Left, Right?

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“Bring your right hand to your left ankle,” says Pam. “Left ankle. Left. Left.”

Not until she gently taps the ankle in question does my brain register the command and respond correctly. I mumble, “Sorry.”

But this is yoga: there’s no need to apologize. Not to myself, least of all to my wise, accepting teacher. Why have I involuntarily offered humility?

Because I feel stupid. Some days on the mat, everything is a little out of whack. Fold in the ridiculousness of muddling basic right and left, and I’m left feeling the fool.

I try to let it go, remembering Pam’s frequent advice: “Pay attention to what comes up. Then pay it no mind.”

I twist deeper into Revolved Triangle, a foolish, useless pose. It appears to have been developed in order to take yogis’ egos down a notch. If so, it’s working.

My butt is sticking up, my left hand wobbles towards some kind of skyward reach that’s supposed to be graceful. My torso twists miserably around, and my right hand, finally, grips my left ankle. Only an episode of flatulence could make this pose more humiliating.

I remind myself to pay attention to what comes up. Finally, I recognize what’s really bothering me is not my butt in the air, but mixing up right and left. Somewhere hovers memories of terrible scenes in gym class and embarrassing moments on the road with somebody shouting, “No, the other left!”

Pam cues us to switch and talks us through Revolved Triangle’s alignment for the other side. Again, my hands won’t heed my ears. She has to tap my right ankle before I can find my way into the pose. I sigh, poisonously.

“This is a tricky pose,” says Pam, perhaps taking mercy on me. “There’s a lot going on. Some of you are having trouble with getting your bodies to respond. It’s actually a good sign.”

Losing track of right and left in yoga is positive, she continues, because it means we’re becoming immersed in our bodies and overriding our analytical brain.

Hmmm . . . Maybe this left/right business is different from the kind of brain fart that makes me feel so stupid.

Maybe it’s a sign that I’m starting to do the real work of yoga—creating wholeness. As an intellectual, I’m too often stuck in my logical mind. It can be dangerous: I’m prone to ignoring intuition and nonverbal communication. One of the many reasons I come to yoga is to develop my capacity to feel, rather than judge.

And here I am, feeling Revolved Triangle’s wisdom. The added layer of feeling moronic is only a bonus prize—defeating ego is also important work on the mat. But the real win is recognizing how mind and body, right and left, can be so in tune they can’t be automatically differentiated.

That’s real yogic mode: yoked, whole, one.

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Michelle Superle writes books plus other stuff and earns a living teaching people how to do it too. She gets her wellness on by running around with the lovely human male, charming dog, and beautiful horses she lives with. Join Michelle through her journey back to yoga.