Where you least expect it
I can find yoga anywhere – as long as I wait for it.
And as long as I can be humble and ask for help when it's elusive.
A long time ago, my teacher was guiding me in Ardha Matsyendrasana, Half Lord of the Fishes Pose. Perfectly erect, perfectly aligned, my upper body in a perfect twist, I touched the metaphorical riverbank of my perfect pose. When I felt sated, and my mind was growing restless, I began the journey out of the pose. She motioned for me to wait. Breathe deep into your pose, she said. That’s where the yoga is.
I went traveling this February. I spent some time in Chile and Argentina, sometimes in the company of my husband and our two grown sons, and sometimes alone. It’s easy for me to find my yoga when I’m alone or with my family, but in groups of people it's harder. Staying tuned to my own frequency when I’m among many people is my challenge.
My week in Puerto Natales, in southernmost Chile (Patagonia), was a solitary traveler's dream. I explored every walkable kilometer of the little port city—its shores and streets, cafés and grocery stores. I met the locals and the tourists, families and backpackers, and stumbled through my first authentic Spanish lessons. I descended beneath the surface of the earth in the nearby Milodon Caves and toured the majestic Torres del Paine National Park. Each evening I returned to my hostel, where I was met with warmth, sweet rustic comfort, and a sense of peace. At the end of the week I noticed that my yoga mat was still rolled up and propped against the wall in the corner of my room.
During the second part of my travels the challenge to find my yoga rose up before me like a rogue wave. With my family I joined a Canadian expedition ship bound for two weeks in Antarctica and the South Shetland Islands. The ship was expertly crewed and amply sized for its ninety passengers, with generous decks, comfortable cabins, and a huge, enclosed observation lounge with chairs designed for curling up with a book and a view.
For fourteen days my eyes rested on Antarctica's calming, monochrome scenery. My lungs were transfused with pure oxygen. My body was exercised with hikes through snowdrifts and ice and along beaches of lava rock. I camped out overnight in a simple bivy sack in deep snow on an island with fellow passengers, waking to a sunrise painted bronze and apricot and other colors that I have no name for. I reveled in the sight and sounds of unspoiled, fearless wildlife. But at the same time as all of this glory I was bombarded by unexpected noise; on every excursion in the zodiacs to cruise through icebergs, to view seals and whales, or to make landings, a cacophony of comments and jokes competed with my interior voice. My hugely anticipated journey to this remote geography was a precious experience and I was jealously guarding every moment, but my private narrative was proving hard to follow. I feared losing my thoughts and my words-in-the-making to the audible narrative of strangers. I began to regard these voluble fellow passengers as thieves of the silence.
On one excursion, cruising through a vast white bay and cutting around every size and shape of iceberg, our driver brought the zodiac to a standstill and quietly announced that she was going to kill the outboard engine for five minutes so that we could enjoy the silence. It might be nice to take a moment to appreciate where we are, she said. The following five minutes, drifting voicelessly with the bergs, were precious beyond words. I hope I remembered to thank her for that.
I took my moments of silence when and where I could. During landings I ran up hillsides ahead of other hikers to stand alone in the wind with my camera on the pretext of getting a virgin landscape shot. I lagged behind to commune one on one with the penguins or to sit on a rock and watch the world blow by.
On one of the last days of the expedition we made a landing on Deception Island, an island dominated by a volcanic caldera, close to the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. We split into two groups to hike up a hill and over beaches of dark lava rock. On the return hike I found myself unintentionally trailing behind my group and walking just ahead of two expedition guides. The faster walkers were heading to the zodiacs waiting on the beach, while the other group of hikers was still making its way down a steep hillside. I fell into step with one of the guides as the other joined the rest of the group. We talked about the landscape, the journey, the places in between. I said that I was trying to find a quiet place—both inside myself and out—in the whirl of shipboard activity and the constant rustling of foulweather gear. My walking companion understood, and I sensed that she felt a similar need and the challenge to satisfy it in the face of professional obligations. We stopped to look at the lava-strewn terrain and she offered a suggestion. I'd be happy to stand here and be quiet with you for five minutes, she said. Without any rustling. We both smiled at that. We glanced at the hikers coming down the hillside. Yes, they were still far enough away to give us a few rustle-free minutes.
We stood side by side and were silent together. It was a startlingly calm and intimate experience, intimate with the air and the landscape, intimate with another human being I barely knew but shared a primal need with. I could hear the blood pulse in my ears. I could hear her breathing and I'm sure she could hear mine. I don't know how long it lasted. It was food for my lungs and my head and my soul.
Voices rang down from the path and the hikers came in view. I thanked my companion for the gift. We shared a warm hug and an exchange of some understanding before resuming our walk to the shore and waiting our turn to ride in the zodiacs back to the ship.
At the end of one particularly heavily narrated zodiac excursion I could hardly wait for my turn to get out of the boat. I marched up the gangway, pulled off my boots and foul weather gear, and kept walking up to the next deck and the next until I reached the observation lounge. There, I could usually find relative quiet as well as like-minded passengers. The lounge was blessedly empty. I wept with relief and with exasperation at my inability to transcend my annoyance. After a few minutes I noticed two people sitting quietly in the corner. I recognized one of the expedition's guest lecturers—an explorer and wildlife expert—and his partner. They were the very two people on the ship who I wanted to see at that moment. I barely knew them except for a few pleasant exchanges but I'd felt a spark of connection when we met. On the way back to the ship I'd thought of going to find them to ask if we could talk about the responsibility, the spiritual experience, the metaphysics, or simply the etiquette of observing nature and wildlife, to maybe defuse my frustration with the lack of reverence I was sensing in the jokester commentary among some of my fellow passengers. I thought they would understand. To find them here was serendipitous.
I was vulnerable, teary-cheeked, and not at all pleased with myself, but I went over to say hello. They welcomed me and acknowledged my feelings before I'd finished articulating them. They had experienced similar frustrations. The chatter…the never-ending commentary. I wondered how challenging it might be for them. I was a guest on board the ship and was free to indulge my feelings but they were required to be present in a professional role. Yet the personal—the human interiority—can't always be conveniently dismissed. Rob offered a suggestion. We'll be out of here within the hour and we might never see this again. Get yourself up to the top deck and take it all in. The ship would shortly be leaving the Antarctic region and heading up to the South Shetland Islands. When you get up to the top deck, look around you. It's all yours. Stand still and breathe and take it all in. So you can take it with you forever. Rob and Zeina hugged me warmly. Zeina wiped my cheek with her hand. I started to leave for the top deck. And I'll check in with you at seven o'clock, Rob added, with a smile.
I was very cold on the top deck without my foul weather gear and in only a sailing jacket, but it was worth it to watch the light softening. I stood above the bow, breathed deep and long to fill my lungs, then turned around and around, cramming my field of vision full of Antarctica and my ears full of freezing wind and the beginnings of the silence I craved. I breathed and turned and twisted, then spent the next minutes remembering and working back through my frustration, anger, impatience, confusion, frustration—and finally put an end to it. I blew it all out and stood perfectly still, perfectly erect, perfectly untwisted, and breathed deep into the pose.
I stayed on the top deck well into the cocktail hour. The ship motored slowly and the wind chill was just bearable. Sometimes I stood above the bow, studying the sky and the darkening icebergs, and sometimes I practiced a walking meditation around the deck. Rob didn't come to check in with me, but at one point I spotted Zeina in the twilight, leaning against the port rail, taking it all in.
