Close to home

Call me precocious but since it’s A WHOLE DAY since my TT graduation, I feel different. I feel more responsible to others and to myself. I feel my relationship to yoga has changed. I wonder if this will persist or if it’s just a settling-in period. When will my habitual imposter syndrome kick in again? After all, the cynical part of my brain says all that’s changed is that I now have a paper certificate (and a payment pending for insurance!).

But my heart feels different. I feel full of love. Towards others, certainly. But now also towards myself. I’d like to keep this open-heartedness. It makes the world look different in my eyes.

Hubby on the other hand is full of fear. He’s not practised yoga through the whole of my TT. So much for getting a willing body on the mat to try out instructions and sequences in the evenings… His back is giving him a lot of pain.

But last night he clearly needed to move his body. He was stiff and uncomfortable. I encouraged him to take some gentle stretches. I offered him a bolster and a blanket. And then I let him be. I deliberately didn’t watch, although we were in the same room. I don’t know what he did or for how long, but at the end of it I could feel that he was close to tears. I held him. I breathed with him. I felt the longing in his body for movement and the relief in his heart that he was able to do whatever tentative movements he had made. I could feel the echoes of the movements in his now softer posture.