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Five years ago on this day, Vandita leads our morning sadhana and closes class by singing to us as we lie in savasana, our own little yoga nidra lullaby. In my blanket womb, I feel comforted, tender, safe, and warm. Tears. Emotion.
There are snowflakes falling at 6:30 a.m., a day after sun and 60-something-degree warmth, snow falling one day after I sat outside on the lawn in nothing but a light jacket. Like snowflakes, we are all unique, all different shapes and sizes and density, all falling at different speed and rates, all landing in our own spot. But together, we are one. One snowflake is beautiful itself when it lands on your glove, but together the snowflakes create a gorgeous landscape of snow, drifts, men, forts, and white mountain caps. Is this why I keep seeing people’s faces here? Why, during savasana, every time I close my eyes I see flashes of my classmates’ faces, like they are posing for passport photos or a driver’s license. A, E, D. Everyone. A blink, a face. Even people I didn’t think I cared about, people toward whom I may have harbored ill feelings. We are One. I don’t need to worry about “losing” these people once I leave because they are already inside of me. They are me, I am them. Is it that simple? Can I really break free of feeling like I’m going to lose everyone here by embracing everyone, knowing we are One?
***
After class, as I get my breakfast, I see G, the woman from yesterday’s gentle class whom I assisted first. She smiles and says hello. She grounds me. I feel good. Connected. Vandita’s class has centered me, brought me back home. The funny thing is that she hardly “taught” us–she let us teach ourselves! I did my own thing and emerged from my lullaby womb feeling refreshed, as if I’d been given a beautiful, profound lesson on life. But really, I just trusted myself. I listened to myself. I sang and danced and was OK with my body, my song. These people at the front of the room–the are our guides. Not idols, not gurus, not people we bow and pray to. They are our guides, helping us find ourselves. Tickling our inner knowledge here and there, opening and inspiring, allowing us to grow. Guides, not gurus. Why worship, when the true light lives within? Bow to the Buddha, not because you worship his feet but because you want to walk in his footsteps and cultivate his inner harmony. You just want peace. Not to crawl on your hands and knees for an unattainable figure, idol, but to stand on your own and help others find their feet as well.
Molly's feet, courtesy of Molly.
***
Briefly, my bubble of security bursts as I was faced with THEFT! My black Kripalu coffee mug that I left on the shelf outside Shadowbrook was gone after I emerged from class. A taste of the real world. 😦
***
During Rudy’s guided meditation, I become still. For a few minutes, I disengage from the pull of everyone else. I feel a draw in my belly, my solar plexus. A heat. A gnawing. I feel my third eye burning along with my stomach. I feel slightly nauseated, wanting to purge–or maybe just needing a hug from a stranger. We meditate after 60 minutes of hip-openers. To see, to watch how such opening postures can clear the mind…. I sit in ardha padmasana. I can feel my posture straightening as my breath continues, micromovements of lifting and extending. It feels like little miniscule flashes of heat and light pulling my torso up, sinking my hips, rolling my shoulders back and down.
I tune in, feeling energy around me. The feeling is heat, warmth–my palms and fingers extend; I want to touch this energy. I hear murmurs, whispers, energetic echoes all around the room, as is everyone’s discarded monkey minds are hovering above, dancing, itching to return into the brain. The warmth is amazing, I feel it envelop my body; my hands again like sponges, soaking up this golden, invisible, warm glow. Rudy chimes as out of meditation, and I am reluctant to let go of the glow. I feel myself grabbing the energy, making fists with my palms, bringing that energy to my solar plexus, my heart, bowing and letting what I captured, what I collected, soak deep into my being. Let me bring energy into my life, not physical beings, not idols, not statues, but their energy, their inspiration–elements that are never gone forever, even when the source has disappeared.
During Roger’s relaxation, I experience a feeling of light pressure on my forehead, from eyebrow to eyebrow, like a washcloth lying on my forehead.
***
I am vibrating today, a ball of unbridled energy. I think yesterday’s and this morning’s expulsions have cleared my channels and freed my room for reception. Between crying my eyes out last night, getting my period, enjoying the effects of bhunaman vajrasana, and peeing out a storm after this morning’s coffee, I feel good. Happy. Open.
This morning and afternoon’s meditations turned my power up, my antenna in the right spot. During Helga’s evening sadhana, I felt like I was vibrating. Like, if [my massage therapist/energy healer] saw me now, our touch together could start a fire. The energy just blasting from my pores, circulating through my nadis like a race car circuit. After many yoga mudra forward bends, my arms were buoyed by an unseen force, rising like a beach ball was at either side of me. I feel good sitting in meditation. I am actually starting to like meditation. It helps me tune into my deep thoughts, like
NO, I don’t speak with my body, I speak through my body. My soul speaks through my body. How can I make that work for my practice teach? How can I make that work for classes at home? How can I be me and help others in the process?
Five years ago on this day, I sat outside on the Kripalu front lawn during my lunch break, soaking up the deliciously unseasonable spring-like weather. I open my journal and free write:
I am a deer in the field, my wide-eyed head emerging from the Kripalu knoll. Me, on the hillside, one small deer hidden among many, playing with a rotting, dead leaf. A sad deer, a confused deer. A once sprite and lively deer gradually becoming road kill. Venison.
Suddenly, a movement (a threat or a helping hand?). A purple pixie bounding into the field, a purple pixie so lively and light coming to pet the deer and make it feel special. The purple pixie, coming directly to the lone deer. A mystical, magnetic draw.
What had happened was that as I was drifting off into la-la land with my thoughts of self-doubt, Megha had come outside during her lunch too and scampered toward me as though I were emitting a silent SOS. She was dressed head-to-toe in purple and looked like such a cute little pixie. I blabbered on about not feeling good enough to carry the Kripalu torch, and of course her reassurances were as gracious as always.
***
After a morning session based around assisting, some of us get to use those skills later during a 4:15 public gentle class held in the Main Hall. Megha teaches, and it is a delight to witness her gentle personality emerge after seeing so much of her “bouncy, lively” side. Assisting during savasana was profound and beautiful. I found myself crying as the sun set and the stained glass Om symbol shined brightly. Between Megha’s voice, the people in the room, the stillness…I cried, and I couldn’t find tissues, an oddity in a Kripalu classroom. Rudy put his hand on my back and I felt warm again. There is something deep about the touches here. The vibrations are high. I feel extremely cared for. This is my womb, my village, my safe house.
Later that afternoon, our group stands in a compassion circle. We look everyone in the eye as Megha repeats a mantra about everyone wanting to be loved, everyone feeling hurt, everyone just wanting to be happy. It brought us all to tears. It was very difficult to look other people in the eyes and not feel anything. It drew us together once again, even stronger.
***
In the evening, Shadowbrook vibrates with “Seasons of Love,” “Footloose,” “I Need to Know,” and “New York, New York.” I enter at 7:20, and at first it’s just Megha, Jurian, J and I dancing. DANCING! I feel like it’s my birthday. I am ever so grateful for to dance with these movers and shakers, overwhelmed with gratitude. I want to smile, laugh, dance, cry, and hug at the same time. As a group, we all do a kickline to “New York, New York,” singing and dancing. We are sweating, smelling, laughing. Exhilarated. Breathless. Joyful. Connected. Family. We gather in a group huddle at the end and pound the floor and scream our asses off. Release.
YTT's dancing fools, courtesy of Molly.
***
Shadowbrook calls me after my evening breakdown (everyone has them at Kripalu, it’s totally normal) and shower. I enter the double doors and realize it’s really quiet, so much different than the other night with the howling wind and shaking walls. It is beyond still, so empty and eerie. It smells vaguely of dirty feet, the leftover of our evening hoedown.
I light Shiva’s hand candle and dance, first wildly then refined. I find myself sitting in vajrasana in front of Shiva, moving slowly and intentionally to my Indian music. It’s prayerful and comes from a deep place inside of me. I wonder what I look like to someone watching, unable to hear my music. I wonder if it looks as profound as it feels to me. Then, silence. I try to chant Om but feel so alone. It is unsettling.
Five years ago on this day, I wake up early in my dorm room at Kripalu, fascinated with the sun that, thanks to Daylight Saving being over, is beginning to rise as we do, too. I see it the minute I wake up, a fine line of orange outlining the mountain tops to the east. It grows deeper and stronger as I get dressed, like a fire is burning just beyond the hilltops. It looks like an oven, hot to the touch. It’s hard not to hum “Circle of Life” in your head as the sky grows pinker, shafts of light hues injecting the dark blue sky. Over the lake, the clouds hang low. Thin, wispy clouds so low that it feels like you could touch them if you were out boating.
After Roger’s delicious spinal-soaking morning sadhana, I step out between the great glass doors. It is bright, blinding, and…warm?! October 31, and I can stand in my flip-flops at 8 a.m. I face the east and do three sun salutations, being nourished by the divine light. I feel like the sun and my breath refuel me, like a car going to the gas pump.
Oh, and it’s Halloween. I only know this because some people dress in costume and there are jack-o-lanterns on the front steps.
***
Stephen Cope, one of Kripalu’s main men, talks to us during our morning session. We discuss dukha (ill at ease, suffering, pervasive unsatisfactoriness), the roots of dukha (craving, aversion, delusion), and raga (greed, craving). My notes include things like:
3 Characteristics of Afflicted States: (a) Disturbance (restless, distracted, mind heated up); (b) Obscuration (capacity to see things is obscured); and (c) Separation (the mind separates subject/object).
Wanting/pleasure = OK. Craving/attachment = not. Craving increases dopamine levels in the brain, and thus we need more and more to be satisfied.
To overcome craving/aversion/delusion, we must engage in meditative absorption. The mind is no longer caught in the afflicted state. Burns the roots of the affliction. Mind becomes profoundly one-pointed. Kripalu yoga focuses on subtleties–breath, prana, etc, in order to make the mind razor-sharp.
Investigate dukha. If your practice is not softening craving and aversion/delusion, you need to look at your practice.
***
We are prompted to fill in the blank: My passion (right now, currently, not yesterday and not three years from today) is _____.
Movement! Shadowbrook and Shiva taught me again, brought me back to my roots.
The nature of today’s lecture has me struggling so much, trying to find “me.” Who am I? What brought me here? What has yoga done for me and how can I spread that beyond Kripalu’s walls? What is my passion? What kind of passion can I bring to my yoga, my classes? Who do I look to for inspiration? Do I look to anyone for inspiration?
I am obsessed by and with movement. Dance. Yoga has refueled my passion for movement and dance, the singing of the physical body. I have never danced as passionately as I have after practicing yoga.
I feel so crappy today. I ate so much, I felt like I was going to burst with emotion and confusion. Who the hell am I? Why am I here? Why Kripalu, this mega-huge institution, with so much weight and importance attached to its name? So.much.responsibility. These people here are phenomenal. How can I even think of striving to be like them? But I want to be like them. I want their passion/compassion, dedication and bursting, overflowing love. But how?
***
I eat like a demon here. I am obsessed with food. I think about our meals all the time. One morning during savasana I saw everyone’s heads as hard-boiled eggs. The day before, I saw a vision of me scooping up lasagna. I think I have become more obsessed with chocolate here than I did in China.
***
The teachers take our afternoon session outside for an anatomy/physiology lesson. What troopers–they all dressed up for Halloween and put on a “play” about the different systems of the body. We sat on the east lawn and watched Helga play the circulatory system, Jurian the nervous system, Leila the respiratory, Megha the digestive, Rudy the lymphatic, and Roger (dressed in wooly fur pants) the endocrine. How these people got Helga to wear wings is beyond me.
Rudy, the lymphatic system. Photo courtesy of Krista.
Roger, the endocrine system. Photo courtesy of Krista.
Helga has wings! Photo courtesy of Krista.
So there we were, spread out on blankets, avoiding dog poop (which J got on her pants), dodging worms, and lying on our backs very vulnerably in supta baddha konasana. Megha got us chanting one of the “forgotten” sutras (“I digest, I absorb, I eliminate!”) and talked about poop and farting in class. Roger talked about gonads, and Rudy allowed us to stand up, face the mountains and lake, and soak it all in. Visually. Audibly. Sensually. It was just absolutely stunning, our whole group standing there, staring at the scenery, awed and amazed. It must have been in the mid-60s out there in the sun. We each ate one raisin and cherished it, contemplated it. One raisin, under the perfectly blue sky.
Photo courtesy of Krista.
***
I just noticed that my toes have separated and spread out more. I guess walking around barefoot and not having my feet constricted in shoes all day helps. My right piriformis/glute/whatever pain has been steadily going away. I can kick without that usual twinge of pain.
***
Afternoon sadhana was with Micah. He was intense. We started with shoulderstand, bridge, and utkatasana. Nadi shodhana, kapalabhati, and bhastrika. I was exhausted. We ended with supta matsyendrasana, and I started to cry. I cried during savasana. And then some. I stayed after class to curl up in a fetal position and cry some more. At that point, I didn’t even know why I was crying.
***
I stuffed my face during my silent dinner, ate a second rice cake with jam, and then bought and ate a whole package of those fake M&Ms. [Made a voice post on my old blog] and vented. Left a message for [yoga teacher from home], because she is great and could be a Kripalu teacher without even coming here. I admire her, love her.
I got my period, and that made me feel better. The hunger, the emotions, the pimples.
***
I knew I needed to dance tonight. Movement was calling for me. Even though I wanted to go to bed after my 8:15 shower, I put on my headphones and went to Shadowbrook. The doors were still open into the lobby, so I sat in the corner and slid around on the floor to Indian music. I stayed planted on the bamboo floor until prana spoke to me, and then I leaped up without warning and was soon dancing in front of Shiva.
Janitors poked in, but I kept moving, especially when “Beating Drums” from Winged Migration came on. I flew. I soared. I danced like I was in my living room at home, in private. But I was not alone. I was at Kripalu, with passersby and custodians. I knew this. This is why I love yoga. It gave me passion again, in dance. I dance more soulfully than I ever have. Yoga shows us our true passions. Yoga doesn’t change us; it re-connects us with our true selves. I have to remember that within the postures; there is movement, liberation. I trust that. Now I have to express that to others.
***
Everyone talks about yoga here. You’ll see people on the couch, in a deep conversation about yoga, asana, pranayama, whatever. There are always conversation about yoga going on here, even from people you’d never expect.
***
I try not to think about the future, about post-Kripalu life, but it’s hard. These people–these faces–these smells and sounds and songs…how can I study aparigraha with such sweetness surrounding me?
***
It’s 9:50 p.m. and I am dead tired. I am so old, so exhausted.
Five years ago on this day, my day began with a colon massage.
No, for real.
Our teachers had finally picked up on the fact that everyone was feeling the effects of Kripalu’s high-fiber, mostly roughage-based meals and that most of us hadn’t had a satisfactory bowel movement since we arrived. We all looked a little bit pregnant. Rudy came to our rescue, and in place of a regular morning sadhana led us through a round of bhunaman vajrasana, an abdominal massage that targets the large intestine. Sitting on our heels, we press our left fist gently into our right side, where the transverse colon begins (between pelvis and ribs), massaging the area while bending over our knees. The fist moves across the intestine, bending over with each move of the hand. When we get to the center, we switch hands so that now our right hand is massaging the left side of our colon. After that, we learn agnisera dhauti, an abdominal pumping exercise, in which after a deep inhale and exhale, you pump the abdominal area in and out quickly during the exhale, expanding your lower half like a Buddha belly. Precautions: Menstruation, do on an empty stomach (preferably first thing in morning). Contraindications: Pregnancy. Efficacy: Oh yeaaaaah.
***
Today is Practice Teach #1, and I think I sabotaged myself. In the effort of trying to be so different, so fun, so unique, I ended up being someone I’m not, even though I initially thought I stayed true to myself. Even after all this time of introspection and contemplation, I struggle with knowing my True Self. Yes, I am playful, but is that your primary goal? Who are your inspirations and why? I think too much. Trying to be unique too much. I didn’t feel ME. I felt like I was acting. I don’t know what I felt. Ambivalent. I felt like I had tried on a new pair of shoes–kind of uncomfortable, kind of warm and nice, still a different fit. [Classmate] was amazing. The guy I didn’t trust at all, the weird guy, the black sheep–he was awesome. He nailed all the Kripalu points. His languaging was simple but on. He gave us so much room for exploration and prana response. So many opportunities to take Stage 2 and 3. You know what [my facilitator] told me? You were very loud and clear. She didn’t have to struggle to hear me. My downdog variation with the hand sweep was difficult for beginners.
I spoke clearly.
I spoke clearly.
Great. Awesome. Wow. I can talk! I can talk, therefore I can be a yoga teacher. /sarcasm
So much self-doubt right now. So much negativity. Everyone else is gloating, enamored with themselves and their classes. [Classmate] had this [bleep]ing LSD-entranced smile on her face like she just orgasmed. I don’t feel like that. I feel inadequate. I need to delve deeper, take these Kripalu roots to heart, allow prana to flow to me and my students. Maybe allow students a little prana call and response. Anger, delight, bliss, confusion: Move your body as it feels appropriate. Go. Move. Explore.
***
Afternoon sadhana with Jennifer. By then I feel like crap. Very emotionally vulnerable and kind of sick, too. Feverish. Cold. Hot. Dry, red lips. No energy. Confused. Depleted. I drift in and out of savasana, my little yoga nidra dreams coming and going like waves. At one point, the icy/hot feeling I experienced on the massage table [prior to coming top Kripalu] returns to my belly. It stays warm. I feel like someone tucked six blankets into my core. It does not spread.
***
After some time in the “confessional” (phone booth), I hit the whirlpool. I feel like I stepped back to Roman days, with naked women gathering together, talking, laughing, conversing. Our breasts, our bottoms, our pelvic regions…just there. We sit side-by-side and chat, naked.
***
Bed bug scare [turns out to be negative] in D’s space. Shower. Reading. Bedtime at 10 p.m., my earliest. I get 7.5 hours of deep, dream-frenzied sleep.
Five years ago on this day, the first week of my Kripalu YTT ended. Week 2 begins.
I am tired today. Emotionally, mentally not with it. My head feels stuffed with clouds and cotton balls. Slightly irritable. Morning sadhana with Kimberly. I do Warrior III for the first time in weeks and feel kind of heavy.
***
I eat a lot at lunch, trying to fill myself with food, since I’m not full otherwise. Baked squash. Salad. Mac and cheese. Soup, bread, rice cake and jam, coffee. Still hungry.
***
Our nametags are used constantly. One day I came into the cafeteria and I hear, “Here you go, Jennifer.” One of the volunteers hands me a tray. I walk to the front desk and the woman says, “How can I help you, Jennifer?” I feel known. Special. Acknowledged. It’s kooky but nice. Like the Seinfeld episode.
***
The effects of yoga mudra in a forward bend are intense after coming back up. My arms feel as though they have a life of their own; they want to swirl, dance, undulate, sway. There is a magic propulsion under and around them. The effects of belly-down postures are, um, titillating. Yoga practice has definitely ignited my fire, and pressing my pelvis in the floor causes quite an energy. My Locusts and Boats are getting much higher, due to that mula bandha fire.
***
I came into the afternoon session very, very sluggish. So tired. Confused. Spacey. When they tell us we’d be doing pranayama for the afternoon, I cringed. Blah. But after 90 minutes of dirgha, ujayii, kapalabhati, and nadi shodhana breathing…wow. Instant revitalization. I resisted and silently protested pranayama so much, but I left that room floating on air. My bowels even moved a little. I started Jurian’s sadhana on an ecstatic note. I entered Stage 3 several times, floating back into Warrior I, twisting into Triangle, dancing into Half Moon, sinking into janu sirsanana and coming up from Plough without even thinking. During savasana, I see the cafeteria buffet–lasagna. Me scooping up lasagna. Near the end of savasana, I see all of my classmates and teaches get sucked into my heart center, like a reverse parting of the Red Sea. So many faces and personalities getting sucked into my core. All this wonderful energy.
Five years ago on this day, I slept in till 7:30. It was Saturday, our day off during YTT, and I was woken by the howling wind and pounding rain, a Nor’easter banging on our windows. Breakfast was a massive indulgence–no aparigraha whatsoever: cereal, stratta, a scone, yogurt. I eat the entire scone even though I can feel my stomach getting full. I do some weights in the gym, feeling fat. My legs are huge. My pants are sticking to me. M and I complain about our weight and eating habits. Tonight happens to be dessert night. Aparigraha. ::sigh::
***
Ironically, I talk with S later in the morning. She is leaving. “I’m sick,” she tells me. “I have an eating disorder.” What a wonderful, bold young woman. She came to Kripalu to get away from her sickness, another distraction, but here she came to terms with her illness. She knows she needs help. Psychologically, she is ready–she now knows she needs the physical help. What an intelligent, beautiful 18-year-old. To admit, to share, to stand up and leave and get help. M, S, and I have a deep 30-minute heart-to-heart. I know S will make a great niche teacher once she is certified.
***
This day is our first “gloomy” day, but it’s so romantic too. The clouds are swirling low over the mountains, like stage effects for a Halloween show. Briefly, the sun emerges, casting a brilliant glow on the oranges and yellows. People flock outside and just stand there, amazed. They stand there like God himself just came off the mountain to say hello. “It rained so much that it erased the mountains!” a woman in the lobby says. “You just couldn’t see them.”
***
We all hug here. We talk very softly. We are supportive and nurturing. We nod and gently blink and offer love and compassion.
***
My Stage 3 in Grace’s class is incredible. After some standing postures, I sink into Plough, immersed, encased. I flow into Fish, my heart on fire. I stay, linger. My chest swells. I roll up into sukhasana and sink down into a forward bend. I melt. The energy is intense–through my closed eyes I see vibrating colors and shapes, like a visual boombox, pictorial soundwaves. I find myself in janu sirsasana, falling down and down. I allow my non-extended leg to sink into the mat; my bend deepens. No glute pain. Elongated. Free.
***
I take my first DansKinetics class at noon. Fantastic, Fabulous, Freeing, I write in my journal, followed by exclamation points, stars, question marks, and other random symbols of frenzy.
Live drumming, percussion madness. A gazillion people in our Shadowbrook room, so sweaty, so close, so alive. Megha is fiery, crazy, looney, bouncy, all smiles and compassionate intensity. She wears blue stretch pants, pink socks, and sneakers. We follow her movements, hoot and holler, pound the floor, do the ischial tuberosity dance (with lyrics!) in both dandasana and baddha konasana. We do choo-choo train “follow-the-leader” dances out into the hallway. The sound is maddening. Tribal. Primal. I become an animal. I am the music. I sweat, sweat, sweat. Glistening, then dripping. Have I ever sweated harder than this? The musicians get in the center of the floor and I move to the center, jam along with the drummers, allow their music to surge through me. I feed off their enthusiasm and vitality. I am the music. At the close of the jam session, I get the urge to run around the room, darting in and out of traffic jams, using people’s energy not to bump into them. I gather everyone else’s energy, I scoop it up like a skipping idiot and drink it in. We fall to the floor to relax, and my slimy skin picks up particles of dirt, fuzz, hair. I lie in savasana with my hands in anjali mudra, over my forehead. Ecstasy. Megha calls the YTT group over afterward to see how we were doing. “Are you in the right training program,” she asks me.
Post DansKinetics bliss.
Five years ago on this day, I fall out of bakasana, and I don’t even realize it until my foot is on the floor. I didn’t freak out or criticize. It was natural, human, almost expected. This is a personal accomplishment with my balancing poses.
I rise into a belly-down backbend during Jurian’s 6:30 a.m. sadhana and realized that such poses are very dramatic for me. I lift so effortlessly, I feel like I am flying. Maybe it’s the root bandhas pressing into the floor. Afterward, the exhilaration, the buoyancy I feel is incredibly strong. I cry. I tear up. I feel a movement inside of me that feels like my blood is dancing.
We do a belly-down navasana, followed by a spinal twist. Jurian allows us to go into Stage 3, and I was craving a heart-opener–I could feel my heart wanting to scream to the world. I did ustrasana, Camel, but afterward my heart ached so much that I could not lower my arms in savasana. I had to keep them over my heart and chest protectively for a few minutes before putting them to my sides. Perhaps I ache to share my heart. I ache to rise to others and be open, loving. But eventually, my heart aches in a sad way. Recoil. shell, hide out until the next opportunity for Locust or Boat.
***
After breakfast, we discuss modifications and assists. Somewhere in between, I question why all the Kripalu staff drop the letter A off of most Sanskrit words and call pranayama pranayam and utkatasana utkatasan, so on and so forth. “I think all the older people dropped off the A to cool,” Rudy joked. Added Roger: “I’m so cool, I just say yog.”
***
Observation: My Oms are getting stronger, starting from the belly, the diaphragm, the heart. I no longer hold back; I am vocal, I am filled with life. I have a voice, I am not afraid to use it. I carry my “mmmm” until my very last breath.
Group Om
***
Rudy leads an afternoon sadhana during which we do standing yoga mudra, and my mind escapes into another realm. The visualizations I have are wild, something one might expect from using illegal substances. For instance, as I am hanging over my knees, I see an image of something like a paper towel roll, spinning down in a waterfall-like cascade of vanilla yogurt and what looks like chives. It is spinning, pouring down, down, this white liquid with green speckles. I see a garden of eyeballs, and where there should be heads of lettuce planted in the earth, there are eyeballs instead.
I see Kripalu’s walls, but it is empty. I go up and down the staircases, but there is nothing on the walls, there is no color, no people. It is very lonely and very frightening.
I see my body in the form of a body bag. My body has a zipper, and I am being zipped from the neck up. The zipper is on my face, my face is over my face, closing over my face. (Author’s Note. Yes, that is what I wrote.)
After yoga mudra, I inhale, rise, and feel amazingly buoyed. There is a force under my arms, and it keeps my arms afloat. I want to dance with this movement, this watery motion. After doing sun breath, my arms lower and I feel more energy in my left hand. I feel like someone has ever-so-briefly slipped their hand into my left hand. So gentle. The loving grandmother appears again.
During our Stage 3, I find myself going into setu bandhasana, very quickly, very forcefully. I feel like someone is hovering above me, as though Jurian is standing over my head and Megha at my feet. I then thrust up into full Bridge, then Wheel, very quickly, no preparation, no thinking involved.
Rudy, the "Gentle Yogi"
***
After a long and deep deliberation on the yama of aparigraha (way too involved to include here), I reflect on my ahtitam (small group), A, G, and E. We felt pretty separate until today’s sharing of the yamas and niyamas. Everyone divulged. Here we are, four strangers, confiding in each other about what we feel holds us back in life. Once strangers, now connected in 30 minutes. How? Why? It is because we are safe. Kripalu, Megha, Rudy, Jurian, Roger, Leila, and Helga have made us feel so loved and appreciated that we do not hesitate to be honest. Satya = truth. We are no longer afraid.
***
The camaraderie continues into the night, as Dorm 129 has a “late-night” after-hours party from 9:15 to 10:30. Whee! Everyone brings a snack, so there is juice, tea, apples, chocolate, gummy bears, cookies, pretzels, chips, popcorn. We talk about Kripalu’s dense food and our constipation. A puts on Irish music and a song about witches to celebrate Halloween, which apparently is just days away. The sugar in the gummy bears tastes sensational. We sit in a circle and share our stories. Everyone has incredible stories, and lil’ ol’ me feels rather boring next to the gypsy living off the grid in California, the former Peace Corps member who lived in West Africa, the chick who used to serve in the Air Force, the lady whose house is being sold during her stay at Kripalu, the woman who studied with a Reiki master in India, the former Seva volunteer who spent time living in New Orleans studying animal acupressure, and the Cornell grad who’s taking a break from her career as an aerialist in Cirque du Soleil. Blah. Wow. Shit. In 45 minutes, we become acquainted. The tribe is strengthening.
Five years ago on this day, 65 Kripalu YTT students stood on our mats inside Shadowbrook and just did our own thing. Our 6:30 a.m. class was termed “personal sadhana,” meaning we were to lead ourselves through our own private practice. Sixty-five of us stood on our mats and breathed, each of us doing a completely different practice. Some started with Breath of Joy, some with hara breaths, some kapalabhati. M did a headstand; a threesome in front went into kapotasana all together, and the girl next to me did a vigorous ashtanga practice.
I started off slow, physically and mentally. Tired. Stiff. Slow. I did several pratapana exercises, but I couldn’t break into my own rhythm. I kept thinking as though I were leading a class–what would I do next? What should follow this, and how do I get there? It was hard not to look around and see what others were doing. Being next to M was good, a challenge, because she was doing the primary series. I kept thinking, “I can do that! I can do padagusthasana and marichyasana A, B, C, D…I can do that, too!” But I didn’t want to do those things then and there. I was tired and stiff and still waking up. I liked my own pace. But..but…I can do that, too! I can do bakasana, seriously! I just don’t want to do it now.
It took time, but I finally found my flow, probably when I did a downdog into low lunge. I lifted my arms in my dancer-like fashion, and finally I felt free. But I learned it’s hard for me to be me. I always have the desire to be someone else. But for the final 30-40 minutes of class, I finally found me. She felt good. I felt good. Hot. Tapas. Me.
***
Expansive. That is the word S uses to describe the outdoors, the vast land of cool air, fiery colors, dark heavy clouds, and sunlight that greets us like a living painting every morning after sadhana. You walk outside the Shadowbrook studio and see it–the outside–right in front of you. It’s hard to just ignore the glass doors and bypass it. Many of us flock outside the minute we put on our shoes at 8:01 or 8:05. We come from a warm, insulated cocoon to this amazing, breathing, revitalizing environment–expansive.
There is a world outside of here–trees glowing from the sun’s peeking smile, a shimmering lake, rolling clouds that look like they could bring rain any minute. We stand there en masse, soaking it in. Breathing it in, even if it stings our lungs. J emerges from inside and yells, “Good morning, Kripalu!!” except with his accent, it comes out Crip-a-loo. It’s daring to be so “loud” outside, but we all smile at his enthusiasm.
***
The morning lesson is focused on anatomy, tendons and ligaments and nerve versus muscular tension. “The word pain is like the word snowflake,” Rudy says. “There are so many kinds of them.” I learn that the anatomical name for our butt (sitz) bones is ischial tuberosities. We review the six movements of the spine. We go over some pratapana (warm-up) exercises and then at the end of class pair up with a partner and lead them through some pratapana, our first stab at practice teaching. Mine does not go so well.
I need to stop acting like someone else and start being me, I write in my journal. I led the practice teach like [one of my yoga teachers from home], like someone I’m not. I need to be me. Stop copying. Stop being uncomfortable in your own skin.
***
The afternoon lesson is centered around the warrior postures, and we break down every move step by step. Tuck tailbone under. Lightly draw in abdomen. Core stabilization.
***
Our afternoon sadhana is led by Grace, and she uses lots of analogies from nature to guide us through the class. During vrksasana, we move our hands through the chakras, starting at the root with our hands in prayer and rising up slowly to our temples. I experience a very powerful, intense energetic reaction to this deliberate movement. This is what many YTTers label as “a Kripalu moment”:
Vibrating right leg–tingling, shaking, throbbing with energy and vitality. This needs to get out! I’m feeling every hair on my arm and chest tingle, rise, like static electricity, like there is a magnet above me. Every single hair, follicle, tingling–the sensation is overwhelming. So much feeling up my arms, rising energy, rising like the tree. Arms danced, fluid, drawn by an aura of energy and color around me, magnet, heavy light heat, hot, hot, palms sweating, heat.
In savasana, feeling the release, the blanket against every body part–soft, comforting, nurturing blanket. Comfort, support, love. Cry, cry, cry. Sitting up in sukhasana, trembling, needed more release, insulation, hug. I feel a gentle, loving touch on my right thigh, like a grandmother’s touch. Lose it. Cry. Blanket. Still trembling on my right, hence the sloppy writing. [Author’s note: My handwriting was awful at this point in the journal entry.]
After class, I find out that three other girls experienced the tingly arm hair thing, too. Grace attributes it to the mega-release of energy we were building up during our opening hara exercises.
***
Namaste: I bow to the light and the shadow within you (because darkness is as important as the light).
Five years ago on this day, I woke up for a 6:30 a.m. yoga class led by one of our Kripalu YTT assistants, Roger.
Silly Roger, with the braids
He’s on the silly side, and during spinal rocks along the floor, he tells us, “[This movement] is only called ‘advanced’ because you have to have the mentality of a 5-year-old.” Another quote that makes us chuckle: “Lift your front toes…(pauses)…as opposed to your back toes, that is.” Roger shares some yoga wisdom with us:
• “We tend to tell ourselves that standing on one leg is natural, the easiest thing to do…. When you fall out of a balance posture, explore. Go into a different pose before coming back into balance.”
• Instead of hold utkatasana in its normal form, we do the “utkatasana dance,” holding the intense leg posture but being free in the upper body, moving freely, dancing the arms. It gives the pose a paradoxical feel: the intense, demanding base, but liquid, flowing upper body.
• “Blossom the buttocks” during downdog.
***
Morning. Outside is gorgeous. I feel like I’m in another country. How can I go back home, to light pollution, suburban sprawl, theft, crime, hatred, paranoia? Kripalu is starting the reversal of the mental asylum. The people here aren’t mental–we’re sharing, kind, conservative, conscious, honest, compassionate, yet we’re the ones locked inside this former monastery. The NEW mental asylum is the one OUTSIDE, on the streets, the people outside our enclosed little world. Yes, we’re shuffling around in slippers and wearing our little nametags, but we’re not insane. We’re sane, lucid, in touch with ourselves and others.
Breakfast, to the sounds of Barber’s Adagio for Strings. Cereal with walnuts, raisins, and banana; frittata with broccoli, spinach, cheese, egg, potato. Brown rice. Raspberry gluten-free cake.
***
We chant Ganesha Sharanam, “I bow to the remover of obstacles.”
Ganesh, remover of obstacles
We move from slow to fast to hyper to slower to slow and then to profound. After the smiling and laughing, we put on blindfolds and explore our “sacred space,” walking through the room, using only touch to lead us past our classmates. We reach out for the first person we feel, and then we talk with our hands. So intimate, such an experiment in touch as a tool, learning when to touch longer and deeper, when to withdrawal and pull back, determining whether the person responds with “invitation or aversion.”
***
At night, we do japa meditation with our mala beads. Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya. I honor/make myself receptive to light/great spirit. 108 times.
***
Our teachers demonstrate a Stage 3 posture flow. It is too intimate for words. At times, I feel like I am invading someone’s privacy. It’s sensual, sexual, almost. I watch the loss of control into ecstasy. I cannot write. I cannot sit here like a news reporter and take notes on such a sacred and profane moment. I watched Megha, Rudy, Jurian, and Roger in their posture flow and was nearly moved to tears. It was like watching someone make love. At times I had to look away because I didn’t want to intrude on such a private moment.
When I do the posture flow, I am somewhat inhibited. I allow myself to listen to my body, but I know there is still resistance, the need for others’ approval. Before I even started my own posture flow, I had the intention of pleasing the teachers. So I ended up doing the flow at 98%, doing what my body prompted me to do, but also 2% aware that others were watching and that I had to be conscious of performing for them in the process. However, my experience was exhilarating. I remember lunging into a low warrior–very deep–and doing something cool with my arms. I remember forgetting.
When I finish the flow and become still, something hits me. I feel alone, like a spotlight is shining only on me.
A bit of a background first: Ever since I came here, I’ve had very vivid images dance in my head when I close my eyes. For example, when in a flowing posture, like standing forward bend or bridge, I’d close my eyes and see random snapshots of people–all Kripalu people. I’ll close my eyes at night or during savasana and see quick flashes of people in bandanas, people with shawls, smiling, happy, introspective, compassionate Kripalu people, like I’m looking in a photo album (in fast forward) of all the residents here. However, there are times (usually during chanting, centering, pranayama, and sometimes during certain poses) that I close my eyes and see us all as a unified group. Amazingly synchronized. Holding hands, or arms raised, our mouths open in Om. I see our group, our tribe, together. So tight, as One.
So, that said, at the conclusion of the posture flow, I was aware that I had cheated myself out of the full experience. But my wisdom reminded me of my mistake, because as I rolled up into thunderbolt pose and sat to integrate the moment, a new image came to my head. I didn’t see the group so beautiful as a whole. I didn’t see random Kripalu faces. I suddenly saw (mostly felt, though) ME and only me. My vision was this:
Me in the Shadowbrook studio, under a harsh spotlight, everyone else lost in the shadows, not even there. The perimeter was dark, shadows, cold, and then me, under this judging light. I tried to push it away at first (I wanted my group!), but I Watched and Allowed and explored. The image stayed with me, and suddenly the feeling hit me: You need to work for yourself. You need to stop performing, being on stage. Stop working for approval.
I started to cry lightly. I put my hands to my face and cried more. I went into child’s pose and sobbed. The group chanted Om three times and I sobbed more and more, audible now. Tissue-needing crying. The sound comforted me; it helped me. I saw warm light, a pulsing “movement”in my head. It felt very warm and nice. I felt like everyone was Om’ing just for me. Stop performing. Start being, Jen.
***
J and I were co-listening partners. We were both moved and crying. J talked first about her experiences, and I was not a very neutral listener. I kept crying and wanted to reach out and hug her. When I spoke to J, although internally my feelings were muddled, I spoke very clearly about my experiences. So cathartic. We shared a long, deep hug afterward. (However, now I’m wondering whether the vision I had was a positive one, maybe affirming that my posture flow was for myself and not a group act. Is that why the group vanished? Was my flow an act/show, or a breakthrough?)
***
We all observe that we smell like food all the time. The cafeteria is everywhere, in our hair, on our shirts, in our pants. We are frittatas, we are miso soup and tofu. We are bloated and gassy. Whole grains and roughage and legumes have made us heavy and uncomfortable. We hurt during twists. We are afraid to fart when our classmates faces’ are inches from out butts.
Five years ago on this day, I woke up on the bottom bunk inside a dormitory made for 20.
I had gone to bed around 11 the night before, after showering. There is a girl in the program, M, who’s a “star newbie” like me. She was so upset and broke down in the bathroom. Another girl, a volunteer at Kripalu, stood there on the tiles, barefoot, comforting M, explaining that this is a safe zone, that it’s OK to cry here. I tried to help M too, but in fact I am also petrified. One month.
Everyone’s personal alarm clocks broke the silence of the early morning, going off at 5:30, 5:32, 5:40. Morning sadhana starts in the pre-dawn dark, with hip openers, spinal twists. So easy and so refreshing. When we emerge from savasana the sun is dawning and filling Shadowbrook with a natural light. We Om three times, and that was exhilarating.
***
Breakfast is eaten in silence, just classical music playing softly, and cling-clang of the silverware and dishes. I eat millet cereal with walnuts, raisins, rice milk. Green tea, fake coffee, brown rice, a hard-boiled egg. No one to chit-chat with; just time to collect my thoughts. I’m not quite at home yet, but they’re making it easy.
***
After eating, I see the outside for the first time since arriving yesterday afternoon. Cold, clear, clouds swirling over the mountains. Falls colors everywhere. I smile.
The second I open that glass door and feel that air on my face, see those clouds, I smile. It’s OK to smile here. Smile, cry, hug…it’s all welcome.
Our first morning session. In my journal, (Author’s Note: after a now-forgotten prompt) I write:
Connection. Guidance. Wholeness. Clarity. Real self. No false self. Clear. Wisdom. Outreach. Compassion. For myself and others. No cobwebs of embarrassment, shame, guilt. Just clear me.
We dance to warm up. We do the Shiva dance, shake our butts. There is noise. Sound. Smiling!
***
Lunch is coconut milk and yam soup, stir fry, brown rice, sesame ginger tofu. So filling, hearty, made with love. I dunk my instant Folgers bag in a cup of hot water.
***
Outside, it is cold. Very cold. The rain that falls feels almost like sleet. But the colors! It’s a painting. The whole mountain to our right is a painting of orange and yellow. It’s so still. The wind makes the canopy above me flap. The little birds gather on the wrought-iron trellis.
Being comfortable is essential, encouraged here. Get a blanket. Or two. Sit on a blanket. Wrap a blanket around you. Wiggle. Squirm. Stretch. Shift your legs. Get up and shake it out.
***
(Author’s note. Intense post-meditation writing follows.) Afternoon sadhana. Each time we chant Om or bow to each other and say Jai Bhagwan, it’s more spiritual, deeper, profound. I am on the edge of bawling right now, the effect of a fiery, vigorous, Stage 3-infused sadhana followed by a lengthy, warm, deep savasana. I lay there with a cushion under my knees, a blanket draped over my entire body, and I felt take care of, like I was in a hospital. This is a hospital. Soul doctors. Doctors of soul.
I envision so many people during meditation, various poses and dances and faces and our entire group moving in and out of postures. I saw this group as One, this tribe they speak of. I didn’t see abilities or personalities, just a massive collection of power, all of us together as One. It was beautiful, a once-scrambled jigsaw puzzle finally complete and together, interlocked. Side by side. No longer individual pieces, just a beautiful creation–a flower, Big Ben, Mickey Mouse, whatever. We were finally One. No pieces missing.
***
Dinner is lentil soup, vegetarian lasagna, butternut squash, green beans, cauliflower, garlic bread. I sit with M and S. We talk about mountains and children’s and senior yoga.
Flowtation Devices 