Meeting Your Body in the Present Moment

How do you cope with change? Are you change avoidant, or do you embrace it? I think the answer is variable depending on the situation.

Let me rephrase the question: How do you approach change as it affects your body and your yoga practice?

That’s a tough one, and I find that most people — regardless of how well they respond to the need for change and adaptation in other areas of their life — resist change in their own yoga practice. Why? For one thing, I think many people don’t fully comprehend (or are perhaps in denial) that as we age, our bodies change. And for another thing, we fear death and the decline that often precedes it.

The March toward the Inevitable

Whoa. That got a little dark, didn’t it?

But let’s get real. Our bodies are headed in one direction. That is a fact. The reality is that as we age, we need to pay closer attention to the meatsuits we occupy and treat them with more kindness, more love, and more adaptation to the changes that are inevitable.

When we’re young, we feel invincible, as if our bodies can do anything and we can do anything with and to them. It’s crucial even then to be kind to ourselves, to not beat ourselves up, because we’ll pay for it later. I’m not saying we shouldn’t challenge ourselves. On the contrary, we should ALWAYS challenge ourselves to experience things that are new to us and encourage us to grow.

All of this is to say one thing: It’s important to recognize that as we age, our bodies change. Our yoga practice needs to be a reflection of these changes. This doesn’t mean that we dumb down our practice or stop challenging ourselves. Not at all! The challenge as I see it is to pay more attention to what our bodies are telling us about what they actually need as we approach the mat versus what we have done for years.

Student 1

Here’s a story that perfectly illustrates the mindful approach to our bodies and our practice that I’m talking about. Several years ago I had an adult student who was approaching 90. When I first met her, she was 80 and regularly rode horses, traveled, hiked, went skiing, and maintained an inspiring active lifestyle. She also regularly practiced headstands. As the years passed, headstands became more challenging and less satisfying for her, and it led to some frustration with her yoga practice.

One day, we were talking in the studio, and she lamented not being able to get into a headstand, which she had always loved, so I offered her my help in setting up a headless headstand. I pulled out the folding chairs and blankets and taught her how to bring herself into this supported variation of Sirsasana (headstand). She was able to stay in it for longer than either of us anticipated, and the smile on her face said it all. She had let go of frustration and found a way of doing something she loved in a new way that was appropriate for her 87-year-old body. She was ecstatic!

Student 2

More recently, one of my adult students who is 77 and has been taking classes with me for nearly 15 years approached me after class on the verge of tears. We sat down, and she explained that the past few classes had been extremely challenging for her — to the extent that she was concerned that she may have to stop coming to class, which neither of us wanted. I focused my attention on her and listened as she recounted a laundry list of things that were causing her to lose sleep and experience an increase in frustration and dissatisfaction in her life. Among her challenges: She had hosted a seemingly endless run of guests in her home, for whom she cooked, cleaned, and entertained; lighting had struck her house less than a week before, and the electrical system was seriously damaged; and on top of everything else, her husband was out of town and the burden of dealing with all of these things fell to her alone. She was exhausted. Oh, and her balance (always a difficulty for her) was more unreliable than ever in class.

We talked about our changing bodies, and I encouraged her to be kinder to herself, to focus on going deeper into the experience of each pose even if it meant modifying its physical form. Most importantly, I encouraged her to continue using the wall for balance support, which she had been doing for years. “But you didn’t tell us to today,” she said. And I should have. Despite the fact that nearly everyone in the class has studied with me for many years and is accustomed to utilizing props (including walls) as a regular part of our practice, her fatigue and frustration with daily life had overwhelmed her; she had struggled to stay present with herself and give her body what it need to sustain itself through what was, for her, a difficult class. And I mistakenly assumed she would go to the wall without being instructed to. It was humbling for me as an instructor. She felt better after our talk and followed up with some gentler treatment of herself at home. She also set some boundaries around what she was (and wasn’t) willing to do as a good host.

The next class was a whole different experience for her. She felt empowered in her practice and when I reminded everyone that sometimes doing less is really doing more, it resonated for her. She stayed in her body (and out of her head) and practiced moment to moment, responding to more subtle changes and shifts in her body and in how it occupied the poses. She felt confident and satisfied, accomplished and grounded. And her practice was visibly changed. All she needed was a little emotional support and a reminder that propping is a conscious choice to honor the ever-changing needs of the human body.

Student 3 (Me!)

My own practice has shifted over the years, both as someone who does yoga and as someone who teaches others to do yoga. Here’s how:

1. I don’t teach power yoga these days. I enjoy vinyasa and the challenge of a power yoga class, but it no longer fits the needs of the majority of my students, not to mention my schedule. I’m not saying I’ll never teach it again, but I’m not teaching it now.
2. I try to do fewer poses and deepen the exploration of the ones I choose to do. I’ve let go of assuming that my body will do everything it did 30 years ago and am more interested in nuance. What can I do today that expresses a deeper connection to my body and to the yoga poses I incorporate?
3. I have mostly stopped practicing headstands in the past few years for two reasons: first, I have had some nasty bouts of vertigo that have laid me out for days, so I no longer spin in circles, ride amusement park rides, and put my body in positions that will trigger vertigo. It’s just not worth it. The second reason that I no longer do headstands is that I have developed arthritis in my neck to a fairly significant degree, and as a result I experience a lot of neck tension and discomfort/pain on a regular basis. The headstands often make it worse. The exception is that headless headstand that I taught my student to do using a couple of folding chairs. It feels much better as it doesn’t put any pressure on my head and neck, and if I do it occasionally (and only after assessing my equilibrium!), it’s a more satisfying and joyful experience!

I can safely say I practice with greater curiosity and more kindness so that I avoid injury and support my well-being. It also makes me a nicer person because I’m not experiencing the frustration that comes from forcing the body I have today into a practice I did decades ago. My practice and my teaching are more vibrant than ever, and I feel I have even more to offer as a result.

So my advice to you is this: Be kind to yourself and honor the body you have now. And know that it will be different every time you practice yoga.

Lindel Hart teaches yoga online for PerfectFit Wellness. He lives in Western Massachusetts and teaches at Deerfield Academy, a private residential high school, as well as at Community Yoga and Wellness in Greenfield, MA. Visit his website, Hart Yoga.