As Handstands Mirror Life

My baby sister stood in a glass box the size of a long gone, street side phone booth.  She was seven years old.  We were visiting the mall in the city where my grandparents had relocated - Spartanburg, South Carolina.  She had been chosen from a crowd of people that had gathered around the booth in curiosity.  I don't know if they thought they were being clever choosing a young kid for the show.  If they did, they had never encountered a kid like my sister.

She wore a mix of fear and excitement on her face.  They closed and sealed the door to the box.  As soon as it was secured, they turned on a blower that shot a high force of air up from the bottom of the box.  Her hair blew.  Then, they released the cash.  A combination of bills, mostly ones, blew all around her.  The timer began.  She had thirty seconds to grab all she could hold and stuff into her clothes.  If she was lucky, she'd snag the hundred dollar bill.

She reached and grabbed faster than I had ever seen her little, chunky kid body move.  Most of the bills flew out of her reach, but she didn't focus on what she couldn't get.  She kept all the effort close.  She clutched and snatched the money like all our lives depended on it.  I can't remember how much she had when she left the box.  I just remember how impressed everyone was with the amount.  They said, "She might as well have grabbed that Benjamin!" 

That scenario was a dream for two little girls raised in the hollers of southeastern Kentucky.  We continuously heard the adults around us lamenting the fact that there was never "enough" money.  Leah, my sister, took that bull of a once in a lifetime chance by the horns, and moved with all the precision of a master bull rider.  You don't give half an effort at any opportunity to earn money, gain recognition, or otherwise get a leg up when you come from a place so close to the earth.

Today, while practicing my adho mukha vrksasana, commonly known as the handstand, I realized that I had lived my entire life embodying the energy that Leah had in that glass box... fully aware of the glass ceiling.

Everything that required and effort or attempt from me received 100%.  100% of frantic, desperate, overly zealous, hurried, raging fire me until I burned out.  I felt the need to seize every opportunity that I felt confident I could use to achieve.  It didn't matter what I was achieving, as long as people would think it was good.  I'd give it my best regardless of whether or not it spoke to my heart or fed my soul.  I'd do it simply because I could.

I've only recently started working to achieve a handstand after seventeen years of yoga practice.  Unlike those opportunities I mentioned seizing before, I never felt like I could succeed at handstanding.  It was much like math to me.  Math feels like an alien language.  Handstanders always appeared to have this ease and control of their bodies that I didn't believe I could ever possess over my own.  By the time I wanted to give it a sincere try, I feared that at 40, I'd have lost the ability to train my body for the shape.

With the discovery of an amazing individual and world renown yoga teacher, Dylan Werner, my interest in creating the ability for my body to float and fly grew.  I bought the online yoga platform (Alo Moves) where he hosts his virtual classes this passed January, and began the journey.  

Pincha Mayurasana - Forearm stand

Dylan isn't the only teacher offering classes on the app, and soon I was saw another instructor, Melini Jesuadson, who offered specific handstand conditioning and training.  She was trained in the Cirque du Soleil tradition, and made it look so doable.  I picked up that program a month ago.  I train strength and mobility with Dylan and a few others.  Proprioception, approach and form is covered in Melini's program.  I continue with my regular asana, pranayama, and meditation practice.  

In the class of the series Melini calls Handstands with Wall, she talks a lot about fear.  What creates it and how to work passed fear.  She suggests that a handstand practice can tell you a lot about your personality and your approach to life, especially challenges.  Seeing handstanding as unattainable for so long gave me the impression that there wasn't much more that I could learn about myself and my body from its practice that I couldn't learn from doing foundational asanas like Warrior II.  From the first time I worked through that class, I decided to use the practice as a tool to help me pin down patterns of behavior, my inner voice, and ways in which I react to challenges that I cannot readily meet.  The practice of handstand would be the alchemical process for understanding these aspects of myself and transforming them into something more useful.  It's been amazing.

That brings me back to the story about my sister.  My quest and self imposed obligation to take on every opportunity to earn money or credentials, like my sister's money grabbing adventure, is indicative of a scarcity experience creating a scarcity mindset.  Growing up knowing that there was no and never was going to be a nest egg drew out the drive to grapple for those opportunities.  It's common among people where I come from.  It's basic sense of survival.  Leah and I were taught that our mind was our best asset for providing a good life for ourselves.  It was a combination of education and achievement that would secure a comfortable life.  Our mother hoped too, that we could make ourselves attractive enough to possibly marry up.

In 2012, according to a health issues poll conducted by the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, eastern Kentuckians believed that their children would be worse off financially as adults than they are by a rate of 61%.  I know that fear was real for my family growing up in the 80s and 90s.  We were always encouraged to do well in school, go to college, and leave the mountains.  Based on some comments female adult family members made to me and teasing in school, I decided early on that my looks could get me nowhere.  I had to rely on brains.  I had to use every available space to prove myself worthy of being chosen.  Being from eastern Kentucky, I better never turn down a good opportunity to earn my keep whether or not it would be through a means I was passionate about and felt drawn towards.  Another good, or better opportunity may never come.  The grass is never greener.  Accept the blessings you're given and be content.  I've never been content in traditional roles, in the rat race, or selling my soul to the machine. 

In my 40 years, I've labeled myself by many reliable career paths, personal achievements, and "acceptable" female roles.  I put my truest dreams on hold to earn an income, support my partner through his schooling and apprenticeship, making mothering and homeschooling my primary identity, and finally by trying to create self employment in areas where I didn't question my capability to do the work and accomplish goals.  I never had a blueprint or example of doing what I really longed to do, being a writer, workshop creator, and public speaker as a livelihood.  For those who made it doing those things, it appeared as if by chance.  A lucky stroke.  A shot in the dark.  How does a woman in a holler in eastern Kentucky ever become noticed by 

the outside world who could make it happen for her?  After many rejection letters for my short stories, I had to give my time more to making a real living and raising kids.

To land yourself in handstand there are variables that must have your attention.  If any one component is off or unrecognized, you find yourself using a lot of energy without ever holding your body upside down.  At worst, you'll fall feet over head on your ass.  Every time I had randomly attempted handstand, I did so wishing that my brute strength would see me through and something would click.  Like training wheels on a bike, I was too ornery to use a wall.  I've fallen many times flat on my back, even the side of my face.  It was as if in every approach I was setting out to prove myself right.  Handstands were not possible for me, therefore I could justify it as not being part of my practice no matter how far I advanced my physical abilities.  It was like my dream of being a writer.  I was unlikely to score through serendipity.  My effort needed to be toward achievable goals.

It turns out that handstanding can be learned through a variety of clear methods.  Step by step.  Body awareness.  Fun daily practice.  I'm learning to be an upside down tree.  Rooting into the ability to trust and believe in the unseen.  Proprioception.  Tangibly dreaming that in my middle age, I too will float and fly.

Everything I've done, I've relied on my intellect and a force of effort to see me achieve.  Because of that, I have kept goals smaller than the dreams of my heart, focusing on the obstacles and practicalities of life instead of potential for finding my purpose.  We're now living in an era where it could be easier than ever before to find yourself making a livable wage as a writer and speaker on topics of personal growth and spiritual awakening.  Many times I tried, taking the risk only when I was sure I could recoup from the pain of the fall.  Taking the similar more pragmatic offers, always getting me close, but never the cigar.  There is a way.  A plan.  A means to see my dreams alive under my hands and in the sound of my voice speaking to curious hearts.

I stand feet together, hands shoulder width apart on my mat, and wrists in one line.  I draw my navel in and up, lift my pelvic floor, and tuck in my lower ribs.  I lock out my elbows and lift through my chest.  From flat feet, I bend both knees, and spring with control off both feet.  I push the ground away with my hand.  I tuck up and find my big toes against the wall.  I point my toes, press my ankles together, and squeeze my butt.  I check core engagement.  Arms straight.  Eyes focused on the mat between my thumbs.  All this I have practiced also laying down.  One step at a time.  Daily practice until I am practicing in the center of the room.