I’m Not Being Dramatic, But Yoga Did Save My Life.
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20 years ago, I lay in a bed in my mother’s guest room wishing I could just evaporate. I appealed to God (or whatever power that may be) to just let me not wake up.
My mother was gravely ill with cancer a couple of rooms away, and had been in a decline with her health for a couple of years, which was all on the heels of my father’s demise from cancer.
This alone would be kind of heavy, but adding to the sense of doom was the fact that my second husband had just vacated our marriage, leaving our 18-month old daughter and my older two daughters in the dust for his 19-year-old receptionist from work. Perhaps the humiliation of this cliché was almost as bad as the actual trauma of the breakup.
Oh yes, and he left without any warning on the exact anniversary of my father’s death. Nice.
I was publishing a magazine at that time, and it was circling the drain as whatever money I had was hemorrhaging from every potential source. I felt a wee bit defeated.
Life was messy, and I wasn’t feeling particularly well-equipped to deal with it.
I was about four years into my adventure in recovery from alcoholism and addiction — at least I had that going for me!
Just to give you a perspective on my physical and mental state — I had been smoking and drinking and abusing drugs since I was 12, although I had finally quit smoking cigarettes along with all the other fun stuff at that point in my life.
I had started having children at the age of 21, and had some difficulties with each of these pregnancies that left me scarred mentally, emotionally and physically. I had kind of lost faith in my body and had no idea how detached from it I had become.
I wandered around fairly unconscious of what my body might want or need, and took for granted that things would keep moving and functioning right up till I actually didn’t care about anything anymore.
So, when the Universe, God or whatever didn’t comply with my wish to stop living in a magical pain-free way, I threw on some jeans and shuffled off to a women’s AA meeting, where I slumped into a chair and expected to not be helped.
I shared with the group that I wasn’t feeling particularly good about living. I guess the hopelessness oozed out, and one kind woman said,
“Honey, you need to not be alone. Why don’t you come with me to my Yoga class, and then we’ll worry about the rest of the day later?”
She was wise. Very wise.
I had never done Yoga, and I had zero interest in anything, but for some reason, I followed this woman into the class — jeans and all — and just plunked myself unceremoniously onto a mat, and hoped maybe I could at least get a nap in while I was so close to the floor.
The teacher, Nancy Sena, gently asked us all to pay attention to our bodies. Was it her voice, her super non-judgmental way of guiding the class, or was it just good timing? Don’t know, but I was astonished at how emotional I was getting.
She would say something foreign like, “Breathe into those muscles and ask them what they need,” and all I could do was cry. I hadn’t ever spoken to my body, let alone acknowledge that it might have needs. I blubbered and cried through the entire class, but for some reason didn’t care.
By the time we stretched out for Savasana, I was stunned by how little I had been connected to my body and by how much neglect and abuse I had thoughtlessly heaped upon it.
A new sense of connection to this vessel of flesh had ignited.
Yoga Meg in Hawaii got up off that floor a different person, and has never felt the kind of despair she went into that Yoga studio with again. Not that life is perfect or there haven’t been tough times in the last 20 years, but it marked the beginning of a journey of a relationship with my body that is still an ongoing adventure.
I was probably 40 pounds overweight at that time. I began taking Yoga from Nancy, and as I began to familiarize myself with my own body (sounds crazy, but it was like a new thing for me), I embarked on a time of exercise and fitness that would lead in a couple of years to the best shape I’d ever been in — ever — in my mid-thirties.
In more recent years, I’ve had some physical challenges and have drifted from a regular Yoga practice. I recently remembered I could hit the Reset button on whatever was going on by starting a gentle Yoga routine, and I actually did the opening 20 minutes of Nancy’s class, which is apparently etched in my cellular memory.
For three months, I have been starting my days with a combination of Yoga, meditation and prayer, and guess what? I feel my body’s state of happiness returning.
I’ve always eaten a fairly clean and healthy diet, but all the organic juice and sprouts in the world aren’t enough if I’m not paying attention to my body, and even a simple and gentle Yoga practice can help me communicate with my body in a way I just don’t seem to do otherwise.
For a variety of reasons, including menopause, my weight has blossomed to an all-time high, and while I’m not obsessed with being skinny, I do want to feel healthy, energetic and strong. So, for the second time in my life, Yoga is jump-starting my focus on optimal health, and once again, I’m amazed at how revitalized I feel.
I don’t know if Yoga is saving my life this time, but you never know.
Bonus:
Ever feel like you are addicted to your digital devices? Well, most of us are. It’s important for so many reasons to unplug and find balance, to reconnect with ourselves, our families, and nature. GD Meg offers us a wonderful guided meditation as well as a few strategies for taking mini tech timeouts throughout the day. You’ll want to bookmark this one!
*Written by Green Diva Meg for Green Divas. Published with permission.
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