On my yoga mat, I felt perfectly comfortable and at home.
Everything was a-okay, nothing wrong here, nothing to work on here… except maybe a posture or two. I had opened my heart, I'd calmed my mind, I had become more flexible in body and mind. At least that’s how I felt within myself and that’s how I felt on my yoga mat after eight years of a fairly steady yoga practice.
That is, until the day I was asked if I’d like to try AcroYoga. The term was new to me, the concept sounded interesting, exciting and fun. But once it was suggested that I place my body on someone’s feet, my insides sort of freaked out. If someone had asked me if I was a "control freak," I would have balked at such a preposterous question. First of all, freak is pretty extreme and sounds like someone who is abnormal and unusual, and I wasn’t connecting to that. Do I prefer to have control over myself? Of course!
"Okay, I'll have a go at it," I thought. As I checked out the person asking, he seemed fine: I knew he was strong, he wasn’t being pushy, and he was a friend and fellow yogi. But there was this unnamed sensation that swept over me, something like: am I crazy for doing this? Can I fall? Can I get injured? Wait! Do I even trust this person to be able to hold me up?
Body size issues, control, my own strength and power issues, and not least of all my boundary and trust issues were being challenged in a way that had never been presented to me.
I took a deep breath in, and out of a self-conscious need for not embarrassing myself, I tried. Looking back, I have no idea how I got up into bird. Did I instinctively draw myself in and grasp for the base's hands — and hold on for dear life? Did I surrender and let the pose happen? I doubt it. I don’t recall.
But what became evident for me was that once my feet were back on terra firma, I had the euphoric feeling of accomplishment.
Acknowledge and Attend To
I felt the accomplishment of acknowledging being full of fear yet realizing that the fear did not actually apply to that moment. And that felt not only good and right, but it set in motion a momentum to continue.
Since that first day, the transformation has come at times in large growth spurts and for other issues, they have slowly transitioned to a more healthy way of approaching life.
I'm grateful you are on this journey with me.
Namaste,
Lorrie