For whom do you practice your yoga?

I dreamt last night that my mother died.

Well, first, I dreamt that a small boy I once knew fell from a balcony at a swim meet and landed 15 feet below on the deck, dazed, bleeding, barely whimpering or moving. And then, after awaking from that nightmare, I fell into yet another horrible dream that my mother had passed, and she had left me an envelope filled with crumpled bills that amounted to a little less than $1,000, and a tangled old necklace, and a scrap of paper with a scribbled note in her barely legible script.  Oh, I wept and wept.  And I awoke so convinced the dream was real, so enraged and saddened and confused and frightened and alone. It was awful.

Then, at the office this morning, a coworker came up to my desk and told me about how a woman in our office just found out that her boyfriend died.  Also, one of my coworker’s friends had been hit by a car this weekend and her leg was broken. We then discussed the latest Airbus tragedy (note to self: do not get on a plane flying across an ocean anytime soon).  Then, of course, we had to pause and pay heed to how Michael, Farrah, Ed, and Bill all died within the last 10 days.  Oh, and did you read about the bombings? About the shootings?

What is going on, world?!

Tonight in my yoga class, the teacher said to us as we laid in our final savasana that we do this yoga for ourselves first and foremost, but we also practice for others, “for the people in our lives, for the people we love, and even for the people we don’t like.”  After ruminating on this during my walk home, I think what she meant was: We do this yoga so that we may live longer with our loved ones.  So that we may be happier, healthier, stronger, sturdier.  We practice patience, stillness, fortitude, determination, courage, with a little bit of humor and a lot of hard work, and we try to practice these same virtues off our sweaty yoga mats. We do this yoga to find balance in ourselves so that we may help put balance back into the world beyond our studio walls.

Well, that’s the hope anyway.  Right?

But, does it work?  Does my yoga matter, in the grand scheme of things?  I can’t stop terrorism with triangle pose.  Nor can I convince a gunman to lower his arms by explaining how to breathe through the torture that is camel or standing bow.  I can’t save a dying child by completing a 30-day challenge.

That’s taking things uber literally, I know.  Let’s take a step back then.

An old high school friend e-mailed me today asking about my yoga practice—she’s trying to get back into Bikram and struggling to find motivation and wondering whether this yoga is really for her.  I eagerly wrote her a long-winded e-mail all about what my yoga means to me, all the lessons I’ve learned, how yoga has changed my life and how I am a better person today because of my practice.

And that’s certainly enough for me, for the bubble that is Hannah. But, what about beyond?  Has my yoga helped the loved ones around me become better people, too?

Doubtful.

Still, I’m intrigued by this idea of my practice affecting the lives around me. Does it? And how?  When?  Why?

I’d like to think that the power we yogis generate in a single class could feed a large, hungry family with love, strength, belief, hope. And I’d like to think the effort we exert to move diligently and carefully and powerfully could stop a murderer or terrorist or rapist in their tracks. I’d even like to think we’re capable of passing grace and forgiveness to those who we might not think deserve much of a second chance.

Yes, I know—this is my naiveté speaking.

But, like I said to my friend, the trying is what really matters.  The simple act of showing up.  Of looking yourself in the eye—or looking your demon in the eye—and saying, “Enough already. Let go, be free.”  You make room for the good by releasing the bad.

The simple act—of saying “I love you” when you really mean it, of volunteering, donating, giving beyond what’s expected or asked of you, to friends and strangers. Of seeking the goodness in others, of working to forgive yourself, the same way you work to forgive the flaws in those around you. You seek balance, serenity.

I don’t think I—or even an entire troop of yogis—can bring about world peace from the perch atop a $20 yoga mat. No, friends.

But, what I think I can do, what I think my teacher was saying, what I think my dreams and my fears of late about the great tragedies and sorrows in the world are trying to tell me, is that action trumps all.  Showing up, letting go, giving, nurturing, tutoring, working hard, saying what you mean and feel, helping, hoping, loving—these things we can do, on and off our mats.

And then I, we yogis, and those around us, and our worlds, separate and intertwined, will be the better for it.

At least, that is the hope. My hope. In all its radiant naiveté.

---

Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)

• You fall to stand again.
• The Power of Yin Energy and SSR
• Depression, Bodywork and Change. Krista Tippett’s article
• American Pie 4