My Journey Toward a Sustainable Yoga Practice

by Sandy

Beauty Supported by Prudence, Scorns the Offerings of Folly
by Angelica Kauffman

I’d already been studying and practicing yoga for about a dozen years when I decided I wanted to try Ashtanga Yoga. I was 38 at the time and, specifically, I decided I wanted to learn the first series of the Ashtanga system before I turned 40. I had several reasons for this. One was the rising popularity of Ashtanga at the time. I’d studied a number of types of yoga, with the Iyengar tradition at the core of my practice, and as a teacher, I wanted to find out what Ashtanga was all about. Another reason was that, as I approached middle age, I thought a more athletic practice might help me “keep in shape.” And yet another was just to have some variety in my practice and shake things up. 

I did learn the first series and shortly before I turned 40 I started on second series. I’d been a strong practitioner in terms of asana ability when I started, so although the sheer endurance that first series required was pretty daunting—getting through all those Sun Salutations, jumps, and standing poses that were just the warmup often felt like climbing a mountain during those first months of learning it—in relative terms it wasn’t that hard for me. There were some shockingly difficult poses, especially given that it was just the first of, theoretically, seven series, and I was very grateful for both my previous yoga experience and my Iyengar background, which I still feel helped keep me safe from injury. 

Although even when I was immersed in it, I had plenty of reservations and criticisms about both the Ashtanga system and the culture around it, I also have to say I enjoyed those years of delving into it. I was suited to the acrobatics and it was a joyful thing to fly through the air as I learned the jumps and Tik-Toks (dropping from Handstand into Backbend and then jumping back up to Handstand again ten times in row). Although I’d done some of that in high school gymnastics classes, I never imagined I’d be doing it again at 40. I was also welcomed into the community and made lots of new friends. It wasn’t until I’d been around the scene for a while that I realized a big part of why I was so welcomed had to do with how “advanced” my practice was. The huge focus on what people could do physically, accomplishing the next pose and getting to the next series, started to make a me a little uncomfortable, even though it was also seductive.

Another concern was so often hearing the people I’d just practiced with discussing their injuries over breakfast after classes. As a teacher I wanted my classes to be both safe and accessible for all kinds of people, and I also viewed yoga as a healing practice for both myself and my students. I recall mentioning my concern to a few fellow Ashtangis and being met with quizzical looks. It was a bit like talking to fish about water being wet. One woman responded quite earnestly that since she’d “practiced for almost three years before ever having an injury,” she didn’t agree that it was risky. The Ashtanga system is intended to be a tapas practice, heat building and purifying, and tends to draw the hardcore Type A personalities, the same types of people who would train for marathons if they were runners. While I have that driven part of me, I had also experienced the serenity of gentle and restorative practices and appreciated the full spectrum. 

A pivotal moment came when I was taking a workshop with a very well-known Ashtanga teacher who, while helping me with a pose, said she wanted me to “be ambitious” with my practice. She meant this to be entirely encouraging and went on to say that I could easily “get to third series” if I worked hard. But it had the complete opposite effect on me. I have to admit in the moment, I thought, yeah! Third series by the time I’m 45! But later, showering off all the sweat from that day’s practice, I started to think about it differently, wondering if I really wanted my practice to be about that kind of ambition. Did I want the focus to be on accumulating more poses and advancing through the series’? Would that actually be good for me, both physically and psychologically? As a teacher, is that what I wanted to model for my students? 

As I reflected on those questions over the months that followed, I started to draw away from the Ashanga practice, toward one that felt more nurturing to me. I began thinking about embracing aging in my practice, rather than running from it. Now, closing in on 60, I think I have a fairly sanguine relationship with aging. There are things I miss, and aspects I don’t like, but there are also parts of it I’ve embraced and enjoy. I believe strongly there are both losses and gains at all stages of life, and, as a positive psychologist, the pervasive negativity around aging troubles me. I very much want to cultivate and promote positive aging, the view that life is a gift and each day is precious. 

My yoga practice is still an essential part of my life, though it has changed quite a bit over the past 15 years. There are still days when I do a very challenging practice, but I vary those with more “maintenance“ sessions, in which I focus on what I consider to be the basics, more gentle and restorative days, and increasingly more pranayama and meditation. I’ve made decisions along the way to cut many “advanced” asanas out of my practice proactively, reasoning that it’s better to be safe than to wait until I have to stop doing something. Still, every once in a while, just for fun, I do a very modified version of first or second series from Ashtanga. The truth is, though, that I always modified that practice, for safety in both the sequencing and in the poses themselves. And the biggest modification was that I never did it every single day, since I think variety is one of the keys to a sustainable practice. Doing such a demanding, rigorous practice day after day, with all those Chaturangas and deep backbends, never felt right for even my very flexible, able body. 

Barbara Papini, a colleague who for many years trained aspiring teachers in the Berkeley Yoga Room’s program in to how to teach pre-natal yoga, used to say that it was often difficult for pregnant women who already did yoga to let go of the practice they were accustomed to and make the switch to the very modified, gentle practice offered in pre-natal classes. She recommended gently guiding them with this simple thought: “You can practice yoga in spite of your pregnancy, or you can practice in support of your pregnancy.” I thought this was so wise and have applied it to many different conditions and situations over the years. What I love most about my practice is being able to customize it and use it to nourish myself wherever I’m at that day, physically, energetically, and emotionally. Modifying our practices, and our lives, for aging and mortality may be the ultimate test of our ability to be authentically in the moment with our true selves.

For information about Sandy’s classes, writing, and positive psychology journey see www.sandy.blaine.com.

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