Gladly home

I'm home now, back in my space. I'm happy to be here, but my heart aches for my family left behind after Christmas. My body aches too after some days of a different routine -- strange bed, different food, activity (or the lack thereof) and so on... Now I have the luxury of some days... Continue Reading →

December 28, 2015 1

Eyes on me

I realised this week that I really, really don't like being in the spotlight. I'm not talking hostile interrogation, actually kindly attention -- and even attention that I've invited. But I find it almost unbearable. A private session recently with my yoga teacher, whom I should know well enough to feel comfortable with, induced a state... Continue Reading →

December 11, 2015 10

Green-eyed yogini

I envied the practice of the girl next to me in class. I wasn't watching her, but I had a sense of her gracefulness -- lightness and control, movements that looked deliberate and yet natural. I could sense this more than I actually saw it. I was trying to do my own practice, after all!... Continue Reading →

December 4, 2015 0

What a difference a day makes

A friend of mine remarked recently that she would have been sceptical about the 'transformative power' of yoga if I wasn't a living example. She used to see me as super-stressed in the office, always bringing work home, unable to let it go at the end of the day, and offering self-recrimination that I wasn't always... Continue Reading →

December 3, 2015 5

Lamp Posts and Bus Stops

I gave a mini-English lesson this evening as I waited for the bus home. I always have interesting moments at this bus stop after yoga class. Is it the bus stop? Maybe it's like the lamppost in Narnia -- where meetings happen! No, it's probably more likely another curious side-effect of yoga. Maybe somehow I give... Continue Reading →

December 1, 2015 2

Hello equanimity!

As I walked to class this morning I looked up at the wintry trees swaying in the strong wind, those with leaves fluttering madly, those without swaying their bare branches. Grey clouds scudded wildly behind. It was early and there were few people about. It felt like my kingdom, my territory: I had my place in... Continue Reading →

November 29, 2015 4

Transports of delight

Hubby's thinking about buying a car. We've never owned one, and on a practical level we mostly get by without. Plus it allows me to feel slightly smug about my (otherwise lamentable) eco-credentials! But ever since we guzzumped Eric Catona in a hire car office in the south of France and were freely upgraded to the... Continue Reading →

November 25, 2015 1

Sprezzatura yoga

Sprezzatura is a beautiful-sounding word coined in the sixteenth century to define the ideals of courtly behaviour in Renaissance Italy. It originally meant "a certain nonchalance, so as to conceal all art and make whatever one does or says appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it". I think my yoga teacher displays... Continue Reading →

November 24, 2015 3

Aquaphobic yogini

I'm a bit scared of water, I'll admit it. And I'm very scared of deep water. I guess it's a rational enough fear, though I also intellectually know that if I give myself up to the water it will hold me up. The likelihood of drowning only becomes a real problem if I tense up and... Continue Reading →

November 23, 2015 1

Toe-curling and squirming in yoga

When I was taught Mindfulness techniques, one of the practices we did was with a partner. We would take take turns to talk and to listen, within strict time limits, on a particular theme or experience. During this alternation of speaking and listening, I always experienced the same thing — at some point during the... Continue Reading →