Riding the Waves

I am thinking tonight about the Yin yoga class that I teach at Darling Yoga. I teach it twice a week, and I love planning the postures, and choosing the right music. Yin yoga has taught me a great deal about riding the waves of emotion, and maybe that is why I am drawn to the practice. Yin is a passive type of yoga, with supported and long held postures. The poses are held for anywhere from three to ten minutes, with little to no muscular engagement. The idea is to allow gravity and time to delve below the muscles of the body, and deep within the connective tissues and fascia.  When I started teaching this class, the plan was to teach a class incorporating both yin and yang. I mainly practice a more yang type of yoga, which is faster paced, using more muscular energy and balance. I love that type of practice, but am actually more challenged by the slower and less energetic yoga. The students seem to have embraced this practice as well, and complain when I try to flow with a quicker pace, so I have dropped the yang.  On Monday, I had a student tell me that the practice on Sunday that I taught seemed to have released some stored up emotions, and they had been crying off and on throughout the day. I store my emotions like a pro, mainly because I'm afraid. I'm afraid that my sadness, grief, pain, etc...will last for all of eternity, and so hell no, I'm not going to go there! Being in a deep shoulder or hip opener for five or more minutes, breathing through the discomfort(never pain), allowing the body to release and let go, is an amazing lesson. Discomfort doesn't last forever. It ebbs and flows, and you are in charge of how deep you go. You learn that you can back out at anytime. You learn that you are stronger and have more stamina than you think. If I could sit down for a good cry, and have a teacher call out, "Five more breaths, you are doing great!," I would possibly be all for that shit! I still have so much to learn. I fear my emotions.  I work hard on accepting and embracing them, but I get tired, and I get disappointed. My navigational system is quite often faulty, and I stumble around without direction. I have no idea how to read a map, and I don't always trust myself to make it through. I tell my students not to worry so much about the destination...

I'm trying to take my own advice. 

"The moment you completely accept your non-peace, your non-peace becomes transmuted into peace. 

Anything you accept fully will get you there, will take you into peace. 

This is the miracle of surrender." 

~Eckhart Tolle