General public

I had a small gynae procedure yesterday. It might have been ‘routine’ for the clinical staff but it was a pretty extreme experience for me and way more painful than I was expecting. At one point one of the assisting nurses told me to ‘do yoga breathing’ as she could see I was struggling with the pain. This kind of relaxed me momentarily as I laughed at the vagueness of the instruction, likely followed immediately by some anxious muscle clenching as I wondered what type of ‘yoga breathing’ she might have meant! Hubby joked later that I should have gone full on kapalabhati to see what happened. In the moment, I settled for a quiet ujjayi kind of thing which usually feels helpful for regulating strong sensations. But mostly my focus was on trying not to whimper too pathetically, rather than perfect pranayama!

I’m always amused at how often yoga comes up in medical settings or other everyday situations, where there’s a clear expectation of some shared understanding. As a yoga teacher, I can’t help but marvel at the assumption everyone knows how to ‘do yoga’! My own GP always asks me about my own yoga practice and if I’m keeping up with it, but she has known for years that this is the cornerstone of my better health. I used to suppose she imagined me doing restorative yoga or something slow and relaxing until we talked once about my handstand training and she eagerly suggested how good this is as ‘therapy’!

When I was wild camping a few weekends back, the ex-royal marine who’d been teaching us all sorts of highly practical things about navigation and survival then sat us down for 10 minutes of mindfulness in the middle of a wood. He gave no more instruction than that, and the whole group seemed content. I spent the first few minutes worrying about what everyone else might be doing and if I should have offered a grounding guided intro to help everyone settle… Until I gave myself permission not to be a teacher on this occasion and just attend to my own practice.

When I’m talking with my yoga mentors we focus so much on the skills and details of teaching yoga and meditation that it can be such a relief to encounter these practices in the everyday world and realise that most people have picked up some knowledge and that oftentimes this will be enough for them in the moment, providing them with the space or the control that they need.

What a relief. It’s not down to me to save the world!