9.7 Contact - Higher Than

Bestest Friend and I are doing a blog project. Each day we will write a blog post on a pre-determined theme chosen by a random noun generator. The theme for the seventh day of the month is "Contact." 

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This is my last nagging reminder to you, dear Reader, that our A Tree Grows in Brooklyn book club will begin on MONDAY! It's here. This is NOT a drill.  It's only about fifty pages a week. Please join us!

July 10 (Chapters 1 - 5)
July 17 (Chapters 6 -10)
July 24 (Chapters 11 - 18)
July 31 (Chapters 19 - 26)
August 7 (Chapters 27 - 32)
August 14 (Chapters 33 - 37)
August 21 (Chapters 38 – 41)
August 28 (Chapters 42 – 45)
September 4 (Chapters 46 – 51)
September 11 (Chapters 52 – 56)
September 18 (entire book wrap up)

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I have written about a yoga class called 20/20/20 that the yoga teacher at the community center teaches that I occasionally take. In my first mention, I suggested that perhaps I wanted more guidance in the class. In my second mention, I complained that I was uncomfortable with the journaling aspect of the class. In my most recent post about it, I did more complaining about the journaling. Well, friends, I'm here to say that I have done a complete 180 on this class. 

I love it.

At one point, Jenny wrote a comment here that I could just use the journaling time to write about whatever I wanted to. There's no need for me to write about my empowered vision of the future or what color I feel if that doesn't work for me. I sort of laughed because I am a rule follower, someone who wants do the homework right, and do what authority figures tell me to do because they must have their reasons for their rules.  But. Jenny was right.  My yoga teacher just wants me to do what works for me.  I wasn't actually breaking the rules, I was doing what I needed to do to have the most effective experience. 

So I love the first bit of the class where we dance around now. My teacher gives some instructions about focusing on gravity and root chakras and whatnot, but I just leave what doesn't make sense to me and focus on the music and moving my body and jumping around.  When we do unstructured yoga, I basically just try to do the same thing - a mini-practice I've created for myself - each time. I do a dead bug sequence, a couple of sun salutations, and then a warrior sequence. If there's time after that, I throw myself on the floor for some pigeon poses/other leg stretches.  So, at first this unstructured time was scary because I didn't know what I was going to do, but now it's predictable and it's comforting.

And then! The journaling. She usually has us journal at this point and I have taken to literally just writing down everything on my to-do list or anything that I've been focusing on while I'm doing the yoga piece.  

That means that by the time we get to meditation, my monkey brain has settled and I'm able to focus on my body and breathing. And I kind of feel like I'm high by the time we're done. Maybe more of a contact high than an actual high, but you know what I mean. 

When she asks me to share my journaling, I frequently tell her exactly what I wrote down and why and she's absolutely fine with it. 

Anyway, I do feel like this class is really helping me to focus on connecting with my own feelings and anxiety and how that manifests in my physical body. I'm converted. It's a weird class and probably not for everyone, but I'm 100% on the 20/20/20 train now.