get moving

I'm not giving anything away by letting on that the heroine in my latest book - RESCUING THE ROYAL RUNAWAY BRIDE - is a runaway bride ;). She literally jumps out of a ground floor window of a castle and runs across hill and dale in a pretty huge pink wedding dress in order to avoid marrying...well, a gorgeous prince, actually.  (But that's another story...)

I’ve never been a runner.  Or a jumper.  I have bad knees.  And low willpower when it comes to purposely inflicting discomfort upon myself. So apart from a strange aberration at the age of 10, I’ve never been a runner.  A lap swimmer.  Or a bicycler. Cyclist?  See I don’t’ even know the terminology.

The reason for my bad knees is years of dancing when I was a kid.  Because I looooove to dance.  In a club.  At a wedding.  Or in my kitchen with Bruno Mars slipping me some Uptown Funk.

I did Physical Culture (now Physie) for fifteen odd years.  I took Highland Dancing classes for three.  I was a gymnast (avoiding vault with everything I had, for its nothing but running and jumping and therefore the ultimate evil).

"Go Team Go!"

One of my first jobs was as a professional cheerleader. There was some jumping involved but the dance portion, and the pure fun, made up for it.  My team won a lot which helped.  And we got to travel – all the way to the USA one year.  So I coped.

Funnily, I never tried ballet until a couple of years ago - ballet slippers, legwarmers, the lot!  The flexibility and strength required, even from that first lesson, was mind-boggling.  It was truly hard. But those years of dance training as a kid stick so picking up the routines was doable.  And immensely satisfying.  My muscles thanked me for putting them through the wringer, even as they wept.

It's all about the outfit.

My favourite part of dancing was always the part where you stretch at the beginning and the end.  (The least runny/jumpy parts 😊.)

Imagine my state of pure bliss the first time I tried yoga.  Yoga is now my thing.  My bliss.  My time out.  My mental break.  No running.  No jumping.  Just lots of gorgeous stretching and stretching and more stretching. And then you get to lie down at the end for a really long time!

Yoga is the kind of purposeful infliction of discomfort I understand.  Not huffing and puffing and getting lactic acid itches in your legs and stitches in your side.  The kind where you feel your spine unfolding and your muscles sighing.  Where afterwards you feel an inch taller, and like you’re floating just a little off the ground.  Where you can feel oodles of sanctimony for having moved your body while at the same time sending “your positive energy out to your love ones and the whole world”!

Run as far and fast as you like, kids, no track coach will ever give you that 😉.

How about you?  What’s your favourite way to get moving? Do you love exercise or believe its the work of the devil?

(For those who are concerned about the fate of the gorgeous prince left at the altar by the runaway bride in RESCUING THE RUNAWAY BRIDE, do not fret!  He gets his own happy ever after in AMBER AND THE ROGUE PRINCE.)

The Problem with Yoga

Don’t get me wrong - I love yoga.  It is my absolute bliss.  I want to be one of those ninety-year-olds who can downward dog like a teenager.

 

Because I’ve always been more of a stretchy bendy girl than a runny jumpy girl and add the quiet, the strength, the ability to give my mind a much-needed time out and it is necessary to my life.

I’ve also been doing it so long now, that it actually works. And thank goodness.

Outside of yoga my mind is a constant crazy scribble.  A jumbled mess of appointments, memories, things I should have remember but know I’ve forgotten, current books ideas, new book ideas, kids stuff and so on.

Until the moment I step into a yoga studio and for a good hour and a half all that simply goes away.  My mind goes quiet.  My breathe evens.  And I am truly in the now.

Thoughts do happen.  And that’s okay!  Normal even.  One simply learns to accept the thought then let it go.  I like to watch mine float across my mind and out of sight like clouds on a windy day.

Now, here’s the problem.  What happens when the thought that I am meant to watch blow away is a pertinent plot idea for a book?!?!? 

I had that very problem last night.  There I was, lying with my legs up a wall as I began to wind down.  My brain filled with blissful oxygen.  My muscles all warm and tingly.  Getting my yoga on.

Image created by Freepik

Then BAM!  Idea.  And not just any idea, but A Very Important Idea That Will Tie My Entire Book Together.

It was the most truly odd sensation. (In the moment I likened it to drowning, drama queen that I am.)  My mind all floaty and soft, my instincts fought for all they were worth.

Instead of choosing a gentling mantra (inner peace, patience, good health etc) I was secretly chanting the bones of my idea (“Prime Minister, University Grant, Old Lecturer”) in my head, hoping all the while my yoga instructor couldn’t tell that I was totally cheating.  It was very stressful!

The moment Namaste left my mouth I ran to my phone, frantically typing down those notes, breathing a sigh of relief when done.  Phew.  Crisis averted.   

I think I need another yoga class just to get over the last one!

 
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Have you ever tried yoga (if not, you really should!)  Or is running more your bag?  What about Pilates?  Soccer?  Underwater wrestling?  Rescuing wine from a bottle? What’s your favourite way to decompress?

 

 

Bend and Stretch (or should that be I'm Still Standing?) -- Michelle Douglas

In the still late-afternoon light I arrive at the yoga school, and taking a deep breath push through the doors. I stow my shoes and handbag on a shelf. I glance around and an overwhelming sense of relief hits me—there’s not a perky blonde eighteen-year-old wearing lycra in sight. Thank you, God!

I’m told to take a mat, a blanket, a bolster, a block and a belt. What??? There’s equipment? I find a vacant spot by the wall and stare at my equipment. The lady next to me, seeing me scratch my head, sets up my equipment precisely. She tells me in an offhand way that, “Iyengar yoga is OCD.” I swallow and nod and glance at the door with longing.

What am I doing here?

I lie on my mat in what I guess is some kind of opening out relaxation pose. My neighbour tells me, “Nothing in yoga should hurt.” I decide against telling her that the stretch in my left thigh is already starting to hurt. Quiet descends. A surreptitious peek around the room tells me everyone is now in this pose. I throw myself back into position. But…am I supposed to be relaxing? Or maybe I’m supposed to be breathing in some kind of energy to ready me for the class? Also, exactly when is the class going to start? It’s kinda cold in here, but I guess I’m not supposed to wrap myself in the blanket.

I stare at the ceiling pondering these imponderables when the instructor suddenly looms over me. He asks if I have any injuries he should be aware of. This gives him a big tick in my mental notebook even if he is looming. He then asks if I’m menstruating. Okay, so now he has a big black mark against his name and I’m thinking he’s a pervert.

What am I doing here?


The class starts and I’m ready to drop by the end of the warm up. He shows us poses. Holy crap! He wants me to do what? Look, I understand that yoga is a non-competitive sport, but this is a BEGINNERS class, people, and a woman has her pride. So I grit my teeth and push on. The poses are alien. The instructor moves about the room correcting alignments and giving instructions. He’s methodical and calm and I start to think he might not be a pervert after all. Especially when he moves across to me with a, “Michelle, that’s an advanced pose” and takes the block from my right hand and puts it in my left hand. Oh, that’s better. Then we start on a series of planks and yoga immediately becomes a form of torture.

I discover that there are lots of poses where one balances on the knees and elbows. The hardness of the floor through the mat pinches mercilessly. This isn’t something I’d considered. I also don’t think yoga is such a good idea when one has a full bladder. And another thing—I totally appreciate the concept of pacing oneself, but other than lie there like a landed fish (can’t do that—pride remember?) how exactly does one go about adjusting a pose so it’s not quite so challenging? If I had any oxygen to spare I’d consider asking.

Ninety minutes is a LONG time. We do lots of poses. We finish with a meditation. I’m supposed to relax after that? Ha! I start composing this blog in my mind instead.

Finally I’m allowed to leave. My knees and elbows are bright red. I’ll have bruises tomorrow. When I pay my money (I paid for this?), I need to lock my knees to prevent my thighs from shaking. I totter out on my jelly legs. I buy fish and chips on the way home as there’s no way on God’s green I’m cooking dinner tonight. I doubt I could stand that long.

It’s Monday night. I stop hurting come Friday.

Have I been back? Of course I have. I love it. :)