Skip to content

CARITA GARDINER

What to Read When You're Avoiding School Work

Menu
  • Home
  • About
  • Writing
  • “Why”…Wednesdays
  • GrammarLove
  • Contact/Subscribe
Menu

154. Why Props

Posted on December 15, 2021December 16, 2021 by caritagardiner
yoga with props

I took the photo above from Yoga London's article, "What Are Yoga Props and How to Improvise Them For Home Practice."

I didn't take to yoga right away. Close to twenty years ago, the director of student health for my school (Hi, NB!) organized a special yoga class run by a teacher from the local yoga studio. Always game for new exercise options, I signed up, showed up, and hated every minute of it. The class focused on restorative yoga, so I didn't breathe hard and didn't sweat. At the end of the class, lying in savasana (or corpse pose), I thought about how much this class was wasting my time, time when I could be doing any of my long list of working-mother-of-young-children tasks. I completed the six sessions of the class, but never got the point.

Flash forward several years, I tried another yoga class with a teacher (Hi, AH!) who had a different philosophy about yoga. The class moved to upbeat music and stretched and strengthened my every muscle. I came out sore, sweaty, and satisfied. Sadly for me and happily for her, that teacher moved across the country. For a while I looked for other in-person studios and found some I liked, but also found their classes too expensive and/or at inconvenient times and places.

Then I discovered online yoga. I love the internet options, convenient to my ridiculously early wake-up times and my aversion to driving to exercise. When I was doing Aditi Shah's Peloton online class this morning, I noticed that the instructor used the props to support herself in the floor poses.

In all of the classes I've taken, the teachers offer modifications with props, encouraging students to do what feels right, to push with an awareness of what's happening inside their own bodies rather than based on what anyone else in the room is doing. But up until this morning's class, it always felt like they were saying, "Sure, use the props if you need to because you're not strong/flexible/good enough, but if you want to push yourself, you won't need them." Silly me.

The props allow us to stretch farther, to push deeper, to relax the parts of our bodies we're not using in order to strengthen the parts we are. And of course I started thinking about how important it is for all of us to rely on and take advantage of the support systems we have in yoga and in life. None of us would have survived the last two years without the people and infrastructure that buoy us when we sink and hold us steady when we wobble.

After writing last week's post about working together, I was thinking about the idea of working alone. I realized that even when I'm sitting by myself, no other human in sight, I'm not alone because I'm being held up by lots of supports, including the chair under my bum and the people I have in my corner.

Including you. If you're reading this, you're part of my support system. I give you props for showing up and making me feel safe stretching my writing muscles. I hope I'm a support to you. I'd love to hear about what supports and buoys you in the comments.

6 thoughts on “154. Why Props”

  1. Viveca says:
    December 15, 2021 at 10:10 pm

    Such a sweet post! Thanks for being one of my most helpful supporters all these years. (And I went through the same perceptual change about the yoga props.)

    Reply
    1. caritagardiner says:
      December 16, 2021 at 1:14 pm

      Thanks and back at you!

      Reply
  2. Yuna says:
    December 15, 2021 at 10:15 pm

    Totally resonate with this line in particular: “The props allow us to stretch farther, to push deeper, to relax the parts of our bodies we’re not using in order to strengthen the parts we are.” For me, my yoga block is one of my favorite props to set up some rejuvenating back openers and opens my heart up. Happy Why Wed, BBB!

    Reply
    1. caritagardiner says:
      December 16, 2021 at 1:14 pm

      Yes, BBB! I like the reminder that we need props when we’re not working out just as much as when we are!

      Reply
  3. Karen says:
    December 15, 2021 at 10:50 pm

    Beautifully said. I am still on the yoga journey and admittedly need props in everyday life. Thanks for being there for me many times!

    Reply
    1. caritagardiner says:
      December 16, 2021 at 1:13 pm

      Thanks, Karen. You’ve been a support for so many for so long — gratitude, good wishes, and love headed your way!

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

WHAT I DO

I teach English to high schoolers at a boarding school in Connecticut. I read AP English Literature and Composition exams and serve as a teacher mentor for the University of Pennsylvania Teaching Fellows program. I’ve earned a Bachelor of Arts (Amherst College), an Education Master in Learning and Teaching (Harvard University Graduate School of Education), a Master of Arts in English (Bread Loaf School of English), and most recently a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing with a certificate in the online teaching of writing (Southern New Hampshire University).

As a writer, I hope to capture the complexity and joy of life in the New England boarding school world. On this site, I share what I know about trying to write fiction while teaching English, coaching, and doing the other tasks associated with helping to raise over six hundred other people’s children.

WHAT I CAN DO FOR YOU

Teach                    Tutor

Revise                   Edit

Entertain             Enlighten

Follow Me

  • Instagram
  • Facebook

Contact Me

  • cgardine@hotchkiss.org

Read my recent “Why” Wednesday Blog Posts

  • 213. Why Read Banned Books
  • 212. Why Acknowledge the Ocean
  • 211. Why Surf
  • 210. Why MJ
  • 209. Why Learn to Bake
© 2023 CARITA GARDINER | Powered by Minimalist Blog WordPress Theme