Stronger than Sampson

When Uschi approached me last fall to sub her strong vinyasa classes while she was away in India I was thrilled beyond belief. I'm a strong vinyasayer from way back, a lover of the 'that class totally kicked my ass' club. I dug into my yoga library with tons of 'strong vinyasa' teacher training manuals and notes from practices I used to attend and some of the classes I used to teach. I dusted them off and took them for a ride on the mat. Not once, but a few times, just to be sure because I couldn't believe my body. Actually not so much my body, but my mind screaming with fear, anger, disappointment, discomfort, never enough, and never quite right. I sat on my mat after the last of these torture sessions and actually laughed out loud at myself. That style of practice  so summed up a lot of things happening to me under the surface of my strong practice about three years ago. I think I actually strong vinyasayed my way into a mid life crisis, spending years trying to literally shape the postures of my life to replicate 'the good life' according to glossy photographs in swank publications, not to mention following what other people said it all should look like. Both on and off the mat. Especially off the mat. 

With my name on the sub schedule a beginning date a few weeks away it all hit me with a Holy Cow. I'm in teaching trouble here. I clearly don't want to teach this stuff I used to think was so way cool. So now what? I had to do a ton of soul searching and practice and play with it all. As I moved on the mat I was constantly coming back to 'what in the heck does strong mean anyway?

I grew up in Dallas, Texas, the land of the big bleached blonde hair, and I've been growing my hair out from the day when I was five years old when my mother cut my hair a la Twiggy in a short pixie (I recently forgave her for that, by the way). Just like the Sampson myth, cutting my hair in my mind was synonymous with loosing my power. For years I was scared to death to mess with my hairdo, some kind of twisted 70's Farrah Fawcett fetish mixed in with some Barbie wannabe and a dash of the Sampson myth. It was a recipe that drove an incredible emotional bond to long blonde hair. When I started making some changes in my life about three years ago when I began to realize that my life wasn't exactly working out so well, one of the first things I did was cut my 'down to the middle of my back' hair up to my shoulders. I was trying anything to lighten up! Now this might not seem like a big deal to most, but it was radical and huge for me. It was one of the first things I did to break through some very deeply held self made myths and attachments. 

I've been teaching a gentle yoga class called One Breath at a Time on Saturday evenings for about a year. It has come to my recent attention that class for many has become 'too hard' and 'too strong'. This gave me cause to pause. To me, the practice is pretty simple and easy stuff. But if I really tune into the flavor of beginning yoga, some of the sequences are hard. So lately I've been going back to the basics, slowing it down, and softening the series. It seems to work better for the practitioners that show up. And its been enormously helpful for me to remember why I started teaching this stuff in the first place, which is the antithesis of the 'kick my ass' yoga club. It was like a big 'oh yeah, follow your heart and not so much your head'. This seems to work as it applies to teaching yoga as well as to haircuts.

But now I have this 'strong vinyasa' classed dropped into my lap. The name itself suggests a license to let it rip. But what's come up for me is a flow of postures based on what some of my new ideas I've learned about being strong. I think its is less of what anything looks like on the outside and more about honoring what you find on the inside, and perhaps a sprinkle of risk taking. Depending on who shows up, a variety of advancing postures may be offered. Whether or not one moves towards them, or how deep they dive into a pose is up to the individual practitioner. Listening to the guidance of one's internal intelligence is really the game. And if practiced consistently, it will make you stronger than Sampson.

Strong vinyasa isn't strong anything unless you honor your breath, the spaciousness inside, and your connection to those things. Take some risks, challenge yourself, and have some fun to be sure, but always check in with that internal dashboard. It reduces the interference in your mind so that you can get in touch with your true strength, which is your inner wisdom.  The truth really does set you free.