Shifting

This is Mike Dunn and I at the Pittsford Tri, respresenting our yoga Studio...... BREATHE!

Today I got to have coffee with my friend Deb. We've been saying for months that we were going to get together and I was so glad it happened today. Deb's the leader of the local Mom's In Motion Group, a group of women who have gathered to celebrate fitness and life and it's really grown here in Rochester. At the Pittsford Triathlon I saw bright pink shirts everywhere and I felt so proud of all of them. Deb included because she's been the ringleader.

Deb is also training for her first Ironman, we got together just to chat about thing and all things Ironman. I am really proud of her, as she's also been a student of yoga for a while now. I told her today how I have seen such a shift in her since she started..... and as a yoga teacher I get to say that a lot about a lot of people.

Especially when athletes open up to yoga.

Typically I have to drag an athlete into the studio kicking and screaming. They will announce to me they are there to become more flexible, to not be broken, and they want nothing to do with the spiritual aspect of it all.

I know because I was once the president of that club.

You can see it in their first downward facing dog. Full of control, full of fight. And I always say this; the dog you come with is never the dog you leave with. It was true with me, true with Deb, and it's true for so many.

When I say the spiritual aspect of yoga I don't mean that we will all join hands, find the tallest mountain sit together and chant Om Shanti...... it's an undefinable shift, an undefinable spirituality, a quietness that seeps it's way in.

When people ask me what it is like to be in the Ironman I have to tell them the truth..... it's yoga.

It's yoga in that I am completely present. I think of nothing that is coming, nothing that has happened, I only think of where I am right now. In the Ironman I am by myself, not running away from anything like people think Ironman athletes do. I am not locked between my ears I am in my body. Not a lot of thought happens for me in a race.

Now there have been races where I get stuck between my ears. Inevitably those end in disaster.

I have trouble getting the yoga world to understand me as a triathlete and I have trouble getting the triathlon world to understand me as a yogi.

So I gave it up. I don't try either way anymore. I just exist as who I am and I embrace both the yin and the yang of my life.

I can see how that's happening for Deb too. I know she feels it and I know she may not be able to place her finger on it. It's not a definable thing... it's just a feeling. A feeling of peace. A feeling of calmness. Many times it represents itself in a physical practice like yoga. There's more space between the vertebrae, the muscles, the joints..... which translates into space elsewhere. Between the ears. An openness in the heart, the soul.

Those who really don't get it read this and laugh or shake their head. My husband doesn't get it, he calls yoga glorified stretching. I can't fault either side. I just feel like there is this gift I want to share and the only way for me to share it is to let people find it on their own, if it is for them.

It's been exciting to watch the shift in Deb. I know it will carry her through Ironman Wisconsin.

Just like it has carried me.

Namaste!