A couple months ago, I had one of those days at work when I just had to leave early. I was frustrated, wondering why the hell I ever signed up for this arts thing, and exhausted. I caught an early afternoon yoga class and took a shower by the time my husband came home from work. We made dinner, I sat on the couch in comfortable clothes and looked through Netflix for something to watch.

One of my favorite composers is Philip Glass and I found a documentary about him streaming on Netflix. The film is called Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts. I can watch it over and over again.

In one part of the film, he is describing how he writes music. I found a transcript of an interview where he talks about it:

“..as if I looked out in a field…but I saw there was something there, but I couldn’t quite make it out, but if I sit long enough I begin to see the shape of a building perhaps and after a while I might see a few trees and this and that, but basically I am straining to see in the same way that I am fighting to listen, trying to hear and trying to hear things. I barely can hear it.”

It was so humbling to hear one of the greatest living composers (who I once drove to dinner but was too shy to tell him how much I love his music) …sorry…one of the greatest living composers talking about how hard it is for him to hear the music he is writing.

I realized, upon hearing this, that it is similar to how I finally came to a regular yoga practice.

So I’ve written about my false starts with yoga, What finally got me on the mat? How did I get to a point where I don’t run when someone says something in sanskrit or make excuses to leave when I hear the world kundalini?

I felt a call to find a spiritual and creative outlet. I needed to commit to something to understand the commitments in my life. I was driving through town, passed a yoga studio and saw “40 Day Transformation” advertised in the window. I went to their website, signed up, and found what I was looking for. I discovered there are people in the yoga community who are very down-to-earth and don’t take themselves too seriously.

I don’t sit in circles and do freaking monkey breaths. I have fun – I fall, I get tangled up, I stand on my head and my arms, I lose my breath and find it again. I feel alive again.

As I became disciplined about the practice, I went from being completely disoriented in my life to acknowledging I was in a foggy field. Then I found a path. As I follow this path, the buildings and trees come in to focus and fade in the background. This path is taking me through beautiful and challenging territory. The air is sweet and the birds often sing.

Namaste.