Closer

Each time I go to yoga, I feel I'm actually getting closer to where I need to be. Granted, usually I'm the youngest person in class - I go during the day (my unemployment allows me to do so) and am usually surrounded by women my mother's age and above. As horrible this is, I find myself checking out everyone's bodies...if I'm surrounded by flab, then why continue to practice something that makes me hurt and I'm not all that good at yet?

I'm sure I'll be berated by anyone who seriously practices yoga by claiming that I'm "not good yet". I realize yoga is a practice to better yourself, not something to master and move on. This is the same way to approach writing, I think - limber yourself up, but you can always stretch just a little bit further, tone your muscles a bit more. But I'm still hoping to be a buff bitch by the time I have to wiggle into my bikini in a couple of weeks.

When I say where I need to be, I suppose it's the feeling I get during and after practicing yoga. During my sessions, I try to focus only on the yogi leading the class and my own body. Keeping my body neat seems to be the goal of yoga. Tucking my hips underneath my rib cage, keeping my elbows to my side, my feet underneath my hips, my shoulders relaxed...it sounds confusing when I read it back. But after a couple of classes, it doesn't feel confusing to my body.

Besides yoga class, I've been going to classes that combine yoga, Pilates, and Tai Chi. I also have been hitting the cardio machines and free weights before or after the classes I attend as often as I can. At this point in my life, my graduate career behind me, and not many prospects ahead, I feel overwhelmed by lack of focus. For the past two years, I've been sprinting towards the end - always another due date, another book to read, another poem to revise. I don't have that now. It's hard not to be disappointed in myself, although I have many people in my life who remind me daily of what I've accomplished. I would like to be farther than I am right now, if that makes any sense to you, dear reader.

So this yoga and the gym are ways I'm achieving a goal now, because I have little to work towards right now that seems to be a reachable goal. Applying for jobs online is a time filler and little else, and tapping into my small pool of "connections" hasn't gotten me very far yet. I have a full-length poetry collection I could start submitting to contests, but I can't afford to start blow money on the reading fees for these contests until I have a more solid income. I know mine isn't an original tale, but this emptiness is new for me.