Manning or Serena Williams. But add yoga to your program and you can continue to pretend for a long, long time.

  99

  Watch me, now. I'm going right over to yonder tree and I'm gonna climb right up it. Surely am. And then I'm a-gonna shimmy out onto that skinny, skinny limb and set up my little soapbox. Can y'all hear me down there?

  Good.

  Many more women than men attend yoga classes. That's a fact. So much so that yoga in the West has come to be associated with the feminine. Yet, this is completely contrary to Eastern yoga, where men dominate. Why is that? Having interviewed a number of average, non-yogi men on the subject I am not surprised to say that the answer is hardly forthright. I have heard everything from, "It's a girlie sport," to "It's too hard." I guess I should have expected no less. So that leaves me to contemplate, speculate, and postulate on this tricky topic alone.

  I must conclude, after much deliberation, that I believe Western men do not resonate to yoga largely because there is no immediate achievement and no clear competition. Unlike popular sports, yoga does not give you a competitive rush, or the sense of having "won." No crowd will ever scream madly when you manage a perfect headstand. There is no finish-line tape to burst through when you complete a sun-salutation for the eighty-seventh time. Scoreboards and second clocks do not exist in yoga. So how does a man know if he's faster, stronger, smarter—better— than the next?

  I think that's the hurdle for many modern men. Yoga is not a sport, although it demands considerably more than any mere athletic event. Yoga can be physically tough. It can be the most challenging mental and physical exercise you will ever come across. A hard practitioner could go toe to toe with any athlete in terms of focus, endurance and strength.

  Male or female.

  However, there is no clear-cut method for determining your yoga "success," or any playbook that lays down how and when you will complete the task. Yoga demands patience and reflection, steadiness and fortitude. Achievement happens over a lifetime. Competition has no place. Mayhap this is too confusing to our common, Western male.

  When spirituality for men comes in Bud Lite ads, and accomplishment races around a track at 140 mph, how can yoga hope to capture their hearts? Everything that we teach our young males comes wrapped in competition. So much so that success is only measured by the vanquishing of another. Our heroes are those who have exercised this methodology in its most complete sense: Corporate sharks, cut-throat tycoons, ruthless lawyers, professional athletes.

  This type of thinking will never raise its head in yoga. Never. So its really no wonder that your average Joe Friday man won't bother with it. We've taught him that it has no value.

  The only person to compete with in yoga is yourself, and the only foe you will ever conquer is your ego. This is true in all of life whether we want to admit it or not. But most people, most men, don't understand the value of this way of thinking. It is simply not the way they were raised. Do better. Beat them. Prove that you are the best and therefore more worthy. Of what? Don't ask me. I'm missing the Y chromosome and all of its sundry parts.

  I could be very wrong. It could also be that men sense the daring and difficulty of yoga and are afraid of pitting their "superior" athleticism against women. Especially in a practice that has, somehow, come to be dominated by them.

  Oh, dear. Was that a gauntlet that just fell from my tree limb?

  100

  A few weeks ago, a gentleman came to class. An experienced yogi, he had brought his father to a beginner class in an effort to share the benefits of Yoga. Despite his advanced level, he practiced as a beginner to encourage another to try. It was lovely to behold. But as they left, I overheard a bit of their conversation. (I know, I know…eavesdropping bad. Bad teacher! Bad!) The father asked how this class differed from others, and the son replied, “My other instructor pays more attention to detail.”

  Well, that’s what I get for eavesdropping, right? Let me tell you, I went right up into smoke. “Details? He thinks I don’t pay attention? He thinks I’m a bad instructor! He thinks I don’t know what I’m doing! Wait, do I know what I am doing?! Am I wrong??!! Oh, no. I am wrong. I’m terrible!” The insecurities roared out of me like Dragon’s breath until I remembered something. Something precious and simple.

  The Devil, they say, is in the details. And the details can lock you up faster than US41 in season.

  Yoga is perceived and taught in many different ways. And, he’s right. I am not a detail instructor. I wasn’t taught that way and I don’t practice that way. But that does not make me a bad instructor. On the co
ntrary. I am a big believer in the yoga experience. I would rather see a student experience the lightness of being than the absolutely perfect posture. Because, in my experience, when you enmire yourself completely in the tiny, nitty details of the physical, you lose the ebb and flow of greater connection. To tune in only to the detail is to concern oneself with the mundane and to lose the cosmic.

  People will disagree. And that’s their prerogative.

  But I think some practices focus so deeply on the detail of the physical that everything gets distilled down into body awareness. This provides a great sense of focus. But it doesn’t allow for that unique sense of yogic release when the mind is sharp, the spirit connects and the body just flows. I know that I can’t really let go when I am concerned with engaging the shoulder loop, internal rotation of the upper thigh bone and external rotation of the lower leg, one hip rolling out to press the external ridge of the foot down. That just feels busy to me. And you can’t imagine what that is like to teach. Every time I try, students look at me as if springs have just popped from my ears and a little yellow cuckoo bird is doing the cha cha off of my tongue. Crazy lady, whachoo talkin’ ‘bout?

  Life is so busy anyway. Why does yoga have to be busy too? Yes, it is important to practice the postures correctly. But correct can be different for every body. If you’re cruising in the experience, I don’t think I should interrupt unless you are on the path to injury. Believe me, I’ve got my eye out. I’ve got you covered. And I will adjust you if it comes to that. But I’m not going to chatter away, hammering you with details that you may or may not understand. Yoga is a deeply private, personal experience between your body, mind and God. It is the path to finding your connection.

  I can’t draw you a detailed map to get there. I wouldn’t even dream to try. All I can do, all any instructor can do, is to guide gently. To illuminate the path you must walk alone. To do more is to make my experience your experience. And that is as dangerous as not paying attention at all.