Yoga

90 minutes of torture, that's Bikram. Sorry, folks, but there's just not much fun to be had doing 26 poses, twice each, in a room that's as hot as a steam room.

But, dammit, you feel so good when you're done.

Today my lovely teacher inspired me. As I was lying there in the stench of mine (and everyone else's) sweat, she said: when you come to a pose that challenges you, work harder. When you feel like giving up, try harder. For whatever reason, that's where you have to work.

OK. I've been working hard since I was a kid. At seven years of age I spent my summer in the orchards, picking strawberries and cherries. It wasn't easy, it wasn't fun, and at the end of the summer I got $48. "See," my mom said, "wasn't it worth it?"

Believe it or not, at the time I did think so.

So when my teacher says, lie on your stomach, lift your arms like airplane wings, and raise your legs without separating them, and breathe, I try. I roll my eyes to the ceiling and beyond when she tells me to do that too. I sweat, I grimace, I struggle. I hold. I breathe. I beg to let go. Finally, I release. And she says, "How amazing. You just used your spine strength to lift your entire body against gravity. Wow."

And, at the time, believe it or not, I'm pretty happy about that too.

Now it comes to the practical application. Let's face it, that's what yoga is really about.

I really miss my kids when they're with their dad. But I believe that they need him, that he has a right to them, that it's good for them, and that it's good for me. But that doesn't make it easy.

I cry at night, soothe myself by racing up Quadra in my imagination, and over to their other house, and slipping in through the upstairs window, and into their bedroom, to cuddle them. I send my spirit to love them, to accompany them in dreamland, and to report back to me that they are perfectly all right.

When I work that way, loving them rather than missing them, I can eventually release into peace. Into trusting that whatever it is, it is all right. Even if it's as hard as this.

Namaste.