Ashtanga yoga is my anchor. Yoga is my heart.

Last week I practiced Ashtanga at the home studio of my friend, Martin. A new home, a new home studio, but still built by Martin’s hands.

I used to practice regularly with Martin pre kids. Maybe a decade ago.

Vande gurunam opening chant. Joy. The familiar consonants whirling around my mouth. Tongue and jaw enjoying the muscle memory. 

Ekam inhale and off we go.

To move with the breath, in a small space with others. It’s so special. The warmth holding you in the intimacy of the studio box. Hands-on adjustments, confident, purposeful palms on the body to ease, open, guide.

The intensity of the ujayi breath, the count easing you through the asana. How the mind shuts off from all external distractions. Just this breath, this body, this now 45 year-old body moving.

I look back on my body and life of a decade ago. Pre kids, I had all the time to practice. The feelings of gratitude. Connection to body. Deepening the practice (overstretching the ligaments?).

Such fantastic teachers and their memories arise with every asana.

Utthita Parsvakonasana, 2012, sweaty Koh Samui, Michel Besnard whispers in ear: “You’re better than you think you are” and tears fall silently. There’s no hiding on a mat.

April’s toes grounding backs of heels in utkatasana.

Over the past decade this body has worked hard. It’s grown and birthed two children. 

Lax ligaments. Painful pregnancies. Record-breaking labour times.

Hours of yin melting heart on the bathroom floor to slow everything down. Days of aching shoulders afterwards.

Torpedo babies launched into serene birthing pools leaving a trail of unseen decimation inside. Nirvana album cover masking the silent damage.

Broken for years. No mula bandha. No grounding. A need for reconstruction. Surgery to fix this body. 

A week later, an unexpected emergency. Extreme blood loss. Numb fingertips. Covid masks and loneliness in A&E.

Glaring theatre lights overhead and hands clasped fiercely round throat as I surrender to going under. No tongue swallowed but the memory remains.

So utterly broken physically and mentally. Pain. No connection to body.

Learning to use the bladder again. To feel again.

Building yourself up.

Everything that children take from you. Taking taking taking your sanity, health, your body. 

But the love. Oh the love.

A loss of foundation. Unmoored. Untethered. Set adrift.

Just through the sleep loss of babies, hormones saying a massive fuck you with their nightly 3am alarm call. Heavy limbs. Heavier eyelids.

Where is the body today? What practice is possible, realistic, doable? 

Where will it be in another 10 years?

But this body knows the asana. Onto the next one. Delighting in the drishti.

And you know what? This body is strong. It’s capable. It’s a bit more battered than 10 years ago but it’s  brilliant. It’s resilient. 

More awareness of edges, fewer binds, greater acceptance, less striving.

The unison of breath and body moving is so soothing. I know this. The bliss.

Moving breathing releasing feeling. Better than therapy and cheaper too. Cathartic.

Not the external Insta perfection – no sunset cliche poses. Instead, the grittiness. The internal work. The heart opening tears in backbends.

Martin’s familiar voice coaxing you out of savasana and back to the land of reality. The cold dark January night hitting you as you reluctantly step onto slabs and out onto the silent street.

Late night dog walkers trudging along the pavement. 

The routine. The regulation. The anchor.