Wrestling With Yourself
Day 90 of 90 days straight of hot yoga at Modo Yoga LA and I am honored that today’s class was with teacher Joe and the Modo flow. I am also honored by Matt, Lisa, Carolina, and Grant who showed up to the class and practiced. They are wonderful teachers at the studio whom I admire. To Emily B who sent me encouragement but who couldn’t make it, because it conflicted with her teaching. I am taking a deep breath now, as my body, mind, and soul collect themselves. It feels like that moment in Breakfast Club when they ask the nerd to sum it all up in a letter.
This journey has been filled with babysitters, scheduling, soccer, life, traffic, work, and so much more. Everyday I sat with putting yoga first and figuring out how I cuold fit practice in. I did that for 90 straight days. This single Dad made it work. And everyday I shared with you and offered you my story and reflections of my practice and what I learned. I am honored you stopped by to read it. And for most of you it inspired you.
Emily M was my behind the scene angel. Two moments in my life that I will always take to heart, the first is her encouraging me on day 24, “David go for 90 and see where it takes you inwardly, see what unfolds in you, with your journey.” And the second moment was around somewhere in the day 60 range and she was teaching and she came up to me in power pose and whispered, “David what day are you on, 80, 75, you are much stronger than you think, go deeper, have your thighs parallel to the mat.” My body was not feeling it, but I did, and because she was cheering me on, from that moment on my practice just got stronger and stronger. So thank you to all the angels who encouraged me.
Teacher Joe in class today, offered us so much wisdom, and the practice was wonderful and filled with lots of humor. When I started at Modo three months ago, teacher Joe was telling us about the breath, and today was no different. What I got in practice today was that, you breath, and the only thing that changes is the poses. And as Joe explained today, ‘The pose come and go, and the breath continues.” So it felt wonderful to open up to unconditional acceptance on the mat. Inviting the sensations, feelings, thoughts, and allowing the breath to breath. The invitation on the mat is always in accepting, allowing, and breathing.
Each pose offers us an experience, and the experience is just that, an experience. These 90 days have given me the opportunity to learn how to accept things as they are. In a society of distractions, in a mind that works on distractions, can I come to practice with the willingness to accept what is? Yoga is about realizing our oneness and that place is here. There is nothing to seek, search for, look for, because it is all here on the mat. Your mat offers you enough. You can handle it, that is why it is happening on your mat.
On my journey, like yours, I ran into many days where everything was off, or on, but it passed, and what I realized is that everything on the mat is passing, it is constant change, like a river, but there is a part that wants desperately to hold on, but that is futile. There is nothing to hold on too. Nothing. And so I would rest in the breath and move on to the next offering on my mat, which is the next pose. Every pose is enough as it is, the breath is enough as it is, this is enough as it is, you are enough as you are.
Thank you to all the staff and teachers at Modo and Mosksha Yoga. I am honored by you! Also to the wonderful people at Clover! As tears come down my face, I can not believe I did this, a breath and a smile. My heart is smiling now. Words can not express.
I love my talks before class with teacher Joe, we always talk about his garden. Which reminds me of life….
David Matthew Brown
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