An Onkwehonwe in Kanata

The best thing about going to yoga is the time spent in savasana – corpse pose. Every yoga teacher I have ever had calls it the hardest pose to do, which I suppose it is. The reason for its difficulty is because you have to lie flat on your back, eyes closed, muscles relaxed, and pretend that you are dead. A lot of people in this wired world, their nervous systems all jacked up on too much caffeine, too much wireless technology, sleep deprivation and general culture-driven neurosis get up and flee when this pose, which traditionally ends a class, is talked through by the teacher. You can practically feel their relief as they exit the room. I find it extremely relaxing. I don’t fall asleep at all – ostensibly you are supposed to meditate, and I suppose what happens to me is a form of meditation, although it’s more of a rumination than anything else – I chew over snippets of thought, things I have read, things that have happened to me during the day, things people have said, what a rando...

I ended up going to yoga after all. Let me digress a little and explain -- I was a headstanding, Sanskrit-chanting, blissed out yogini chick for about a four-year span of my life -- my late 30's early 40's. Then, for a lot of reasons (which I will not get into here, but suffice to say it had to do with my marriage almost breaking up, being in a funk about my work, changing gears and getting an actual career, and repairing my marriage) I went on a two-year yoga hiatus wherein I didn't even think about it. But recently a lot of factors brought me back to the mat. Number one, changing jobs and getting an actual career that makes me incredibly happy was the first thing. I am actually in a place where I can get out of my head and back into my body because I'm not all tied up in knots about the fact that I hated my job so much. Number two was my younger brother getting diagnosed with the dreaded-but-sadly-expected diabetes. I always thought I'd be the first one because my...