No, this isn’t a post about the latest tyre puncture* I got whilst doing fieldwork last week.
This is a post about how I’ve been feeling for the past few weeks: flat.
I am shortly going on a yoga intensive -which I have been looking forward to all year – and I’m not excited in the slightest. I am not interested in work, I am not interested in going to the gym (although I have dramatically increased the amount of running I’m doing). I’m not really interested in watching TV or reading books. I’m not much interested in anything at all. Apart from wasting time on the internet. Which I suspect has become an addiction.
Most of all I am worried about my lack of interest in going to the gym.
I’ve been going to the gym -to group fitness classes and doing weights-at least 5 times per week for 23 years. This is twice as long as I’ve been doing yoga. When I think about it, I’ve been teaching gym classes for 20 years!
Now, I am just not interested. Even in Pump, which is the best, most effective class in the whole world.
This really worries me.
You see, I rely on Pump to keep me athletic and strong. I can see my muscles fading (no, they don’t turn into fat – just like apples don’t turn into oranges). But I just can’t make myself go.
And no, I’m not putting on weight – afterall, I’m running and doing yoga (ok. I am still doing Body Attack a couple of times per week). To be truthful, I’m losing weight because of muscle shrinkage. Not that I have any extra weight to lose. Last time I weighed myself, I was 47kg ( before you say bitch! or something like that, please note that I am only 157cm or 5 ft 2 inches tall – about the size of a 12 year old!).
I really want the enthusiasm for the gym, for well … everything to come back.
I’ve noticed over the past few months that I’ve been really tired. For the past 3 weeks, I’ve had a lot of trouble sleeping which has made me even more tired and feel less like going to the gym.
Then there’s the politics of instructing and the demands of teaching which I’ve written about in a previous post. This does not make me feel like going at all. There are two other gyms in town -one of which has even worse politics and one which doesn’t have the Les Mills classes that I love, so I don’t really have much of a choice.
Maybe I just need a break. Maybe I should just accept that everyone goes ‘flat’ once in a while … but I’m flat in every part of my life it seems.
Maybe there is something wrong with me…
Or is it just that time of year?
*In case you’re wondering (you probably weren’t), I average about 2 flats per year, remarkable given the kinds of off-road driving I do during my work.
AnthroYogini 
Hey… you need to give yourself a break!
Is this yoga intensive with the teacher you’ve told me about? The one you feel very connected to? Even if its not…
Very often before I go on retreat – and this is an experience many of my fellow yogis have too – weird shit starts to happen.
Listening to you talk about losing interest in everything… well that sounds very familiar. Often when the kundalini starts to move again, interest in every day life goes away.
This can make some people can feel like they’re going mad. Others start to contemplate death alot more than usual. What I’m saying is its not unusual before some sort of big teaching to have your energy states messed around with.
Its often the beginning of a series of changes you won’t fully understand til after you’re back home. Its not always smooth and easy, unfortunately! But believe it or not, its a good thing… your world view is being re-shaped.
Perhaps I’m wrong and perhaps its something else. I’m just sayin’, is all…
I hope you have a wonderful intensive and that you return refreshed, envigorated and re-engaged in the world! Although if you don’t, I wouldn’t worry about that either.
After all, everything is temporary.
Namaste & *hugs*
Thanks Svasti. I hope you’re right. I’ver just been feeling so blah! about everything.
Although I suspect the problems I’ve been having with sleep – which often foretell a period of depression for me- might have something to do with it.
Nah, this isn’t the other teacher -I have to wait until May next year for that one- this is a teacher training intensive with John Olgivie (Byron Bay Yoga). I’m sure it’s going to be very intense and not at all easy – like other intensives I’ve done.
I guess the gym thing has really got me miffed … I can’t even walk in the place.
LOL – that makes me laugh – being miffed because you can’t go to the gym!
Y’know, the break down of what we think is imporant – things like having nice muscles, working out regularly… sometimes these perceptions of ourselves need to be stripped away. And we don’t always get a choice about when that happens. And that’s when the struggle kicks in!
It doesn’t have to be your other teacher for kundalini to stir either.
Do enough physical yoga and things start cooking anyway… and if this intensive is going to be full on, then John Ogilvie could already be stoking the flames in preparation, you know?
Sure, it might possibly be depression too. But I recall very vividly my trip to San Fran for the 2007 retreat. I had problems sleeping for at least three weeks before I left. It didn’t stop me getting up and being totally hyper either. I just couldn’t sleep – or I had very ‘out there’ dreams which was the same as not sleeping.
Also, depression in and of itself can just be movement of energy in a different way.
Wait til you get back to see how you feel. You might just surprise yourself! 🙂