Yogi - Is a bear right?

I have always wanted to do yoga. When I say this, I really mean I want to be long, lean and sinewy. I want to be zen. I want to be yoga smug. You know those people that walk along with their rolled up yoga mats with an ethereal look on their faces. That's what I wanted. The other day I found myself walking my dog and happened upon a new yoga studio right around the corner from my apartment (yes, I have a dog in an apartment and yes it is a nightmare). Grabbing a leaflet, I swooned with delight over terms such as  as 'threshold of an amazing journey', 'the development of conscious awareness' and 'It's your journey'. This surely must a sign? 


It can be said, among all those that know me, the power of suggestion is powerful with me. A normal person would have shown up for an open yoga class (as opposed to a closed class?), however I decided to sign up for a month of personal yoga tuition classes in the hope this would bring be closer to my perceived new imaginary yoga persona. ie Long, lean & sinewy. Emails flurried back and forth between myself and the female teacher and we agreed on two mornings a week to get me started. I did notice on their website that the main 'yogi' was a wee man with bulging eyes who was referred to in awe as a 'guru'. Whatever, I just want to be lean.


I arrived at my 6am private tuition sick with nerves. It's a miracle I try anything new as I literally freeze up with knots in my stomach at even the smallest new endeavour. For example, I can not enter a clothing shop I have never entered before on my own. Why? Because I have an irrational fear that upon entering said store I will appear out of my depth and that the shop assistants will quickly usher me out the back door for fear I will ruin the look of their store. 


Where was I? Oh yes, yoga. Entering the yoga studio I realise three things immediately - there is incense burning, there is no Enya playing like normal yoga places and the guru is sitting on a cushion in the corner in what can only be described as a mediating pose with his eyes closed and his legs in a bendy manner.  He is wearing fisherman pants which should only ever be worn on Khao San Road in Bangkok whilst getting your fake dreadlocks super glued into your hair (incidentally my gay Vietnamese hairdresser did it and he strongly recommends not going down this route. Ever). And I have no idea what the guru's name is. I'm fucked. 


I notice the female teacher is near the 'shoe section' frantically gesturing at me to stop walking across the sacred floor in my flip flops. These flip flops cost $60 thank you very much. She explains to me excitably that the guru will be taking me on my journey and I am very fortunate to have this opportunity to work with such a great master.  Rolling out my mat, I suddenly wonder why the other mats in the room are lovely muted shades and mine is lime green? When I had demanded my husband locate a yoga mat in the garage, he had muttered something about one already located in the ironing closet. Oh, I see.  My mat is a forgotten lime green yoga sports mat for Nintendo Wii Fit. How very zen of me. The class consists of me, an actor, the guru and the female 'yogi in training' I had been emailing. The guru explains to me that it is highly unusual for him to take on a completely new student as usually people do classes first before the intense personal tuition, however he just 'knew' it was meant to be. He says all this whilst smiling at me, adjusting his massive grey top-knot and using my name in every sentence. I look at him blankly and hope to remember his name. I also realise I should have gone to a few classes first before throwing myself in the deep end. Kind of like deciding to explore bisexuality and instead of experimenting first, finding yourself suddenly in a long distance relationship with a lesbian movie director who is unpacking the U-Haul after the second date. Not a good idea and a true story.


Starting out in yoga, I envisioned it would be me following a teacher in a series of poses. Kind of like a one-on-one aerobics class without the Grapevine or Reebok step. Apparently in yoga you have to memorise the poses yourself and think for yourself. My memory is so bad, my friends refer to me as the goldfish. I also have a very short attention span and find it hard to concentrate. So, the thought of  having to memorise yoga poses is very daunting. I explain all this to the guru and he smiles serenely and says yoga will help with these problems. As we go through the series of poses I keep forgetting, he explains to me I must stop thinking of what is next and focus on the now. As he says this I am furiously scanning my muddled brain for the next pose which I then promptly forget. The guru claims this doesn't matter as I have to retrain my brain after 37 years of not being in the 'now'. I am feeling quite stressed and almost accuse him purposely trying to make me fail. I realise this is probably quite childish of me and perhaps I should keep these thoughts to myself.  At the end of the tuition which was 90 minutes long, he asks me to lie down in the corpse position. Now, this name I remember. He then explains I am to lie with my palms out and not move like, you guessed it, a corpse. I asked for how long and he says 'oh, about ten minutes'. You're joking aren't you? Lying there with still no music (I never thought I'd wish for Enya) I focus on my breathing as instructed. Before I know it, it's time to get up and I realise I have accomplished the small miracle of lying completely still for ten minutes. Maybe there's something to this yoga after all.