When I was working long days in tech, I completely ignored an important voice, the voice of my body. Curved over the computer, stressed about details I no longer remember, I ordered pain into the background, ordered my body to keep going. I knew that I needed to exercise, so I parked at the far edge of the parking lot and walked to the building and up the stairs to my office. I walked on the weekends and made myself take classes: aerobics, toning, even a little yoga here and there.
My least favorite part of these classes was getting down on the floor.
Getting up and down seemed like more effort than I could possibly afford. Some days just hauling myself out of the car and up the stairs to work seemed too much to ask, let alone getting down on the floor for exercises I was never sure I was doing quite right. And the floor was an uncomfortable place, hard and cold, drawing my reluctant attention to my aches and pains.
My father, no stranger to long days and work stress, had a sympathetic piece of advice he used when I told him about my frustrations: “Don’t let them get you down on the floor.” An ominous expression if I ever heard one, it seemed to imply that once on the floor the battle would be over for sure, and also that you if you let them get you down on the floor it was your own damned fault. You’ve got to be tougher, be smarter, he urged me in these conversations.
Also, especially when I was younger, I periodically had a reaction to abdominal pain combined with stress in which I would sometimes faint. Eventually I learned how to handle this peculiarity by lowering down at the first sign of trouble, usually in the middle of the night. I would wake up a few moments later, face on the cold hard floor, sorting through that jumble of images and ideas that the brain has when it’s been rebooted abruptly and is trying to spin back up. And thus the cold hard floor became associated in my mind with fainting, losing consciousness, losing control—scary things.
However as I begin my 70s I have, as Joni might have said, seen the floor from both sides now. For over a year I’ve been a daily devotee of a specialized yoga practice called Kaiut Yoga that focuses on the joints, developing strength and greater mobility, reconnecting mind, body and spirit. To my amazement, this slow-moving, meditative form of yoga has become a cornerstone of my life. As a result of my daily practice I feel stronger both emotionally and physically, more centered. I now feel much more comfortable on the floor than ever before in my life. I still experience an occasional uneasiness as I lie on it though, the vague memory of unwanted floor encounters of the past.
On the other side of 70, the floor’s sure support, its very hardness, its indisputable confirmation of the here and now, have finally made it my friend.
