Tree-Pose and Brain-Twitter.

It’s a funny thing, Yoga.

There’s Downward Dog, Tree Pose, and Trikonasana… There’s the Cobra, Virasana, and Reverse Warrior… But amongst all these awkward, highly exposing bodily maneuvres, there’s this great art of ‘meditation’.

 Something that I haven’t quite mastered yet.

I know I haven’t mastered it, because all the meditation and “higher-self” books I’ve been reading keep telling me that to achieve full heightened awareness, “one must disengage from all thoughts”. All? I didn’t think human beings were capable of such a thing. Me especially. Aren’t we designed for complex problem solving and higher thinking? Isn’t that what sets us apart from apes?

After a great session of Iengar yoga, where my whole body is feeling intensely sore, I lie back as the lights are dimmed for “Savasana,” and I try this meditation thing once again. Back to it, honey. Learn to disengage. And I try all the tricks that I’ve been taught: imagining sifting through a sky full of clouds, conscious breathing through a light tunnel in my belly…. or quite simply… just not thinking. Eventually, I’m back where I started. My stupid little brain-world.

I’d like to shut off this brain-world at most times of the day, actually. It’s quite an inefficient part of myself. It often stops me from getting a good night’s sleep, or working to full capacity. 

There my little brain tweets the most ridiculous thoughts. And when I say “tweets”, we’re probably not too far off the Twitter variety. Meaningless crap. Or just plain fantasy daydreaming.

And all this reading to “improve my self” has taught me to live in the “now”. That’s also kind of hard when I’m constantly thinking of the past, or the future. Now? You want me to think of ‘right now’? I’m not sure that me laying on my back in a crowded hall is too interesting. However, my plans for the weekend, or the thought of holidays far far away one day, seem rather enticing, don’t you think?

And there’s the other thing: there are a whole lot of women in my class. And one guy. Who is fairly old and quite possibly only in attendance for the eye-candy. And it leads me thinking - is this “thinking” thing a female problem? And here I am, thinking again. Are women subjected to tortuous thoughts for their entire lives, whilst men are quite happy in their desolate mind-caverns?

I’ve been told it’s true; I’ve even read it in books. I have been assured that men really do have a no-thinking zone in their minds. So when they are asked, “What are you thinking,” and they say, “I dunno, nothing?” they are apparently speaking the truth. Whilst we are incredibly busy trying to find an answer to all our deep and meaningful questions about life, our male counterparts are just…. watching the footy. Or drinking beer.

So I’ve come to realise that the severe lack of men in my yoga class is because men don’t need yoga to switch off their Brain-Twitter. Because they have none. Men can get over their problems in an instant, by simply not thinking about it ever again. Which leads us women to become entirely confused and frustrated and makes us obsess over it again and again until our minds are full of pointless updates that make us angry, passive-aggressive and in intense need of saving from ourselves.

It would be so much easier to be a man. You get to go to yoga simply to perve on women. And you don’t even need to worry about it.

So here I am again, back at my first dilemma. I cannot switch off my little brain, and I have some obviously unresolved injustice issues. And so, I’m wondering if I am a Yoga failure…. or if slowly by slowly, I am gaining a little more awareness of the “self”, after all.

Isn’t recognition the first step to improvement? I think yes. And if Downward Dog leads me any closer to spiritual greatness, then let’s get those hamstrings stretching. Ugggh…. pain.