Practice…the day after

On my 35th birthday, real estate mogul and reality tv star Donald Trump earned enough votes from the electoral college to become our 45th president.  That is quite possibly the most insane sentence I have ever written in my entire life.  In all honesty, I avoided the tv all day and just spent time with my husband celebrating us and being thankful to see another birthday.

I woke up the next morning to check what was going on and saw what happened.  Facebook was super negative and toxic.  I am, by nature, a pretty positive person, and do my best to avoid that type of mess, but I was shocked.  I stepped into the sadness with everyone.  The uncertainty of what was happening, the wondering if we were all safe or if this mouthpiece of a man was going to try to make good on all that he promised.  It definitely is a moment of limbo that is stressing everyone out.

My view on politics doesn’t make me feel like this is the worst thing in the world and we have no way out, so for the most part, I was disappointed, but fine.  I wore the stress of everyone else that day…or so I thought.

Enter yoga with Jenny.

More people were in class this evening.  That spoke volumes to me.  I attend a beginner flow class, and there were clearly seasoned yogis in there this night.  The level of the class didn’t matter, the vibe of the room was that this was something everyone NEEDED to help process.  It was a somber, yet hopeful feeling in there.

My whole intention was to participate in all of the poses.  I felt the intimidation creep in as I saw experienced yogis do their thing as I fumbled through doing my best.  I breathed and refocused on me.  My intimidated feeling has nothing to do with them, but me.  Breathe. The feeling drifted past.  Cool.  I’m getting the hang of the meditation part of this.

Then we sat in a butterfly and laid back.  Not sure if it’s because this is a vulnerable pose, but emotions that I didn’t know I had were stirred up.  I felt the tears start at the base of my feet, travel through my legs, in my stomach, now chest-specifically my heart, neck….brain interrupts (bitch, you are in a room of 8 people that you do not know, don’t cry…why are you even upset?!).  Jenny’s voice reminds us to breathe.  I took a breath, quieted my mind and just let go.  I let go, and the tears continued through my neck, my cheeks, nose tingle, eyes tingle and wetness.  I tried my best to hang on, then the permission to let it flow came from somewhere.

I laid there and let the tears stream down my face. I checked in to see why this was happening, where this was coming from.  I was disappointed.  I didn’t feel fear.  I felt the sadness of those around me and those that I know and in that vulnerable pose, I allowed those emotions to flow through.  I was the person that never understood why people mentioned crying in yoga.

Now I am one of those people. Staying present and honest with myself about where I am.

I felt better.  We can all feel better by letting go.  This situation is what it is.  What we have to do now, is stick together; no matter who you voted for, and hope that this man won’t crash the plane with all of us aboard.  To all of the people who have felt disrespected by him, don’t allow him to have that control over your life.  People of color, women, people of varying religions, we have gone through scary times over the years and we are still here.  We will get though this with love.  He can’t have my joy.  It’s mine.