hot yoga makes my eyeballs sweat

i was planning on going to the 6:00am efficient class today, but i just wanted (i won't say that i just *couldn't* make myself get up at 4:50) to sleep later. it worked out that i could go to two classes tonight (girls, does that count for day 12 AND 13? ;)). i chose to go to hot and yin.

i've only shared this blog with my 40 day group and a few loved ones. today, after a friend read my first post, i received one of the most touching emails i've ever received. i carried around snippets of that email in my head throughout the rest of my day.

a portion said that no matter what i've been through in my life, i am a strong person. as i was shaking while holding poses tonight, i said to myself that i am strong. even though i couldn't (yet!) hold (or attempt) certain poses, i am strong. i am using the body that God has given me. i am making it the way He intended. i am using MY body to improve myself, to make me sweat, to make me strong. i am using MY body that gave me my beautiful girls. my practice is mine. i am constantly becoming stronger in the physical sense, like i am strong in the non-physical. i am different than anyone in the studio. i am me, and they are them. we each push our body as far as we can. but i'm not going to automatically assume i can't do something just because of how i look. i AM strong.

during our class, the speakers stopped working. the sound of rachel's instructions and the calm breathing (um...panting? ;)) were all we could hear for awhile. at the end of class, when we went into corpse pose (i can't remember the real term), rachel tried the speakers again, and "have a little faith in me" was on. now, i don't know if that was going to be the next song anyway had the speakers not gone out, or if she turned that song on especially for the end of class. i'll believe the former...

as i lay there, trying to calm my breath and just BE (which is hard for me), i heard snippets of the song... i know it's not intended this way, but i'm going to have a little faith in ME.

so tonight? as the song was playing, feeling the cool cloth on my head, and as i was laying in puddles of my hard-earned sweat, i wasn't just tearing up as i sometimes do while practicing yoga. tonight? full on heaves.

thank you, rachel, for a wonderful class.