If you know your yoga sutras, you’ll remember that Patanjali has a daunting list of ‘obstacles’ that might get in the way of practice. They are general issues like illness, doubt, laziness, carelessness. They’re so universal I think we can all identify with them at one time or another. We might also make a modern world addendum to this list involving more practical concerns like childcare, late-running meetings, traffic jams, not to mention boxed sets and comfy sofas. There are so many things that can make getting to yoga class more of an effort than it need be. We do love to complicate things. Perhaps there’s a human need to create obstacles for ourselves so we can then get the reward of overcoming them!
Just recently the difficulty I’m having with yoga is even more trivial than these mundane concerns. It’s my hair! Specifically my very long, very thick hair. How do I tie it up so it doesn’t get in the way when I practice? As a braid or ponytail, it is now so heavy that it literally pulls me off alignment in standing poses — as I move it’ll suddenly swing past my eye and unbalance me. And the day I put it up into a neat bun I went to a class was all about headstand and I had to rethink the topknot idea mid-sequence — or learn to levitate upside-down.