Reflections

It feels good to move. I get on my yoga mat and do one pose, then another, then another. My practice has started. It’s 7:00 in the morning and I feel like I am accomplishing something; like I have accomplished something. I know from experience that if I don’t get myself here and get going I am likely to not at all during the day and then I will be sorry, I won’t have gotten that ‘something’ done, and I won’t feel nearly as good. Neither my body nor my sense of self.  So with that memory I get going (most mornings anyway), I get up, get in the car and over to the studio to practice. I know if I stay home I will be easily distracted. Moving was easier when I was younger, but I know that if I just get going it gets better with each passing minute. 

When I teach I know it is the same for my students, they need to move, they need to learn to know their bodies, to begin to feel, to be aware, to adjust. We move not just to be moving but to become aware of our selves and to react and to adjust. I give lots of instructions when I am teaching; how to do the pose. Most to the whole group but also to individual students, about how to move, how to change, where the alignment is going off. How to move very specifically. This week while doing a standing pose called Triangle pose where the legs are turned to the right and you extend the trunk over the right leg while it is straight, one man was obviously having difficulty with his knee. An instruction to turn the inner knee forward and lift strongly the knee cap relieved the discomfort and his breath became quiet. This is the learning we each get to do for ourselves as we move in and out of the yoga poses. We get to learn how our bodies are built and how we must study them and how we must adjust and change them. As we do this the pose gradually becomes quiet; we don’t lesson the intensity, the effort is still there but it is withdrawn inward.

This learning is the gift of reflection. It is a chance to practice self awareness where you become sensitive and go fully within. Our world is chaotic and rushed and we are bombarded by ‘multitasking’ and too much sound and too many things that we feel we have to do. The yoga mat is a wonderful place where we can be with ourselves and learn to reflect inward, to find the peace of silence in the inner self. You practice in the controlled environment of the mat and find that what you learn spreads to the world away from the mat. I invite you to give it a try.

Sue Salaniuk, Intermediate Senior I Certified Iyengar Teacher. Each week one of the teachers at the Yoga Space shares her thoughts and experiences in this blog. The Yoga Space is a studio just east of Dexter serving Saline, Chelsea, Manchester and Ann Arbor.  We have been helping people with their flexibility, strength, focus and stress management for over 14 years. Fall 2 Classes begin October 28 and we offer a free class the last Friday of each month from 6-7 pm (Oct 25). 180 Little Lake Dr #1 Ann Arbor, MI, 48103. www.yogaspaceannarbor.com 734-622-9600