Yoga and New Year Resolutions

I don’t break new year resolutions for the simple reason I don’t make them in the first place. This year I would say that I did make one (although would still hesitate to use the term) and more importantly have stuck to it with a certain steadfastness for a month.

I decided that every weekend I would spend two hours learning Yoga. Sure enough I am ready for my Yoga teacher when he comes home in the morning, having already taken a bath. Every Saturday and Sunday in 2010 (alright I did skip one Sunday) I have been learning Yoga for an hour. What has helped me is what in management jargon can be termed as “the customized home delivery model”, which when translated into simple English means that I have a person teaching me Yoga at home and I don’t have to get up early during the weekend and rush to a class.

The truth is also that I have actually been ready to get out of bed and attend Yoga classes and even enrolled in one. This led to a very strange situation where the student was willing but the teacher was simply unavailable. The institute very kindly offered to refund the money as they were having a problem getting a teacher for the particular batch that I had enrolled. I graciously offered to wait. Like all great problems this one too had a simple solution. A yoga teacher landed quite literally at my doorstep. My wife and mother chanced to speak to my neighbour Mule aunty who informed them that she had a teacher come over to her house everyday. Then matters as the great story tellers say took their course and I am finally learning Yoga.

On a more serious note, this perhaps illustrates best what my teacher Shyamji says in practically every session: Yoga is learnt only by those people who are destined to learn it. While doing Yoga has added a certain amount of peace to my life, it has also served to remind me that I am not getting any younger. The Sarvanghasan, (an exercise where one has to kind of support oneself using the neck) which was child’s play when I was a child is now not so easy. In fact, I have already deferred trying it a couple of times.

The body may not be so flexible but still willing. The mind of course is still willing as I continue on my journey of learning Yoga. This is one year resolution which I shall do my best to keep.