India Bound

Only a day left until I embark on an adventure – I think this is the one I have heard about all my life, the adventure of a lifetime. Not only am I India bound, but traveling to a Holy city by the river Ganges at the foothills of the Himalayas, which is vegetarian by law, and where I will study intensively amongst ashrams, sadhus, monkeys and cows.

Rishikesh is famous for being the place where the Beatles went to try transcendental meditation, but much more than that, it is said that if you meditate there you can achieve moksha, or liberation from the cycle of life and death – moksha means freedom.

Freedom has always been an integral part of my being, but at the same time I wholly believe that if something is to be done, it has to be done well. In fact I only just realised recently that I suffer from perfectionism and that it has held me back from doing a lot of things. So has fear – fear of failure, fear of consequences, fear of the unknown. But now, without a care in the world, I’m off to India to become a yoga teacher.

I have always been someone who likes to think for herself, and hates being told what to do – a bit of a hippie, rebellious type who believed in karma before I even really grasped the full meaning of the word. Growing up, I tried my hand at the usual jobs starting out at a very young age working, even when I wasn’t technically supposed to, and jumping ship more times than I care to remember. Sales, admin, editing, journalism, copywriting, public relations, in the end I became a writer, whatever that is.

Staying in the same job for more than a year always seemed like a crazy idea to me, and who had the patience for that? But starting out my life in London I am grateful that I had the space and opportunity to be completely myself, with all the mistakes and errors of judgement that entailed. I traveled here and there, and then I moved to Cairo.

After more than a decade of living in Egypt with its ups and massive downs, after the revolution and the realisations and the repercussions, I the strong, the arrogant, the proud, came down with a depression so dark, that it seemed like the end of all life was better than having to face how I had come to view the world.

In my eyes everything had become futile, breathing had become futile. I thought I had been depressed before, but boy was I wrong. There is nothing anyone can do for you when you are in that state, because frankly you just don’t give a damn. Only you can bring yourself out, as I discovered, and there must be a trigger.

My trigger was an injury in my right arm, the pain was such that I had to brush my teeth with my left hand, which was not fun and it lasted for months and months. The thought that this was it, I wouldn’t be able to write anymore, or type – I mean, what else was I good for? I didn’t have any other skills, if I couldn’t use one of my arms then there was really no point to my living. I turned to God and I asked for knowledge.

I don’t remember the exact moment when I became completely hooked on yoga. I was still in the haze of depression, but hooked I was. Maybe it was the sense of accomplishment after a certain pose, the warmth of the flowing energy, the feeling of well-being towards myself and those around me, the urge to forgive, or the overwhelming need to share this well-being with everyone and anyone, I don’t know. But the process of teaching myself to do yoga healed me, my mind and my arm. I remember thinking that if it did this for me, than it could do this for everyone. I felt compelled to share it and I immediately began to plan this – my yoga teacher training. It’s been a long and worthy road and I have learned so much along the way about myself, about life and yet it’s only just the beginning.

So in a day or so, and for the first time in my life I will reach a goal that means something to me, that has some aspect of good to it. The fact that I have no idea what it will be like or whether I will able to do it doesn’t matter. What yoga has taught me best is this: Be here, now, start where you are, and breathe – the rest will come and it will feel good.

WE SAID THIS: All the best of luck to you on your journey, Nancy!