If making hot coffee was a yoga posture, I’d be in better health. Like my step-dogs.
When I was working in Savannah, Georgia, I came across an advertisement for Doggy Yoga hosted by the Save-A-Life animal welfare organization every Sunday. Strange, but it’s popular, and my dogs seem pretty bendy.
The first time I ever tried yoga, I was immediately put off. We took an hour to do 5 postures that, in trying, I discovered I couldn’t do and left in a huff of frustration. I think it was the tree frog position that broke me. I didn’t go back for years.
When I did, I learned to love it, so much that I took up hot yoga, then challenged myself to do hot yoga for 60 days straight. I managed it for about 45, but this was in England and I had to unexpectedly fly back to California, and so my streak was broken.
45 days isn’t bad though. I really got into yoga. For a while back in California, I even taught Power Yoga. To people who are hesitant or intimidated a little by the seemingly physical demands of yoga, Power Yoga was terrifying. I should have called it Empowering Yoga. The lexis of language is so important.
Anyway, since December, I have let my yoga practice fly out the window, and with it has flown my posture, my flexibility, and an over all feeling of good health.
There is a Hot Yoga studio not far from where I live, and I think I might just throw down the big bucks in exchange for a sweaty towel and healthy pores. Lord knows I need it.
Every morning when my dogs wake up they make me feel guilty. Crawford, who does the Upward-Facing Dog straight after waking from his sleep, and looks at me for his breakfast. Sewell surpasses him (and me) when she wakes by beginning with a Downward-Facing Dog, then stretches, pauses, and flows smoothly and beautifully into her Upward-Facing Dog.
“Yeah, yeah,” I think as I move into my post-sleep routine and make a cup of coffee.
My dogs do this better.
