RESIST AND YIELD

Well, without going into detail (but you might be able to relate), I've been a bit riled about some national level political machinations and policy implementation lately.  I have a variety of "message" T-shirts I've accumulated over the past year.  One of them says "RESIST" across the front.  I wore it to class on Tuesday.

A sister Yogi asked what I was resisting.  I said, "All bad things."  We both laughed and agreed on that being a good idea. And Karen, our Tuesday teacher, also commented, "Resist! We resist in yoga too.  And then we yield."

WOW.  For the rest of the class my mantra was "yield and resist, resist and yield".  It felt like a profound way to move through the more challenging asanas, allowing full yielding rests between times of passive resistance as muscle hugs to bone or the active resistance of holding a plank pose.  Reminding myself to resist helped me move more fully into the pose.  Reminding myself to yield allowed me to fully relax and renew in resting poses.

Then on Thursday, I went to my "strength" class at the Y.  I'm trying to fight the muscle atrophy that comes with growing older and have begun taking a free-weights class.  The instructor is a bit of drill sergeant whose voice booms through her headset mic over a pounding soundtrack of music with a heavy beat.  She's no nonsense.  We are there to work!  But she is also great at offering modifications for beginners and those of lesser muscle mass, so I find I am (surprisingly) enjoying it (mostly). I hang out in the back of the class, watching in awe as the younger women in front of me heft their 20 pound dumbbells while I give my 8-pounders a workout.

Again, in that class, I thought of the concept of "yield and resist, resist and yield".  We do three sets of various lifts, with a short rest between each set.  When I am doing my biceps curls,  flyes,  overhead presses, rows, dead lifts...whatever...I am fully engaged and determined.  I am also really looking forward to that rest period and I fully appreciate it when it comes.

Which brings me back to politics.  I have been operating under the definition of resistance as stated in Webster's:  "Resistance -- the refusal to accept or comply with something; the attempt to prevent something by action or argument".  It has been exhausting me and making me weaker as I allow the constant act of resisting to sap me of energy.  I mistakenly felt I couldn't for one minute take a break.

But I'm learning yielding is healing, both on the mat, in the gym, and in life.  Resistance makes our muscles stronger, helps us stay upright, and balanced in many ways.  But yielding; yielding allows us to recover, to find peace, to melt into gratitude.   Equal measures of resistance and rest are a recipe for success in mind, body, spirit....and politics. ©

Namaste, donnajurene
Photo Credit:  www.pixabay.com