Yoga is not for the Flexible, it is for the Willing

Before I started a regular yoga practice (rather, before I even set foot in my first yoga class) I thought "I can't do yoga, I'm not flexible," "I can't do yoga, I'm not thin enough," "I can't do yoga, I'm not an acrobat" and "I can't do yoga, I'm not strong enough." Everything I perceived to be yoga, I firmly declared I was not. Yoga magazines only entrenched my alienation: they depicted lithe, young women hovering upside down, one hand on the ground, smiling with ease. That was (and still is), definitively, not me.

But, I finally gave yoga a chance

​It turned out, I could do yoga. Standing up and bending over, fingers reaching toward my toes: that is yoga. Laying on the ground: that is yoga. Hands and feet on the ground in downward facing dog: this is also yoga. And, when it became too difficult to stay in downward facing dog, I learned it is also yoga to drop to my knees to honor my body and what I am feeling at that very moment. Yoga is about non-judgment: no one thinks less of me for not being able to hold a pose, and I don't feel jealous of those who are able to do what I cannot.

Yoga turned out to be filled with people of all shapes, sizes, colors, genders, ages, and experience levels. Regardless of who we are, we all encourage each other in our practices and, most importantly, we all respect each others' practices. Yoga helped me recognize that each of us are on our own journey, and we are all in different places on our paths. No one holds that against anyone else. And this amazing experience of acceptance? It also extends to self. Yoga was the first tool to accepting my own self: accept my body, who I was and who I am, with strengths, limitations, and everything that comes with it. I grew to appreciate my body in its present state, and appreciate its physical limitations. Those limits may exist forever, and that's okay, but someday, they may fade away, and that's okay, too.

Yoga has nothing to do with flexibility, weight, acrobatics or strength. Of course, those things probably come in handy for one-handed handstands. But nothing about yoga requires a one-handed handstand. Instead, yoga has everything to do with the willingness to simply try. The willingness to say "I'm okay where I am, even if I'm not better or stronger or more flexible." The courage to trust that "if I start here today, maybe someday I will be stronger and more flexible." The ability to see that "I am fine just as I am now." My own mind was the greatest roadblock, and yoga taught me that flexibility of the mind is the hurdle we must overcome, with willingness as the mechanism to achieving that acceptance and balance.

I am a few years into a regular yoga practice now. It took about three months to feel relatively at ease in downward facing dog. And some days, it still feels like a challenging yoga pose. But because I do yoga, my body can move a bit more freely. I've become a lot more physically flexible, and I've grown quite a bit stronger. My curves don't get in the way like I thought they would. Yoga is achievable regardless of them. And, at times, my mind still says "I can't." But when it does, instead of believing it, I breathe, smile, and relish who I am and where I am in the present. Because tomorrow, or next week, or in ten years, maybe I will. Maybe I can.