How Yoga Keeps You Sane

 First off, the title of this piece is based on one very large assumption. So let’s just clear that matter up completely. The assumption is that I—the author of this article about yoga and sanity—actually am sane. It’s tempting to say the jury's still out on this, but to qualify to write this article I submitted to a battery of tests, went before a panel of experts, and just to be thorough did a few quick self-tests in some self-help books. I didn't actually buy the books, but I spent a good two hours tucked in the aisle of the Boulder Bookstore.
And apparently I did great. I was amazing. Spectacular. Record breaking. In fact this article was a bit late, simply because some of the experts who tested me wanted to speak with me privately about how extraordinarily balanced I am. I swear.
Honestly, though, if life were like the selection process for a fifth grade kick ball game—and the qualities they were selecting for were the extremely calm balanced mellow looking individuals—I would be that awkward embarrassed kid left sweating it out to the bitter end until finally—thank god—one of the two captains picked me. But you know how that goes. Everybody knows they kinda had to.
But no matter. As I understand it, each of us is a totally unique evolutionary, genetic, spiritual experiment. No one else is exactly like us. Some of us quiet, some loud, some more sensitive and wish we were less so. Some more stoic and wish we could feel more. And then some of us are pretty darn comfortable exactly where we are. But here's my second assumption: a lot of us would like to feel more balanced than maybe we routinely do. And because of this, we somehow find ourselves standing at the end of a yoga mat, listening to some tall guy with extremely long legs and a nice voice, who appears unusually concerned about the soft palette.
So why yoga?
No matter our make up, yoga is one way to learn to love the cards we were dealt. Why not love them, eh? I can tell you that the thirty some years I've been actively not loving mine, doesn't seem to actually have changed the cards. So now I'm working on the other direction. Trying to like them. Some of my cards I do actually like, then others I just as soon hide in the backseat of my car, in the seams of the seats where plastic wrappers, pennies, and dirt go to die. But sometimes those same cards we struggle with, also simultaneously contribute to the best of who we are.
Here are some of my most challenging cards—nothing extra special, they're just mine—the part of my deck that brings me to yoga:
I feel a lot. I feel a lot a lot of the time. I have a lot of energy, which gives me a lot of time to do stuff and then feel a lot about it. It appears one of my life's passions has been the following: I seem to like to worry, then criticize myself, then worry some more. Occasionally I think a couple of really solid thoughts, then I worry some more, then I worry about worrying...then I judge myself for being a worrier who worries too much. Then I worry about how I judge myself about worrying that I worry too much. Then I worry that I judge that I worry about worrying. Then I just worry. Then I get sad that I wasted so much time worrying. Then I get sad that I feel so sad. Then I am disgusted that I felt so sad about worrying. Then I fantasize about a couple of things about myself and then about a couple of other people. Then I work for a while and have a couple of really good thoughts. Then I notice I'm hungry. And then I start thinking about death and how we are all going to die sooner than we'd like. Then I think about how I hope I don't have cancer. Then I have a bunch of thoughts about how I wish my mother didn't have Alzheimer’s. Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I pick the callous on my thumb.
And here's a scary thought. They gave a person like me a bachelor’s degree. And a master’s. And a job. And a driver’s license. And I'm allowed to vote. Run for office. Run the PTA.
Then I step on my mat. And you know what happens? It’s magic.
I start to worry.
Why does my forward bend suck so hard? Could someone look and see if there's like crazy glue in my back? Or is it because I'm holding my grief there? Is that grief that's making me look like the hunchback of Notre Dame? And the woman next to me of course. She doesn't look like a hunchback. She's a goddess. And look at that tattoo. God that's sexy. Should I get a tattoo? What if I don't like it later? Am I rooting my feet evenly on the floor? God I'm fat. I wish I was already in savasana. Wait, no I like this part. That feels good when my body feels more elastic. Oh rats, I hate Warrior II. Was that five breaths? I’m not sure. Let's call it five breaths. Maybe that was four... what's wrong with me that I care if it’s four or five. Why am I in a rush? Oh god. The guy next to me is making some weird noise. What IS that NOISE? Seriously what in the WORLD is that noise?
Now what's the difference between that and any other part of my day? It is a commitment to myself, working with my nervous system, my particular random combination of genetic material, to witness being a person. Being a person who wants to be successful at this stuff called living. And by success here I don't mean putting big numbers on the scoreboard, or being picked first for the million different versions of adult kickball out here in the world. By success I mean being comfortable in my own skin—which also means comfortable with the discomfort. Yoga teaches me to be the person who can recognize those thoughts about whether I should I paint my toenails or not. Or why doesn't he want me? All those thoughts are just one part of the passing show.
Those thoughts aren't me. There's not actually anyone there with whom to talk. Firing of synapses that will fire, now, and again. And when I'm lucky I can see it as such. And with each time on the mat, I get to recognize how crazy it all is. And that feels sane. Incredibly, marvelously sane.
You hear a lot of people out there talk about how "relaxing" yoga is. But that's not how I would describe it. It reminds me of learning to hike off trail. Like bushwhacking, the internal terrain can be confusing, with dense vegetation, where you find yourself stuck in the trees, where even a good map is of no use to you. And sometimes there are objective hazards that you have very little control over—rock fall, big rivers, avalanches.
With experience, the terrain doesn't get any less complex -- there are still thick patches, and you are guaranteed to lose the clear ridgeline and bottom out landing in some thorny rosehip bush cursing like a sailor. But over time you can move more smoothly through that same messy terrain.
As I can see looking at the details of my life, the terrain hasn't gotten any less hazardous, but a practice like yoga provides an opportunity to lay down new clearer pathways. Now I don't know if any hard research has been done about this, but here's my third assumption: Yoga practice actually helps lay down new neuronal pathways—where our minds (not just our bodies) become stronger, more adaptive and better suited for life’s demands.
Because, lets face it: whether life is more like a bushwhack, a kickball game, or high stakes poker, they all have the potential to both exhilarate you or knock the mula right our of your bunda. It could go either way. But yoga helps me keep my eye on the ball, crawl out of the bushes, and deal.