Tadsana - Mountain

Here's a picture of me celebrating in front of a big-ass, famous mountain in Indonesia. Unfortunately, it is foggy and you cannot see the mountain. It's probably judgment for lying about menstruating when grilled by the holy man guarding the temple.

I've been fortunate in the instructors I've had the opportunity to study under, particularly in Bali. One was Marylene Henry, who studied with the students of Orit Sanj Gupta, who is part of the lineage of Krishnamacharya himself.

A bit of yoga history...

Around 1,000 A.D. many yogis began moving toward the mountains and caves of the Himalayas, withdrawing from the world. They were devotees of Shiva and their leader was Matsyendra Nath, or the Fish Lord (from whom we get matsyendrasana, or Lord of the Fishes pose). 

Under Nath's leadership, it is said that the yogis developed siddhis, or supernatural talents. Periodically, they would come down from the mountains to perform miracles for the common people, in order to demonstrate the power of yoga and how it can help control the mind. This is the incubator into which hatha yoga was born. It is hatha that we practice today, in the West.

A young Krishnamacharya went to study under the monks hidden away in caves in the Himalayas ...monks said to be, by then, hundreds of years old. And he is the one who caused the West to stop and ask -- are siddhis really so impossible? Krishnamacharya, who truly performed many impossible feats -- became the Father of Modern Yoga. His 4 main students went on to found their own yoga lineages, becoming gurus in their own rights. Krishnamacharya made yoga accessible in a way it had not been before. 

I could go on and on, but I'll contain myself.

The point of this is two-fold: 1) yogic history contains miracles And 2), when masters speak, we listen. While Marylene is not Krishnamacharya, I respect her a great deal, so I decided to follow her guidance: pick a pose; hold the pose for several minutes in true alignment; observe & take note. This, after all, is the basis of all hatha. 

The pose I chose most recently is the most foundational pose: samasthiti, tadasana, or "Mountain." 

I know, I know: how many years does it take to master that!?

Just kidding, no one thinks that about tadasana. For the first year I practiced yoga, I thought tadasana just meant standing. Am I on two feet? Check! Done. I could do this all day.

What is harder to see is everything happening internally and perhaps on a muscular & myofascial level.

* Ground the three arches of your feet by pressing into the 3 corners of each foot, activating pada bandha
* Lift the inner arch
* Spread the toes wide and even to create the widest possible base
* Elevate the kneecaps by engaging the quads
* Engage the abdominals
* Tuck the tailbone
* Lift and open the chest
* Lower the shoulders away from the ears
* Reach the fingertips down like roots
* Engage, extend, and lock the arms
* Lift the chin out of the chest
* Find one steady point to gaze at
* Reach the crown of the head up toward the sky
* Focus the energy in manipura chakra
* Activate vayana vayu
* Activate uddiyana bandha

A lot is going on for "just standing." And yet, it is said that mountain pose is in all poses. Stick pose is horizontal mountain. Warrior 3 is levitating mountain. Half Moon is horizontal, rotated, one-legged mountain. Lord of the Fishes pose is seated, revolved, double bent, hasta-bandha mountain. You get the idea.

Mountain is in everything we do.

So I set my timer and I stood in tadasana, ready for total re-alignment of my solar plexus and to feel great things.

Instead, I felt Mountain in my throat. 

Eh?

If there is one part of the body that is not engaged in tadasana, it is the throat. And yet. There was no denying that this is where I felt mountain. (To be fair, this is possibly because I was coming down with the flu & my body was gearing up to start barfing.)

The throat is the location of vishuddha chakra. It is the fifth chakra and the first of the spiritual chakras. Vishuddha aligns with the thyroid gland, so it is said that those who struggle with thyroid problems should do a lot of work within this chakra. Visuddha or "throat chakra" is the chakra of speaking & listening. 

When properly aligned, visuddha helps people speak truth honestly & with love. When imbalanced, practitioners have a difficult time being honest, voicing their reality, speaking up for themselves, and listening to what others are saying.

It could be no mistake that I felt vishuddha chakra, even if I wasn't supposed to. 

I hate confrontation. At work, there was a co-worker who was treating me terribly. Said co-worker has been there for many years and heads up 4 different clubs or committees, yet we have the same job title. My boss called me out about not "working together" with him, so I assume someone complained.

"No one wants to work with someone who is mean to them, Dan," I responded. Probably not the best response, but I didn't know what else to say.

It got so bad that other people noticed, and my friend Kristina even called the man, we'll call him Bill, out on it (unbeknownst to me). Bill pooh-poohed Kris's observations and said it was all in her head.

Obviously, it wasn't.

Things deteriorated to such an extent that I genuinely dreaded going to work every day & my mentor tried to convince me to transfer schools.

"Maybe after I finish Boards," I replied. "I've put too much work in at this building to start over when I'm halfway through."

I racked my brain for what I could possibly have done or said to Bill to make him act like this. Yes, I had criticized the fact that the curriculum was a mess & I couldn't understand it... but I'd given it to Cara and Stella (also 20-year teachers) and neither of them understood it either!!! And the other curriculum writers had laughed and said, "No shit! It's a disaster!! No idea why they made us write it like that." Is that why he was mad?

Or was he mad that I got so far behind my first year teaching in the building?

Or was he mad that his class sizes were bigger than mine and some of my students had requested to be moved to his sections? (He is a phenomenal and well-loved teacher)

Or was he still upset that he'd had to give up a section of 8th grade so that I could teach it?

I didn't know. I just knew that I was miserable.

One of my yoga teachers said it's important to know not only the poses of yoga and their alignment but also the benefits of practicing each.

The benefits of Tadasana are strength, grounding, and a foundational sense of Self. I thought about Therapy Elsa & what she would ask me if we were still meeting. She would doubtless say, "I wonder what would happen if you talked to your co-worker about the way he's treating you?"

The very thought caused me nightmares. Nonetheless, Krishnamacharya once said, "He who makes the effort to practise by following the correct path, he will not be deprived of the fruits of his practise."

So I did it. If I was going to practice self-confidence in Mountain pose, I needed to apply it off the mat.

"Bill," I began, "I cannot help but notice you've been deeply unhappy this year. I'm trying to be a team player, to follow the curriculum, to stay on task during meetings & take copious notes, all things you've complained about... is there anything else I can do to make things easier for you?"

MY GOD, THAT WAS HARD!!

He rubbed his face several times with both hands. "I've been really bitchy to you, and I'm sorry," he finally said. "I thought when we hired you that you'd just come in here and do exactly what I told you & teach exactly how I teach. That was probably unfair because you are a seasoned teacher."

Whale, NO KIDDING. 

THAT'S what he's been mad about this whole time? That I don't teach like him? How the hell can a person be mad about that!?!? Especially when I've been teaching longer than he has!!!!?

I was torn between wanting to scream and wanting to laugh.

Maybe I should transfer schools. But not because someone was mean to me; just so I can be myself more.

The next day, a DEEPLY unprofessional content specialist in my district sent me a string of vitriolic text messages (yes, educators are this petty). She claimed I humiliated her in front of some students. In reality, she'd humiliated herself; all I did was bear witness to it & try to remain stoic. I wanted to respond in the worst possible way!! But in an effort to ride my vishuddha and tadasana high, I merely asked her to stop texting me and to use district email if she needed me.

A few days later, I contacted her to clear the air. For a person who hates confrontation, this was extremely difficult. I decided that part of vishuddha must also be letting some things go. The content specialist said a lot of words, and I wanted to respond, "Your texts were rude, inappropriate, unprofessional, and unbefitting your station. Furthermore, at no point did you apologize for your screw-up." But what would have been the end-goal of that? You don't have to be BFFs with everyone. Maybe having a strong sense of self also means letting people spout off without taking it personally.

I'm still working on a strong sense of self. But all this happened within the last week, so I feel like I'm getting there. Maybe it takes a lot more tadasanas to become fully a bad-ass.

Maybe becoming a bad-ass SELF will be my siddhi some day :-)