Practising in a World of Impossible Standards
This talk was given live online for "Women of Ashtanga" Conference aired on the 12th July 2020. The last 5mins of the talk can be found at the bottom of this post ...
This talk was given at “Women of Ashtanga” online conference. It was aired live on 12th July 2020. Women of Ashtanga is an online Conference supporting female teachers in the Ashtanga Yoga community, more details can be found at their website www.womenofashtanga.com.
… unfortunately due to time restrictions, I was unable to finish giving the whole talk. Below is a transcript of the whole talk including what I didn’t get to say as my final message you to the organisers of this event giving a platform for women to share their knowledge and all the participants that attend from around the globe, especially the many writing in after the event sharing their stories and opening up as as result of this talk. As per your requests I have posted the complete version in writing together with the video of the talk in conference for you.
Recently something have come to my attention while organising online yoga classes and events. I’ll give some examples of what I mean.
This upset me because it was something that shouldn’t even be an issue. I’ll give examples of things I have been told recently to give you a taste of what I mean:
A practitioner and very prominent teacher, contributing greatly in her own country for many many years said to me, thank you for including me in your Ashtanga event, as a mother I haven’t practiced for awhile and now I do other things when I can, I am honoured to be considered still part ashtanga community.
Several women, whom are both long time practitioners and teachers asked me, if it was ok not to have their screens on during online sessions, because they have not practised regularly for while due to various health issues ranging from illness, menopause, depression or personal life issues. And they don't want to be seen as anything less in public, especially by students whom expect perfect physical practice from them which they are now not doing.
And this is one that hit me the hardest, one of the women pioneers in Ashtanga practice asked me if it was ok to join a led primary online if she wasn’t jumping back or thru, due to arthritis and mature age.
Beautiful women whom have dedicated many years of their lives to this practice, 20-30 or 40 years, some even certified with way over a decade of flying to India to practice, putting other aspects of life on hold, these women put in their time, should never feel the expectation and pressures of the Ashtanga community. Feeling inadequate as a result of natural life cycles and life events. It's unacceptable.
There were many more situations I was faced with like these this year and as you can see a theme was forming. Are we expected or putting pressures on our peers or ourselves that the longer you practice or teach the more perfect your asana and if not you have failed or are somewhat less? For the first time a growing number of women in Ashtanga are in uncharted territory of ageing and we have an opportunity to make that acceptable amongst each other without taking away any of the effort that has been put in during a lifetime.
As women we already have a ton of social pressures to be perfect, any mother will tell you that, hell, anyone with a mother will tell you that. From being a woman, a mother, a ceo, politician or what ever it is you do, the pressure to fail is less forgiving as a woman. We really dont need that in yoga too. No thanks. Life is stressful enough. We need to break this vicious cycle of unrealistic expectation, failure to meet expectations leading to embarrassment and insecurity, even lying in some cases to keep up appearances and back again. Then passing it on as an unresolved issue to new students, for the next generations to continue.
Ok sorry, I got abit intense and over enthusiastic 😛 I just feel really passionately about this right now, and pains me to see outstanding women who paid their dues, made sacrifices, devoted years to learning this practice, should never feel any other than confident in the community. However, I am hopeful because I know we can set precedence, to set this straight and set each other free and beyond.
The common unrealistic expectations women are put up against in life and practice are:
Practicing like a man, why is this a good thing? Being an equal doesn’t mean being exactly the same as, EQUAL is not IDENTICAL. So commonly I hear about the rights of the woman should be the same a a man… no. The rights of a woman should be what is best for a woman, what fits our agenda, our lifestyle/lifecycle and our genetics/physical constitution. These are of equal importance and need not be exactly the same as a mans. Punch like a girl? They say? Well I seek to proudly practice like a woman. Despite the fact my teacher and the person next to my mat everyday is a man, and that yoga was originally for men only, I don't seek to physically compete with them, or set their practice as the bar I need to meet, I’d be killing myself everyday if I did and yoga would be so frustrating.
The 2nd common unrealistic expectation is not accepting of our massive biological and emotional life events. Our body changes more, goes thru more fluctuations then men, and they need to be accommodated and accepted. This #practiceeverydamnday ? Dude whatever. Dont beat yourself up. This is not a religion and guilt shouldn’t have a place in it. If you #practiceeverydamnday thats awesome but how is that supportive to the women around you?
Am I thinking about bringing value to you if I #makemoneyeveryday? Do you feel inspired or did I just make you feel bad on the days you didn’t. If someone makes money everyday they don’t need to tell you about it. As women, in life we juggle more, especially if you are married, a mother or look after your elders, you have a ton of responsibility. People depend on you. We juggle more not because its unfortunate, but because we are better at it. It is ok if you dont practice everyday, or if you left practice for a couple years cause it was too much raising a newborn or new job. You aren’t any less of a female practitioner, you didn’t fail, or now out of an Ashtanga community, it is what makes you a woman practitioner, because when you can you do it, and you do it for yourself. If you practice everyday great! If you practice when you can great! Hey ladies, if you didn’t practice today or for couple years because life got in the way no worries, what matters is you are here today and we are all here for you! News Flash: If you are doing now half or less what you used to, that makes absolutely no difference to the lives of anyone. But the fact you are still trying to do something will make all the difference to you.
Balance & Acceptance
I once came across an Ashtanga teacher that admitted he devoted so much to being on the mat at the sacrifice of being present in his marriage and birth and raising of his children, and regretted he never found balance, for the rest of his life after losing them. We must strive for both balance & acceptance. Balance; It is more important to be a better human than a better asana practitioner. Acceptance; Shit happens, tomorrow is another day to try.
Here’s a reality check, yoga was originally for men, our practice was created by a man using his experience. Nothing wrong with that, it's just history and its neither positive or negative but a simple fact. Nobody knew women would be practising this practice in the numbers today, and on top of that doing it everyday for decades when it was created. Ashtanga Yoga is still an amazing system, and accepting this reality is important so we don’t kill ourselves to meet an expectation nobody had in mind for you. We are the first women ever in the centuries, rather millenia of human civilisation of women that are practising this practice for this many years… we are the experiment! How cool is that?! I’ll give you an example, in the last online conference Paramaguru Sharath Jois had for Asia, a question was submitted to him about menopause. He answered that he has no direct experience with that and therefore no answer, and that when it comes to matters deeply personal and specific of women he will not know from personal experience and depends on experienced women practitioners to share it with him. It was fantastic to hear him be so honest, truthful and not have the need to have all the answers. It was egoless and factual. And thats ok, its true reality. We are the first lifecycle of women living today that have practiced for decades in our lives thru adulthood, career, pregnancy, into menopause and beyond… 100yrs ago this never happened.
*Some Perspective* : I mean really, nobody's ladies holiday is actually finished in 3 days, and the suffering is usually before the 'ladies' actually happens, but hey, thanks guys for considering it. If u need go ahead take a day off beforehand or you might just explode on the mat from bloating in a twist, you aren’t being rebellious, you are being a woke practitioner.
The End Of The Talk I Didn’t Get To Say…
Why is this important? Because when we are able to see this, be aware of it, we have perspective, most importantly acceptance of ourselves. And we begin to recognise other women going thru the same, therefore compassion for each other arises, this leads to confident secure women, not needing to pretend to be anything for anyone, whom are able to truly lift each other up instead of competing with other men and women.
There is no need to compete with anyone, it only creates insecurity and false impossible standards few are actually meeting long term. By working on true self confidence (not overconfidence which is ego related), but a true self confidence as a result of awareness, compassion and acceptance, we create a community that is a truly supportive one. One that has no judgement, one that is not self serving. Everything you do is ok when you are trying your best. You dont need to be the same as or better than another.
If we continue to set unrealistic and impossible to meet standards we will continue to hear more of “I stopped practising Ashtanga Yoga because I couldn’t keep up with it in my later years” or worse students whom practiced for a long time starting to blame and hate the practice, their teacher and/or Mysore just because they cant perform as they used to, despite commonly told that this is more than just an physical asana practice. These are things absolutely nothing with the Practice, but everything with how we misunderstand it, and continue to proliferate it thru an unreachable rhetoric that nobody themselves are able to meet reasonably longterm within a full human lifecycle. Being a lifelong practitioner means knowing when to step away, having confidence it will always be there when you want to get back to it and as we mature into the practice after decades means understanding that when and what we do as an Ashtanga Yoga is a practice is to create a more meaningful life and not for us to turn it into an obligation to fulfil as a result of guilt or social pressure. We say a lot of ‘this is not about asana’ and ‘this is a lifelong practice”, but how are we showing it? Let’s foster a message now that this is an all-inclusive practice for women and men of all ages and life situations, regardless of your physical and commitment capability and the changes these go thru. We can walk our talk by accepting ourselves, our journey, so that we can be accepting of others, we can be honest with where we are at and not need to forcefully fit ourselves into the mould of another.
“So Ladies (& Gentlemen) ... no more beating yourself up if you are doing less be it less asana or less times on the mat than before.”
Woooahhhh … A massive topic, I could talk hours more on it, I just wanted to bring up this as food for thought. Plant a seed, a seed that hopefully spreads so that we all end up finding joy and happiness thru being a woman, living a woman’s life and proudly practicing as a woman. I dont have all the answers, but when in doubt I find honesty and acceptance is a great place to start. We need to use this practice to create confident secure women practitioners in each other and in our students, where comparisons and unrealistic expectations are no longer part of our state of mind and replace it with support and acceptance. There we find unity not only as women in Ashtanga but as people.