Uhhhh-huh!

Sometimes, I find that the smallest, unexpected thing can shift my outlook entirely.  Today I went to a yoga class at Darshana Yoga in Palo Alto (a gorgeous studio - highly recommended if you are ever on the peninsula!)  I was feeling quite gloomy, despite the gorgeous California sunshine beating down. A woman brought her 9 year son to the studio, prepared to sit and play on his Gameboy while she practiced.  Catherine, the studio owner and teacher, invited the boy to practice with us, as apparently he goes to the kids yoga class and is quite an accomplished yogi!  The boy accepted the invitation and dragged a mat over next to his mom, where he proceeded to move through the asanas with us with amazing grace. I could hear his breath, energized, and challenged, throughout the class.  He floated in and out of a balancing sequence like he was born to be on the mat. It was a real treat to see and to share the space with someone so young, the group of us spanning decades but connected by something much more powerful than age. Obviously, we live in a special place in the Bay Area, where yoga mats are dropped from helicopters and you can find babies, dogs, and houseplants doing yoga in parks around the city.  But the real delight came during shoulderstand. Catherine was reminding us of all the benefits of the pose, including shoulderstand keeping us healthy "so we can live longer and happier lives", at which point the boy broke the silence in the room, effusing "Uhhh-huh!"  

How uplifting to be reminded by someone less than 1/3 of my age of why I love yoga! The genuine enthusiasm and untarnished outlook on life of a child - something I think most of us could benefit from absorbing from time to time. Who knew my teacher today would be a 9 year old stranger with moppy hair and a Gameboy. Thank you, Luke!






Sally Clark

The good the bad and the ugly...

To be a yogi has many different interpretation. When I started my yoga path I was very young and gullible. I was 15 years old living in Hungary in the midst of communism. Yoga was unheard of at that time. To make a long story short, I got introduced to a secret yoga studio in the outskirts of Budapest.
 I knew nothing about Eastern philosophies, so when the book, Baghavad Gita was given to me I was pretty impressed with it's content. With my young mind I was surprised how fast I was able to relate to the teaching of this great book. As with everything you have to take it with a grain of salt. I quickly emerged in the lifestyle, learned to meditate and practice pranayama. Coming from extreme poverty and neglect at the time,  yoga became my sanctuary.  It was easier to deal with whatever was waiting for me at home. Asanas were not a big part of yoga practice at that time, so I was surprised what different approach to yoga I found when I arrived to San Francisco.  I have joined a yoga studio here in 1989 and begin my physical practice.

 I had a very strict teacher, who made me feel bad about pretty much everything that I did. My lifestyle, the food I ate, people I befriended and the list just went on and on... I felt confused. I missed the simpleness of yoga that I have practiced back home, the honesty of the people around me. However, I practiced every day and  learned some great yoga poses.  My teacher said I have a long way to enlightenment because I am still not able to control my emotions and my mind. (I was 21!)

I felt lonely and disconnected. I was craving a real conversation beside yoga and discipline. I wanted to enjoy music and art and beauty, everything that is created by the great human mind. How could that be wrong? Who is to say what is real and what is illusion? Who can define for sure what is it mean to be enlightened, or what will happen after we die?  How can anyone know the answers to this mystery when we put so much conditioning on everything?  It is different for all of us yet  we might all be heading the same place. To be a yogi does not mean that you have to love and hug everyone, be in a good mood all the time, be "green"( let's talk about that to the people in the housing projects next to our house), to have the perfect trikonasana and all the crazy arm balancing.  How about  when we recite sanskrit mantras which we really don't have any real idea or experience with(enlightenment, whatever that means comes in many forms)?

We are all yogis, living our lives the best we can (hopefully), excepting that we are humans with all sorts of feelings and emotions. To be a yogi is to be all that, the Good the Bad and the Ugly.

Love to all!