In the Beginning

She awoke and moved through her routine. No decisions to be made. It is not a choice. Just do it, as Nike would tell you. She put one foot on the floor and then the other. The dog out for a pee. The teeth brushed, bladder emptied. Sinuses flushed. Time to practice.

It is all practice. Every moment of every day is a practice. We practice what we should have said or done. We practice what we will do or say.

This practice is different. This practice is the practice of connecting to something bigger than herself. Something bigger and yet not separate. Her, in a bigger sense of herself.

She recalled the first time she had realized this sense of not being alone. She had gone to a yoga class in the Ashtanga style. Despite being in pretty good shape, the class had definitely challenged her. She had noticed how easily her sister could move into poses that she struggled with. Quite unlike all her other accomplished physical feats, the movements here seemed to require something that was foreign to her. You cannot just make your body do the pose, you have to coax it into it and let go of getting there at the same time. By the time savasana came, she was physically relieved to lie on the floor, though this would be when she would return to her troubles. Her mind began it’s relentless story-telling of worry and resentment. She consciously tried to relax and yet could feel the tension creeping into her limbs and hips, her eyes. She wanted to cry. She felt almost broken. She had had enough and yet just could not let go. She felt as if she was being swept around in a wind storm and the only thing she knew to do was to hold on.

She could see the brown tam, the brown shirt with the orange and white coloured scarf. She recognized the blue eyes peering at her. It was a little girl, perhaps 7 or 8 years old; she saw herself. This was her in her Brownie uniform. The eyes were soft and caring. Her voice strong and confident. "You will be alright." As the words washed over her and her mind was trying to understand, she could feel a deep sense of safety. A deep sense that these words were true.

Those words would continually wash over her in the weeks and months to come. Along with her curiosity. It was that curiosity that would hold everything together in the next few years.

What was that, why did she appear and in that way? And what did all of that have to do with yoga?