I fell out of headstand in yoga class the other day, and rolled over onto the mats of the persons practicing in front of me. I had been nursing a cold and breathing inconsistently through a runny nose. My concentration was challenged, and I uttered "Jesus Christ!" unconsciously as I toppled, and then apologized to the folks I nearly fell on. Embarrassed, I crawled back on my mat and into child's pose where I silently lectured my ego for letting me get carried away in over ambitious variations of the pose. Neck pain and humiliation set in as I answered the instructor when she came over to ask if I was alright. "Ah-huh," I replied. But I was hurting. Instead of leaving I decided to finish the class since it was winding down, preparing for relaxation pose.
Lying on our backs, the instructor began a Dharma talk about mettā, loving-kindness. But my mind was arrested, battling for relaxation and stuck questioning how I let myself get injured in yoga. I was able to let go of the pain a bit and my thoughts caught up to some of what the instructor was saying. She was suggesting sending mettā to the people in Haiti as a whole; to those that are struggling and suffering, as well as to those that have gone on to another plane. I visualized the earthquake victims' bodies streaming over us, passing through the room, on their way to their next lives.
It occurred to me that this was what death was like; the act of losing a faculty to a natural occurrence. When it was time to come up to sit, my neck was stiff. Temporarily discomforted, I thought of how many people in Haiti lied their after their lives were ravaged by the quake, unable to move, praying. There was no getting up for a moment, only empathy.
