The year is more than half over now and Summer is drawing to a close at a rapid clip. This is my least favorite time of year. It’s hot and dry and nothing wants to grow except weeds. Although he likes school (or claims to), I’m always sad to send my son back so all of the “back to school” promotions bring me down. And with every season, there’s things that you swore you’d get done that you don’t even start.
My word for the year was “simple” and I’ve made efforts the last six months or so to focus on those simple things and seek out opportunities to enjoy them. Saturday, I attended an outdoor yoga class. It was the first group fitness class that I’ve participated in since before the pandemic. And while I do some short yoga classes via Peloton occasionally, it was the first real yoga class I’d attended since probably 2018.
I tend to treat yoga like a good stretch and somewhat shut off that whole mind/body connection thing. The classes that I used to take at our campus recreation center were never peaceful no matter how hard the instructors tried. The fitness studio backed up to the basketball court and lay underneath the weight area. The soft yoga music could not overcome any of that. I never enjoyed full concentration even in the classes that I took in an actual dedicated yoga studio, too focused on if I was doing the poses correctly, if my shirt was riding up, and a variety of other thoughts.
This class was held at a forestry center adjacent to a popular hiking spot in our area. A summer shower had passed though earlier in the morning and due to the grass being wet, the instructor moved us to the porch of the center. The building is a beautiful log structure and the porch faces the hills and an old log farmhouse. Once we settled in and began class, the only sounds we heard was rain dripping off the forestry center’s roof and the sounds of bird calls. There was a breeze blowing in from the hills with a fresh post-rain scent that no candle maker or fabric softener manufacturer can copy no matter how hard they might try. Eventually we began to hear the sounds of tires on gravel as a few hikers began to trickle into the parking lot. But even that was a peaceful throwback to my upbringing.
I was reminded of the scripture “I will cast my eyes upon the hills from whence cometh my help”-Psalm 121. Being from the hills, I found such solace and peace in a yoga practice there. The instructor told us that it wasn’t unusual to have an emotional reaction after a practice like we’d done. I admit I side eyed that a bit but I couldn’t deny leaving the class feeling an enormous load had been lifted. Later in the day, I did feel emotional. Not slamming the cabinets or crying but maybe what Blanche Devereaux called feeling “magenta”.
“Magenta. That’s what I call it when I get that way. All kinds of feelings tumbling all over themselves. Well, you know, you’re not quite blue because you’re not really sad, and although you’re a little jealous, you wouldn’t say you’re green with envy. And every now and then, you realize you’re kinda scared, but you’d hardly call yourself yellow.”
As the day went on, the magenta faded and I was back to that relaxed feeling. I had the best night’s sleep I’ve had in months.
This post title is a bit of a riff on “The Art of Racing in the Rain”, a wonderful book by Garth Stein. It’s the story of Enzo, a dog who lives with a race car driver, and picks up all sort of life lessons from him. One of those “Your car goes where your eyes go” has always been a favorite of mine, and I used to tell my first year college students that frequently. Keep your eyes on the prize, stay focused, you are going to go where your eyes are looking.
With so much STUFF going on in the world, it’s easy for eyes to get distracted. Too many shiny objects to reel us in and off track, away from the finish line, away from where we really want to get.
Taking a morning to reconnect with my roots through yoga was an amazing reminder of the beauty of simplicity. A reminder to find what feeds your soul and cast your eyes there for a few moments. A reminder to put away the phones and gadgets and listen to the world around you.
I encourage you to do that soon. Maybe it’s a lake, a beach, a mountain, a bright city skyline…find the places that strengthen you and cast your eyes there.
Namaste y’all.
From the heart and from the holler,
Minda