Yesterday I taught an afterschool girls club at Emerald Elementary in Broomfield, Colorado. It was the second time I had visited this group of girls, and it was great because the social worker who invited me, Jo-lynn Yoshihara Daly, was a friend from high school. The girls are all Hispanic fourth and fifth grade. I brought out my swan puppet, Hamsa, to set the ritual of our story and yoga time. I talked about the story I would tell, the Lady and the Lion, or also known in Grimm’s as The Singing, Springing Lark.
I love this story for a few reasons. It has a strong girl protagonist. She has immense obstacles, like her father promising her off to a lion to save his own life, confronting an enchanted princess who steals her husband, lots of problems that keep coming at her. I told the girls that life is like that. Difficult stuff keeps coming at you, no matter what your age. But we can deal with that in positive ways. One of the things that my friend was teaching them was PACE. Positive Attitude Changes Everything. And I couldn’t agree more. I told the girls that when the good stuf happens in life, that’s so great. But the bad stuff is bound to happen too, because that is LIFE. And we can choose to take it miserably or we can go into life and confront its challenges powerfully. The choice is yours, so you might as well take everything with a good attitude, because, well, feeling miserable and upset is PAINFUL!.
I had everyone lie down in a comfortable position for a Story Siesta, as I call them, and told the 15-minute fairy tale. Afterwards I sat them in lotus position and taught them that their breath is their best friend. To breath in and out and feel the feeling of being held by the breath. It can get you through anything. I taught them some meditation, to watch the mind and its thinking, and that we can catch those negative thoughts, which sometimes can be difficult I admit, and replace them. We can even change the negative energy that may be grooved in our body from negative patterning from our parents, with practice and yoga nidra. I share with them about having a negative and violent mother, who programed me for negative thinking as an adult, and how it takes effort, tapas, to watch those thoughts, be aware of my thinking and patterns of behavior, and that I can choose ultimately to think positive.
I taught them standing warrior poses, grounding in the body, that our body is our best friend too! The poses make you strong, AND by holding them a long time, it gives you strength and courage. We did chair pose, and I had them hold it. “Oh, no! A challenge has come along, how long will this last? I don’t know, but with breath and yoga, I know I have the strength to endure!” I have the girls shout out affirmations, like “I believe in myself, I love myself!” And that even though we may feel down, like the heroine in the story sometimes, she never gives up and neither do we. Because time passes, things change. If home life is difficult, there will be a day when you grow up and can leave. We did challenging poses, like half moon, but we confronted the challenge, just like the heroine, and yoga gives us the practice run for the real thing in life. We did some heart-opening poses as well, to give us courage, and as always, ended in relaxation.
In the end, I asked them to see how were their lives like the heroine’s? What challenges and problems arise? What mistakes do we make that come up, but we can forgive ourselves for and move on in our lives? How have we persisted? Or how can we persist? What risks can we take?
It is always a joy to work with youth. May you share the healing art of yoga and story with the youth in your life.
Namaste,
SYDNEY SOLIS
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