Wrapping up my fourth day at the yoga retreat, I feel like I’m definitely noticing some changes. I both don’t mind yoga as much as I did previously, but I also hate yoga a little more. I know that I’m getting more flexible with every class, but progress is so slow that it seems like I’m treading water.
Aside from the physical aspect of yoga, I know that part of the practice is mental; you learn discipline and lack of ego, but I have trouble with the latter. I think it is natural to want to improve at something, especially something that you’re working at. But I think that’s where the discipline comes in. If you went to class everyday and saw progress everyday, it would be easier to keep going back. To show up to a class that you’re neither enjoying nor seeing progress in, I would call that discipline. Others might call it stupidity.
Each class is supposed to be about an hour, but the instructors run on Spanish time. Every class starts at least 5 minutes late, depending on when the instructor shows up. Even when the instructor is on time, they fiddle with the playlist that they have planned for the class until several minutes past the start time. Despite the delays in starting, classes often go long, with one class running well over 90 minutes. There was no indication that the class was going to go into overtime, she just kept going. Since all of the students are on vacation, nobody really cared; nobody had to get to work or get home to start dinner. And it wasn’t 90 minutes of all yoga, though. We did some relaxing and meditation both before and after the class, but there was still at least an hour of solid stretching in there.
At the beginning of one class in which we had some new students, the instructor welcomed them and said, “We are here to learn. We are here to practice. We are here to stress.” A brief pause, then her eyes got big and she said, “No! No stress. Stretch. We are here to stretch.” She blamed it on her flawed English. Personally, I think it was Freudian.
Over the course of the past week, I have noticed that the two yoga instructors will teach certain positions or sequences slightly differently. I know that you are supposed to personalize yoga to make it your own, adapting it to your body and to your abilities and needs, but changing it up when you’re teaching new students can only lead to confusion. Given some of the positions that they are suggesting that we get into, I am firmly convinced that they are making some of this stuff up.
When I was lying there in corpse pose at the end of class yesterday, flat on my back, legs and arms outstretched and relaxed, clearing my mind and focusing on my breathing, I heard the all too familiar footsteps of the instructor approaching. Since we weren’t actually doing yoga poses that she would have to correct me on, I assumed she was going to get water or something like that, but instead she stopped near my head and pressed down on my shoulders.
Apparently, I can’t even lie on the floor correctly. I wonder if there’s a remedial yoga class that I can sign up for?
