I've been in and out of psychologists' and psychiatrists' offices since I was eighteen years old. I have used just about every hard-core and soft-core drug at least once and some to the point of addiction. I have debated bankruptcy on a couple of occasions. There was a time in my life I gave myself to every man that was interested just to boost my self-esteem for a couple of hours. I have been physically and sexually assaulted. I have had a gun held to my head. For years, and sometimes still, my favorite activity was planning my suicide and how best to make it look like an accident so that my parents wouldn't be as ashamed as I imagined they'd be if I just swallowed a bunch of pills. (My favorite plan was a car accident: a road with a sharp almost 90 degree turn that happened as it brushed the edge of the Intracoastal Waterway in a less developed area, late on a rainy fall night. Drowning appealed to me, for some reason. The slow ebbing out of life. The excruciating burning of my lungs. My ears filled with the sound of my own pounding heart and the rush of water. I had it planned down to the date.) I was too much of a coward to ever go through with it. I still am.
I am morbidly obese. I have hypothyroidism, chronic clinical depression (my psychiatrist told me last year never to stop taking anti-depressants again), and am running very close to needing to be medicated for high cholesterol and high blood pressure. My menstrual cycle has never, I repeat NEVER, been regular and has, at various points in my life, caused me to have to take iron supplements for anemia. I have migraines. I have had blood clots. When I was 14, a skateboarding accident dislocated my hip-- I never sought medical attention and it took several years before I regained a full range of motion in it; I walk perceptibly off balance because of it and suffer mild but constant lower-back pain. I have dislocated my shoulder in a game of basketball.
More recently, I fell down some rather steep concrete stairs and rather seriously pinched my sciatica which has caused me some pretty serious lower back and leg pain (though I did get to try muscle relaxers for the first time. Those were fun). My knees got so bad this summer that I could barely make it up and down stairs. My feet suddenly started bothering me this summer to the point that I could not walk without a significant limp. Worse yet, type one diabetes runs on my mother's side and type two on my father's. Since I was young, doctors have considered it only a matter of time before I have it too. I eat atrociously and have been diagnosed with eating disorders. I binge eat, starve myself, have taken laxatives and diuretics, have taken ephedrine and any pill or vitamin advertising that it boosts metabolism. There have been endless swallows of thick, tinny, artificially-flavored Slim-Fasts, Weight Watchers meetings, microwaved Lean Cuisines, and contemplations of plastic surgery. There have been gym memberships that were used for about two weeks and then abandoned. There has been forced vomiting, cutting, and deliberate over-medication.
I suffer from agonizing self-consciousness that makes being in public places a significant trial. Social anxiety has plagued me since I was a child. I hate exercise mostly because I hate gyms, exercise clothes, and I especially hate people. Well, not people but the public. Only once in my life have I ever been able to achieve much through exercise and that was when I had a treadmill in my bedroom and a stack of Power Yoga videos. Unfortunately, a bout of severe depression killed my exercise drive, and try as I might, I've never gotten it back.
I need something. And I don't know what. I decided to get my Master's and now my Ph.D., and though I was accepted to more than one program, I'm afraid I chose the wrong one. Since I came to be where I am now, I have struggled with the longest running, deepest bout of depression I have ever endured. I will avoid the specifics for now; suffice it to say that I have been mentally and physically paralyzed with deep anxiety, panic attacks, fear, anger, self-loathing, and self-consciousness. My psychiatrist keeps telling me I need to exercise in order to control the anxiety and anger. My doctor keeps telling me I need to exercise in order to lose some weight. I kept trying at private clubs, my apartment complex gym, and at the student recreation center on campus, but I felt as though every eye in the place was on me, judging me, criticizing what I was wearing, how I was exercising, and what exercises I chose to do. Now, there is a part of me that understands that this is not the case. However, what my brain understands and what my heart feels are two very different things, and the sense of panic and self-consciousness always takes over. Inevitably, I leave in tears and head towards the nearest high-fat, high-calorie, high-sodium comfort food I can find.
This summer I read an article about Bikram Yoga. *Disclaimer* I in no way endorse, support, or claim any allegiance with either Paige Williams or Oprah. In fact, I kind of hate Oprah's show and even more so her magazine, television network, and book club selections. But that's neither here nor there. I just stumbled across the article and was fascinated. Anyhow, I was interested, looked up a few more things about Bikram Yoga, and then put the idea out of my head mostly because of the cost.
It haunted me though. I thought back on what I had learned both from reading about the practice, studies about it's benefits or lack thereof, and about its controversial founder, Bikram Choudhury. It was unlike the yoga I had practiced before. In fact, I had rather gotten interested in the yoga lifestyle a few years ago but was never able to make the principles fully mesh with my own, mostly, I think, because of the irregularity of my practice. At any rate, when the summer was over, I decided I would give it a shot. On the Bikram Yoga site is this quote from Choudhury:
It struck a chord with me. I realized I had written myself off. Not necessarily because I was too old or too sick but because I just didn't like myself. I wanted to start from scratch. The idea of reshaping myself emotionally, mentally, and physically appealed to me. I wanted to sculpt myself-- not in the sense of shaping my muscles or defining my waistline, though that may be part of it eventually. I wanted to re-sculpt my whole life. I have long lived with the sense that if something is meant to be, it will happen. And I don't not believe that, but it has, in recent years, given my life a feeling of being out of control. I feel as though almost everything I've been doing is trying to please someone else: make amends to my parents for being a bad child, make amends to my friends and lovers because I asked too much of them in asking that they fulfill me and lend my life purpose. No, I want control of myself now. If I could get that control, then that was going to be worth every single penny I put into it. And I felt, I feel, like I can get that in Bikram Yoga.
The first class I spent most of the time sitting or lying on my mat trying not to throw up and not to pass out. The instructor called it Bikram's Torture Chamber, and I wholeheartedly agreed (and still agree). For those of you unfamiliar with the practice, it involves practicing a sequence of 26 postures in a room heated to 105 degrees and 40% humidity. I have never sweat so much in my life. Never. And the room has a perpetual odor of sweat (it's not strong or particularly unpleasant, but for the uninitiated, it can be startling at first) and no wonder. I watched the men and women practicing in front of me lose enough water through their skin to irrigate my garden. I overheard a fellow student say after class the other day that she wondered that a cloud didn't form in the room and start to rain, and I believe that one day it will be a distinct possibility.
It was the heat that got me on the first class. When I left, I swore that I would not go back. No sane human would care to endure that voluntarily. That class kicked my ass. Hard. But after class a woman came up to me and said, "Congratulations. You've just done something really wonderful for yourself." Her words stuck with me for the rest of the day and still do.
And she was right. For the rest of the day, I had this loose feeling in my back, neck, hips, and shoulders. I felt calmer and more focused. Doing my work didn't seem like something I had to gear myself up to do; instead, it was just something that needed to be done, and it seemed easier to just go ahead and do it than fret about it and not do it. I had a feeling of peace and calm, and the power of language completely fails me when I try and describe where it may have come from or how I reached it. It just was.
I went back the next day. I felt like a masochist and a glutton. I couldn't fathom, and still can't some days, why I go back. I just get my ass handed to me over and over and over again. The second class was just as awful and difficult. And I continue to go back and each time I'm astounded by how hot it is and how much I am sweating and how much I would like to just throw up and leave the room. Some postures make me dizzy and others make me nauseated. Camel pose, for reasons I do not understand and do not think Western science could explain, brings so much emotion welling up in me every single time that it's everything I can do not to cry. But I don't cry (though I could. With all the sweat, who would know the difference?). I don't leave the room. I make it through every class, all 90 interminable minutes, though I have yet to make it through a class without having to sit down or lie down.
Every day I get up and debate with myself: Am I going to go back to Bikram Yoga today? The sore muscles in my legs and shoulders shout, "Hell No!" My brain is like, "The heat! My god the heat!" And my heart always says, "Go do something good for yourself from yourself."
I've only been a few times. I need to go more. I even am at the point where I had a conversation with a fellow student about how to move from a few classes to an actual practice. Part of me feels masochistic. But it's the only exercise I've found where I can walk in the room and not feel judged by other people. I don't feel like everyone is looking at me. They're too busy looking at themselves in the mirror trying to figure out how to twist one leg around the other leg and one arm around the other arm for Eagle Pose. And I don't feel like the instructor is judging my inability but rather observing my success and offering opportunities to improve. Overall, the generosity of spirit and motivation that I get when I enter the studio is unlike anything I have ever experienced. I have never heard anyone say a bad thing to anyone else; I only hear compliments and words of encouragement.
It's such a positive space-- the exact opposite of where I spend the rest of my day struggling in my doctoral program that seems to be designed to tear me down in every way possible and leave me weeping until I'm nothing left but a puddle on the floor. It seems a gatekeeping strategy designed to create an intellectual exclusivity-- an idea I fully reject. At Bikram, I feel torn down, physically, mentally, emotionally but not to be left that way. Bikram tears me down in order to rebuild a better me. And the best thing about it is that I don't feel compelled to rebuild to be like someone else. The Bikram Yoga instructor doesn't model poses but only speaks a dialogue. I don't feel like I have to do as well as the instructor, nor do I feel as though I'm falling short. As my instructors say, "Your practice is your practice. Each day is different. Do the best you can do today." They also quote Bikram as saying that "you are your own true teacher."
The rhetoric of Bikram Yoga is fascinating, both the instructional dialogue and the talk that circulates in the studio. I can never shut off the part of my brain that has been trained, these long years in the university, to critically examine everything that is said. So there is much that is said at which I smile and nod and leave be. But I listen carefully to the talk and to my body and the rhetoric that seemed absurd before begins to make sense now. I understand, though maybe not with my mind. My instructor says, "Lose your mind."
The benefits are innumerable. After my seventh class, I feel stronger. The class is so comprehensive in that it requires everything of me: mentally, physically, and emotionally. And I feel like I get everything back that I put in and then some. I can hold my arms up longer and my balance is improving. I make it through more and more postures. When I lie on my back, I can actually feel that my spine has changed position a tiny bit as the pressure points have changed. My knees don't hurt as much nor does my back. I am clearer and more focused all day. I have a ton more energy than I remember ever having in recent years, and I accomplish much more during a day. I have aches and pains but the kind that make you feel good about yourself, like you've done a good, hard day's work. I spend a great deal less time in mental reflection. I used to spend most of my days staring at the wall crying or trying to motivate myself. I feel more emotionally stable, happier, more content. My skin is clearer and cleaner. I drink water now-- I almost never did before. I crave it. I eat better because I want to eat better, because eating better makes me feel good. Before fatty, high-calorie foods made me feel better...and sleepy. But after Bikram Yoga, I find myself avoiding meats and cheeses in favor of fruits and vegetables, especially ones with a high water content. I don't want anything heavy on my stomach. I ate a cheeseburger the other day and felt very, very sick.
I no longer want to lie in bed all day and hide. If I have a bad faculty meeting, a bad class, or something bad happens, it barely touches me now. A few weeks ago, it would have sent me to my room to hide under the covers and cry. Bad things just seem to roll off me now. I am much less quick to be irritable and frustrated; I listen better and thus communicate better. I'm more open to the world and to the people in it now that what they do and say doesn't injure me quite so deeply. Bikram Yoga has taught me about the power of group energy and communication, so now when I walk across campus and see everyone listening to their MP3 player or engrossed in talking or texting someone else instead of communicating with each other, I understand how deeply destructive that lack of connection can be.
Most of all, I feel excited about the future. I'm no longer looking to friends and lovers to give my life purpose. I am in control of my mind and my body. Any voids or senses of loss are my own to fill. Instead of being oppressed by an indefinable need, I am excited by the prospect of all that I can use to fill it.
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