Concentration

I have a yoga class on Monday and Wednesday night. I love this, I feel so great afterwards.

Tonight however it was a little bit difficult for me to concentrate! We start the class on our backs, eyes shut, slowly stretching into the class, and out of our day. That part was fine. Then we open our eyes and slowly stretch a little harder and more, gently coming into the yoga poses. Tonight I looked up into the elementary school classroom fluorescent light fixture and swore there was a three inch long scorpion In. There. Directly. Above. My. Head. As we continued on in the class, we do seated poses, hand and knee poses, and finally stand up. I glanced up, and confirmed that directly above me was a HUGE scorpion, just hanging out in the light fixture above me. I panicked a little. How could I not? It wasn't like it was off in a light fixture in front of me, no. It was right up there.

I took deep breaths, more than I usually do as we went through Warrior poses and Triangle poses. Tree pose and the other balancing poses were easier because I was really concentrating on them, and trying very much to not concentrate on that scorpion.

Class ends with savasana or corpse pose. Last week I had a hard time with this one, because my brother had just told me about another suicide, and I spent the class trying not to cry. Yoga really brings out emotions for me, that I have buried. Anyway, tonight the pose wasn't difficult, I did have a few moments of "what if the scorpion falls on me." But I made it through.

As our instructor turned the lights back on, she walked over by me to get something and I pointed the scorpion out to her. The whole class had to walk over and look at it. One girl jumped back, letting out a squeal. It made me feel very good, that I was able to make it through the class, and not worry too much.