Holding on tight

Starting Monday 23rd March I’ve made one phone call a day. Each day the recipient was different, randomly selected from a list.

I’ve spoken to one of you everyday since the doors of the physical studio shut.

I’ve spoken to lawyers. I spoken to ER doctors and nurses. I’ve spoken to people who lost their job and others who’ve been at work for many more hours than usual.

Unless you previously worked from home, had no children, never visited friends or family, was a non-shopping minimalist who didn’t pay attention to global activities, then life changed.

As my list of called names continues to grow, I realised I was speaking to two groups of people.

The first group spoke about corona as if she were a loving but strict mother, who sat them down to have a difficult but heart to heart conversation.

You’ve been working too much lately. You’ve haven’t been eating properly. You haven’t spent enough quality time with your kids. You haven’t hung out with your partner for ages. Get some sleep – you look like sh*t. 

The other group moved into struggle street. The language in the phone call was vastly different.

I miss the gym. I miss yoga. I miss my friends. Homeschooling is BS – I’m not a teacher. I can’t work the way I need to from home.

Common across all the phone calls were references to the roles we play. Essentially the hats we wear. Parent, worker, self-employed, carer, banker, nurse. What corona threw at us all was the need to take on other roles, wear hats we may have never worn before. Unpaid teacher, child psychologist, marriage counsellor for own marriage, yoga teacher to self, cook, toenail painter, eyebrow waxer.

This is where the two different groups emerged.

The people in the first group took off their usual hat, flung it into the wind and looked around for some other hats to try on. Even ugly, too small, weird hats got a shot.

The people in the second group gripped their hat like it was the only f*cker between them and death.

Because our tendencies in life have a way of showing up on a yoga mat, the group you’re in might also be reflective of how you do yoga.

People tend to identify with one way of doing it. I only do hot yoga. I only like fast, flowing yoga. I only do slow yoga. I only do yoga in a studio. I only do yoga with other people. I’m a morning yoga person.

Corona forced me to put on a hat I’d been holding at arm’s length for years. The hat of technology. What has come of it is an online offering of fast, slow, morning, evening and everything in between yoga practices.

If you reflect, really reflect on how you do yoga, there are often lessons there on how you do life. If what you learn is that you’re in a group you’d rather not be in, then use yoga to practice a different way rather than to reinforce the old.

If you encourage variety into your yoga practice you’re giving yourself an opportunity to practice wearing different hats. This tendency will inevitably seep into life off a yoga mat.

What corona demanded of us was the need to wear different hats. What it offered was the possibility of finding comfort and joy in these other hats.

For me the outcome of corona hat wearing have been varied. My kids now know I’m sh*t at maths but they have learnt about all the muscles in their legs.

Our most fundamental role is human. Our most fundamental yoga practice is mindful movement.