Putting yoga to work in a time of pandemic

To borrow a phrase from the internet: what a year this past week has been.

If nothing else, it's a lesson in how quickly things can change and - fortunately/unfortunately - it's a lesson we're all learning. I hold fear in one hand, hope in the other, and I'm not sure where to place either of them.

My primary instinct is to get to work. On an emotional level, I want to comfort (because I need comfort): we’ll all be ok, this too shall pass, I'm here for you, we'll get through this. On a practical level I want to help (because I, too, need help): what do you need? What can I bring? What can I make? What can I do? All ways of saying: I don't know what I need, I don't know what to ask for, I don't know how to be constructive, I don't know what to do. Tell me. Please.

Maybe you’re stockpiling. Maybe you’re denying, or downplaying. Worst-case, or best-case scenario planning - it's all the same: fear and hope.

That we find ourselves in a collective struggle offers some consolation, but little direction.

I am trying to reconcile a deep need to move, with a profound desire to sit still. It's a yoga practice on steroids. 

All I wanted to do yesterday was walk, walk, walk, walk, walk.

All I want to do today is write.

A manifestation of feelings, jumbled - seen and unseen - settling. A tangible thought, a coherent sentence, trying to make sense of something I don't have the words for yet, but is stemming from my jaw, my throat, my chest, my stomach. Thoughts and sensations are - by turns - overwhelmingly present and anxiously absent.

I stop in the hallway, place my hands around my ribs and breathe. That body of mine is still there. 

Negative thought loops

The late Michael Stone elegantly categorised negative thought loops into three groups:

1. Not getting what we want

2. Getting what we don't want

3. Being separated from something we feel connected to.*

COVID-19 presents us with a neat triple whammy.

Not getting what we want

Toilet roll, pasta, a guaranteed income, security of a roof over our heads, comfort, a definitive answer to when all of this will be over and the right thing to do, politicians we like, politicians we trust. I was so excited to be giving a talk on 'yoga ethics in business' this week. It's been cancelled (of course). The company has been forced to make 40% of their staff redundant.

Getting what we don't want

Unpaid overtime, paid overtime, working from home, our less preferred choice of toilet roll and pasta, redundancy, self-isolation, social distancing. For a while now, I've been craving more time and more space. I'm faced with plenty of that now, but having lost over 60% of my income to get there, it's arrived in a much less attractive form. 

Being separated from something we feel connected to

Family, friends, colleagues, work, home (if we haven't been able to travel there), group exercise and physical activity. I have cancelled all face-to-face teaching until September. Am I even a yoga teacher anymore?

Withstanding the tension of opposites

Our paradigm has most definitely shifted and we need to allow ourselves time to adjust. All reactions are valid. We are scared, and perhaps the ones who say they aren't, even more so. We will adapt - certainly - but not quickly. We are in this for the long haul.

The niyama (virtue, habit, personal observance) of tapas is often translated as self-discipline, but I prefer the Stoneian (I really hope I’ve coined that) interpretation:

[T]he creative moment that occurs when we stay in the tension of opposites. Tapas, therefore, can be defined as “patience.” The practice of tapas is a practice of patience.’

- Michael Stone, The Inner Tradition of Yoga: A Guide to Yoga Philosophy for the Contemporary Practitioner, p. 76.

We can rely on each other - I believe that - but this is not a time for spiritual bypassing, false promises, ideals, and empty sentiments. Yoga might help, exercise might help, meditation might help, breathing exercises might help, but none of these things will resolve the fact that personally, locally, nationally, globally: we are going to experience a really difficult time. 

We are not going to be comfortable, but there will be moments of comfort. We will need to offer and give help: we will need to ask for, and receive, help (which is - quite often - the tougher task out of the two). Can we hold our fears alongside our hopes? Can we be patient and withstand the tension? If I'm sounding wishy-washy, think about this the next time you try to maintain physical distance from somebody in a queue for the checkout, or, more challengingly, at home.

It's time to fully engage our coping strategies (although this is not an endorsement, it can be a relief to know that even the maladaptive ones work...). I always joke that I like my yoga nitty-gritty. Well, here we are. This is it. I'm practising.

The important questions right now are:

• What can we do to look after ourselves?

• What can we do to look after each other?

• How can we contribute to an environment that limits harm?

• How can we foster the conditions to manage, and respond to, uncertainty?

• How can we make sure that we have enough; not more, not less?

• What is the right use of our energy?

• What is important to attend to? What can we afford to let go?

We are washing our hands, because it is good for others. We are maintaining a physical distance, because it is good for others. We are changing our lives, because it is good for others.

The self-improvement project is over. It's time to put our yoga to work.

If we have the resources to look after ourselves well, let's do this with some urgency. Stockpile care, not commodities and be prepared to share this out - freely, abundantly and without question - when the time comes. Our relatives, friends, neighbours, colleagues, care workers and health professionals are going to need us, even if it's just to say: "I feel scared. I don't know what to do. How do you feel? Can we bear the weight of this, together?"

*I'm sorry, I can't remember the exact episode, but I heard this in one of Michael's recorded public talks available on his podcast Awake in the World.