Yo-Got This- My Awkwardly Awesome First Yoga Class

Calm blue ocean...  Calm blue ocean...

I had a fantastic recipe all ready to go for today that I was super, duper excited to share...  And then I had my first yoga class.  To say it was a unique experience is the understatement of a lifetime.  

Yoga class was at 10:30 and here I was at the gym at 10 on the dot.  I had 20-25 minutes to burn before class so I figured I'd warm up by going to the water park section of my gym (yes, you read that right, my gym has a mini-water park) and power walking around the pool deck.  It's 80 degrees in there, I work up a good sweat, and honestly, it's how I like to start all of my workouts. 

At about 10:25, I'm feeling good and it's time to confidently march into my first ever in-person yoga class.  Headphones in, rocking out to Sia, I grab the doors, whip them open like a tornado, pumped and ready to go, only to find a room that's totally dark, completely dead silent, and a group of women who were meditating with their eyes closed are now staring at me like I'm insane.

First lesson of yoga class...  Perhaps getting amped up for yoga class the same way you get pumped to tear up the treadmill is probably not the way to go.

After blasting through the door like the Kool-Aid Man, I sheepishly clomp across the parquet floors while frantically trying to turn off my music.  My sneakers make a deafeningly loud noise that seems to echo forever.  So much for just trying to blend in.  At least there was a slot in the back row, a spot I figured I was sure to vanish in the class.  I roll out my mat, which is elaborately painted with a lotus that I thought was pretty but since everybody else has plain Jane mats, it kind of makes me feel like a tool.  I slip into my grip aerobic Mary Jane slippers (which also earned me some sideways "what the heck are those?" looks), and then proceed to look really busy until the start of class.  I stretch.  I lay flat and make like I'm clearing my mind or meditating or something meaningful and yoga-like.  I want to check my phone but I don't because I want to unplug.  Then I remind myself to silence it because I don't want to be "that person" during class.  I notice that absolutely everybody is wearing purple shirts and I'm wearing bright pink.  Like, really bright pink.  

But I think it's pretty...

I try to not look like what I was...  The noob who wandered into a class that clearly is the same group of people every week, who have a routine, and know what they're doing. 

Then it's 10:30.  Everybody in the class, save for me and one other woman in front of me start going through the Sun Salutation.  I think to myself "Crap, this is a class where there's no talking or something...  The teacher is one of these chicks, I should be following along!  Crap, crap, crap..."  So I start through the routine too.  I do two cycles, then at 10:35, the teacher wanders in.  If I had read the schedule, I wouldn't have been surprised that the teacher was a guy...  But since I didn't, I was.  It didn't matter of course, but it just made me feel that much more unprepared.  I also felt like a dope for scrambling to catch up with the routine everybody else was doing, thinking it was the class, but actually it wasn't.

Our teacher looked every bit like he'd be a yoga instructor.  Long hair, kind of hippish, but very calm, soft spoken, yet authoritative.  Immediately I liked him very much.  He scans the room and just says "there are new people here."  Yup, that's me...  Bright pink girl who randomly follows along with other's warm-ups while wearing the stupid socks and a capri skirt skirt.  But as it turns out, the woman directly in front of me, she was new too.  Thank you God, I'm not alone.

He looks at the center of the room, in the direction of me and the other new woman (how is she wearing purple too?  Did I miss the memo?) and says "move back one row."  Then he says "move to your right."  I stare at him blankly.  He says it again.  I say "who, me?" and he just says again "move to your right" while kind of focusing on a spot halfway between me and the woman in front of me.  Who is he talking to?  Who does he want who to do what?  I say again, "You mean me? I move right?"  Then he looks in our direction but not at either of us, wide eyed, shrugging, leaning to my right, maybe a little irritated that we can't follow basic directions.  The other new girl, she turns around, looks at me slightly panicked, obviously just as confused on what to do, hoping that I get something she doesn't.  Finally the lady next to me clues in both of us out by saying quietly, "He means the other new girl move to the back row and you slide over.  He doesn't use names and he likes new people to go to the back so they can see the class."  Ah, gotcha.

Lesson number two...  Our teacher speaks like a fortune cookie.

We get ourselves arraigned and settled while he rolls out his mat, casually apologizes for

Had to to take all my Alex and Ani off too...

being late, and says something about the importance of yoga and the ritual of it, how it connects us to our inner selves and frees us of distraction...  While he fiddles with his cell phone.  All righty.  So far, this teacher is very Vermont...  And anybody who knows anybody from Vermont or has been to Vermont knows exactly what I mean.  It's not an insult, it's actually a compliment, and really a huge comfort.  For the uninitiated, with Vermont living comes a level of casual informality that oozes into everything and just makes you feel at ease.  Vermonters are free and relaxed, and for us uptight New Hampshire folks who take ourselves too seriously, it's really a trip.

Then he says "Sometimes we make choices that we know are negative to our beings and will impact us negatively...  Does anybody else do things they know to be negative to their being but they simply do them anyway?"  Who me?  The girl who ate most of a pint of Ben and Jerry's during last night's "Mad Men" premiere, knowing it'd make me sick?  Yeah, I know all about bad choices and negativity.  Wanting to start off in the spirit of honesty, I shoot my hand up, as does the woman next to me, clearly emboldened by my admission of guilt.  We are the only ones who raise our hands.  Ten other people in class, we are the only two sinners in a church of Saints.  Or, more probably, the only two New Hampshire folks in a room of Vermonters.

Lesson number three...  Do not raise your hand.  Ever.

The teacher responds "I know.  I could tell when I entered the room.  There's a sense of it."  Sweet.  My pink-shirt wearing, ice cream binging aura is palpable.  The lady next to me who helped us before whispers "I never make bad choices...  I can't afford to."  Well that's helpful and not at all creepy.

Bad choices? What bad choices?

Finally, the guy goes into the routine.  I was delighted to find I knew most of the poses and could do them comfortably, especially since the teacher didn't actually do 90% of the moves.  He left it to the clearly experienced women in the front row to go through as guides.  He did coach us through the routine brilliantly, did chants, walked around and corrected our form, and went to people who said they needed extra help in the deep stretches.  My rough start and his quirkiness aside, he was a fantastic teacher who offered corrections without embarrassing anybody, support without judgment, and encouraged challenge without intimidation.  At this point, I was loving every second of the class.  

Once things got going...  I didn't feel like a moron.  I felt confident.  I felt accomplished.  I felt at peace.  And, surprisingly enough, I felt beautiful.  Maybe it sounds strange, but towards the end of the routine were a series of moves he said were to focus on grace and balance, maybe I didn't hit them perfectly, but when I did them, I felt like a long and lean dancer who does this stuff every day.  As weird as it sounds, especially considering my challenges as of late, it was nice to not just not feel self-conscious.     

Not self-conscious, that is, until my cell phone went off.  Stupid me, I forgot to turn off the alarm that reminds me to take my Prednisone, and it makes noise even if my phone is on "silent."  I honestly think it mostly blended in to the hippy music the guy was playing and only I (and the entire back row) noticed.  

Freaking mortifying.  

Yet, I'm signed up for next week and really looking forward to it.  It was an overall beautiful experience that left me a bit misty at parts.  I am stunned that I was actually able to clear my mind, relax, and enjoy the simple complexity of it all.  The relaxation meditation at the end of the class was worth it by itself.  I'll go every week for that five minutes of perfection and peace.  

Want to dress disruptively for your yoga class too? Head to Raw Threads!

Hopefully, I'll be less of a noob next time though...  And please, somebody remind me about the dang phone alarm.  

So...  Let's discuss:

• Yoga class, yay or nay?
• Is there a rule about yoga and purple that I should know about?
• Vermont or New Hampshire?
• Please tell me I'm not alone in my cell phone blooper...