Drinking From the Fire Hose

We gain strength, courage and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face...we must do that which we think we cannot ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

I may have overdone it a bit. In the last 2 days, I have attended no less than four yoga classes. Four...in two days. After two days of almost no practice at all. My muscles are pretty pissed at me right now - my left hip flexor in particular. Too bad, hip flexor. Deal with it.

Four classes in two days is probably a bit much even under normal circumstances - but yesterday I really wanted to do a hot class, and I also really wanted to go to Laura's pre-choir class to get back into my inversions practice - so I did both. I'd already planned on going to Ali's anusara class tonight because immersion starts next week and if I'm going to be drenched in anusara for an entire wekend every month I should maybe, um, go to some anusara classes... but then my friend Ellie asked if I wanted to practice with her at 8am in St. Paul, and how can you say no to a friend? So I did both.

Speaking of this whole Anusara Immersion business, and of overdoing it - I'm super excited but also nervous. I'm pretty sure I know how Harry Potter felt on his first day at Hogwarts when he said to Ron, "I bet I'm the worst in the class." Not that I'm the yogic equivalent of a muggle, but I've only been practicing for a year and a half so in the grand scheme of things I'm really a beginner and I'm guessing a lot of the yogis in this immersion program have been practicing for years. [nightmares of me falling on my head while everyone else effortlessly brings their legs into full lotus while in some crazy one-armed handstand to commence...now].

Yes...I KNOW that yoga is about learning to let go of attachments and comparisons, and nobody is bad at yoga it's just where you are in your practice blah blah blah etc. I'm aware of all of this - however, the extreme perfectionist in me is very afraid of failure right now. But hey - maybe this is just another chance to practice real-life yoga and work on not worrying whether I look like a complete doofus. Before I started Business School, I heard the core curriculum referred to as "drinking through a fire hose", meaning there's just so much information coming at you it's almost imposslbe to take it all in. I spent the vast majority of my first year feeling terrified that I didn't fit in, that I would fail - I held on so hard to my fear that I missed out on a lot, both academic and otherwise. Maybe the best solution is to turn directly towards the firehose, open your arms and embrace whatever you manage to hold onto.

Could I have decided to just not do the immersion? Absolutely. But it feels like the right time - and if I've learned anything in the last few years it's that you should never underestimate the importance of listening to your gut.